Liberation Unleashed


Book Description

Liberation Unleashed introduces you to the process of unraveling the false sense of a separate self at the center of your existence. With insightful metaphors, personal stories, and guided dialogues, this book points directly to our lack of separation and helps you move toward a new, more open reality of selfless bliss. Using the seven clear and focused steps presented, you’ll find liberation in realizing there is no individuated “I” and marvel at the true nature of things. Author Ilona Ciunaite’s search for the truth began when she first “experienced silence of the thinking mind, a sweet sense of being, contentment, peace,” and “feeling at home.” Driven by a desire to reach that state of oneness once more, her path led her through spiritual writings to the process of deconstruction and non-dual self-inquiry and finally to a peaceful emptiness of not knowing, but of simply being. It’s from that place that Ciunaite cocreated the popular Liberation Unleashed forum—a global Internet-based community helping people see through the illusion of a separate self—and it’s just that sense of unknowing peace she wishes to impart with this book. Liberation Unleashed is a lively, fresh, and moving account of the author’s own searching, liberation, and transformation, woven together with the stories of fellow seekers and a clear exposition of the simple, focused tools you can use to go through the “gateless gate.” With its conversational tone, provocative questions, and the presentation of the seven steps—“Clearing the path—meeting the fear,” “Strip away ALL expectations,” “Get in touch with the real,” “‘I’ is a thought,” “There is no separate self,” “How does it feel to see this?” and “Falling”—this book serves as an introductory how-to guide, demonstrating how to use the process of self-inquiry to get free from the falseness of the separate self and realize a blissful oneness. So many of us go through life feeling isolated, searching for ourselves, or seeking a more authentic reality through religion, spirituality, or other, more unconventional means of expanding consciousness. Now, with this book and its guiding principles, you’ll learn how to look deeply into the nature of self and existence; combat the anxieties, fears, mental blocks, and reservations that can arise in self-inquiry; and see the simple beauty of the everyday moment.




Look!- An Illustrated Guide to Seeing What Is


Book Description

"LooK!-An illustrated guide to seeing what IS" takes us on a journey of discovery, points to the so-called 'gateless gate' and shows us how we might investigate the difference between what is real and what is imaginary. This self-exploration can lead us to question our most deeply-rooted beliefs and assumptions until we see for ourselves that life is an indivisible whole, and that separateness, including the "I," is nothing but an assumption created by thought. Liberation Unleashed is a global internet-based community of volunteer guides who strive to transmit the message that separation is only a thought, that there is no entity behind the word "I," and all one needs to do is to look.




Gateless Gatecrashers


Book Description

This book recounts the journeys of 21 ordinary people who dared to investigate whether the self they had always taken for real actually exists. Transcripts of 21 guided conversations record the process step by step, line by line, as each seeker sees through the illusion, and is liberated from belief in a separate self. No such resource for spiritual seekers has ever been published, nor such a large collection of awakening accounts ever been assembled. Completely accessible, totally practical and wholly transparent for all who are interested, Gateless Gatecrashers makes a unique contribution to spiritual literature, and perhaps will lead you – when you are ready - to gatecrash! Liberation Unleashed is a movement of volunteer guides who are dedicated to helping you end the spiritual search. We strive to transmit the message that separation is only a thought, that there is no entity behind the word "I", and all one needs to do is to look.




Emptiness and Joyful Freedom


Book Description

The pinnacle of Buddhism's understanding of reality is the emptiness of all things. Exploring reality towards the realization of emptiness is shockingly radical. It uncovers an exhilarating freedom with nowhere to stand, while engendering a loving joy that engages the world. This path-breaking book employs the emptiness teachings in a fresh, innovative way. Goode and Sander don't rely solely on historical models and meditations. Instead, they have created over eighty original meditations on the emptiness of the self, issues in everyday life, and spiritual paths. These meditations are guided both by Buddhist insights and cutting-edge Western tools of inquiry, such as positive psychology, neuroscience, linguistic philosophy, deconstruction, and scepticism. The result is a set of liberating and usable tools for Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike.




Paris After the Liberation 1944-1949


Book Description

"A rich and intriguing story whcih the authors disentangle with great skill."--Sunday Telegraph From Antony Beevor, the internationally bestselling author of D-Day and The Battle of Arnhem In this brilliant synthesis of social, political, and cultural history, Antony Beevor and Artemis Cooper present a vivid and compelling portrayal of the City of Lights after its liberation. Paris became the diplomatic battleground in the opening stages of the Cold War. Against this volatile political backdrop, every aspect of life is portrayed: scores were settled in a rough and uneven justice, black marketers grew rich on the misery of the population, and a growing number of intellectual luminaries and artists including Hemingway, Beckett, Camus, Sartre, de Beauvoir, Cocteau, and Picassocontributed new ideas and a renewed vitality to this extraordinary moment in time.




Eleven Days in August


Book Description

'I had thought that for me there could never again be any elation in war. But I had reckoned without the liberation of Paris - I had reckoned without remembering that I might be a part of that richly historic day. We were in Paris on the first day - one of the great days of all time.' (Ernie Pyle, US war correspondent) The liberation of Paris was a momentous point in twentieth-century history, yet it is now largely forgotten outside France. Eleven Days in August is a pulsating hour-by-hour reconstruction of these tumultuous events that shaped the final phase of the war and the future of France, told with the pace of a thriller. While examining the conflicting national and international interests that played out in the bloody street fighting, it tells of how, in eleven dramatic days, people lived, fought and died in the most beautiful city in the world. Based largely on unpublished archive material, including secret conversations, coded messages, diaries and eyewitness accounts, Eleven Days in August shows how these August days were experienced in very different ways by ordinary Parisians, Resistance fighters, French collaborators, rank-and-file German soldiers, Allied and French spies, the Allied and German High Commands. Above all, it shows that while the liberation of Paris may be attributed to the audacity of the Resistance, the weakness of the Germans and the strength of the Allies, the key to it all was the Parisians who by turn built street barricades and sunbathed on the banks of the Seine, who fought the Germans and simply tried to survive until the Germans finally surrendered, in a billiard room at the Prefecture of Police. One of the most iconic moments in the history of the twentieth century had come to a close, and the face of Paris would never be the same again.




War and Genocide in South Sudan


Book Description

Using more than a decade's worth of fieldwork in South Sudan, Clémence Pinaud here explores the relationship between predatory wealth accumulation, state formation, and a form of racism—extreme ethnic group entitlement—that has the potential to result in genocide. War and Genocide in South Sudan traces the rise of a predatory state during civil war in southern Sudan and its transformation into a violent Dinka ethnocracy after the region's formal independence. That new state, Pinaud argues, waged genocide against non-Dinka civilians in 2013-2017. During a civil war that wrecked the region between 1983 and 2005, the predominantly Dinka Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) practiced ethnically exclusive and predatory wealth accumulation. Its actions fostered extreme group entitlement and profoundly shaped the rebel state. Ethnic group entitlement eventually grew into an ideology of ethnic supremacy. After that war ended, the semi-autonomous state turned into a violent and predatory ethnocracy—a process accelerated by independence in 2011. The rise of exclusionary nationalism, a new security landscape, and inter-ethnic political competition contributed to the start of a new round of civil war in 2013, in which the recently founded state unleashed violence against nearly all non-Dinka ethnic groups. Pinaud investigates three campaigns waged by the South Sudan government in 2013–2017 and concludes they were genocidal—they sought to destroy non-Dinka target groups. She demonstrates how the perpetrators' sense of group entitlement culminated in land-grabs that amounted to a genocidal conquest echoing the imperialist origins of modern genocides. Thanks to generous funding from TOME, the ebook editions of this book are available as Open Access volumes from Cornell Open (cornellpress.cornell.edu/cornell-open) and other repositories.




Black and Brown Leadership and the Promotion of Change in an Era of Social Unrest


Book Description

The world was dealt a blow that included a pandemic and economic crisis as well as racial unrest, initiating an energized charge for social justice advocacy. The United States is currently facing an unprecedented challenge in ensuring that all citizens live in a fair, inclusive, and opportunity-rich society. These issues have heightened questions about racial justice that have been placated but can no longer be ignored. Marginalized communities cannot thrive if they continue to be oppressed, neglected, disinvested, and isolated from economic opportunity. The culture of allyship needs to be enacted thoughtfully and not performatively to create sustainable change through a critical mass of engaged advocates and activists. Many organizations enable the status quo by not confronting issues around race, gender, and equity. Leaders of color want a seat at the table as highly valued contributors for the transformation of a just and equitable America. By listening to the voices of Black and Brown leaders, the promotion of change in an era of social unrest will finally occur. Black and Brown Leadership and the Promotion of Change in an Era of Social Unrest amplifies the voices of leaders who identify as Black, LatinX, Indigenous, or people of color as they navigate leadership during a time of tumultuous change and social unrest. More specifically, it portrays dilemmas that marginalized communities encounter while advocating for justice and social change within whitestream organizational systems. The chapters delve into the definitions, perceptions, and lived experiences of Americanism, identity, otherness, and racism as it relates to leadership and discusses the issues, dilemmas, struggles, and successes that persons of color experience in leadership roles in business and education. This book is valuable for practitioners and researchers working in the field of social justice leadership in various disciplines, social justice activists and advocates, teachers, policymakers, politicians, managers, executives, practitioners, researchers, academicians, and students interested in how leaders of color can succeed, navigate hostile spaces, and ultimately create a change in mindsets and practices that will lead to justice.




The Tragedy of Liberation


Book Description

The second installment in 'The People's Trilogy', the groundbreaking series from Samuel Johnson Prize-winning author Frank Dikötter 'For anyone who wants to understand the current Beijing regime, this is essential background reading' Anne Applebaum 'Essential reading for all who want to understand the darkness that lies at the heart of one of the world's most important revolutions' Guardian 'Dikötter performs here a tremendous service by making legible the hugely controversial origins of the present Chinese political order' Timothy Snyder In 1949 Mao Zedong hoisted the red flag over Beijing's Forbidden City. Instead of liberating the country, the communists destroyed the old order and replaced it with a repressive system that would dominate every aspect of Chinese life. In an epic of revolution and violence which draws on newly opened party archives, interviews and memoirs, Frank Dikötter interweaves the stories of millions of ordinary people with the brutal politics of Mao's court. A gripping account of how people from all walks of life were caught up in a tragedy that sent at least five million civilians to their deaths.




The Surprising Power of Liberating Structures


Book Description

Smart leaders know that they would greatly increase productivity and innovation if only they could get everyone fully engaged. So do professors, facilitators and all changemakers. The challenge is how. Liberating Structures are novel, practical and no-nonsense methods to help you accomplish this goal with groups of any size. Prepare to be surprised by how simple and easy they are for anyone to use. This book shows you how with detailed descriptions for putting them into practice plus tips on how to get started and traps to avoid. It takes the design and facilitation methods experts use and puts them within reach of anyone in any organization or initiative, from the frontline to the C-suite. Part One: The Hidden Structure of Engagement will ground you with the conceptual framework and vocabulary of Liberating Structures. It contrasts Liberating Structures with conventional methods and shows the benefits of using them to transform the way people collaborate, learn, and discover solutions together. Part Two: Getting Started and Beyond offers guidelines for experimenting in a wide range of applications from small group interactions to system-wide initiatives: meetings, projects, problem solving, change initiatives, product launches, strategy development, etc. Part Three: Stories from the Field illustrates the endless possibilities Liberating Structures offer with stories from users around the world, in all types of organizations -- from healthcare to academic to military to global business enterprises, from judicial and legislative environments to R&D. Part Four: The Field Guide for Including, Engaging, and Unleashing Everyone describes how to use each of the 33 Liberating Structures with step-by-step explanations of what to do and what to expect. Discover today what Liberating Structures can do for you, without expensive investments, complicated training, or difficult restructuring. Liberate everyone's contributions -- all it takes is the determination to experiment.