Publisher's Synopsis
William Homestead takes readers inside the classroom, where lost students mingle with students who think they are ""found."" Most are following the dictates of market-model education--interwoven with the cult of consumerism, techno-addictions, and the understandable need to get a job--rather than exploring their inner lives and responding to our collective lostness in an age of climate crisis. For Homestead, the ""lucrative standard"" must be balanced with turning within and listening to deeper wells, expressed in differing traditions as the Greek daemon, the ""still, small voice"" of Christian mysticism, Jung's process of individuation, and especially Emersonian self-reliance. Striving to figure out how to guide lost students (and help those who believe they are ""found""), Homestead ruminates on the unfolding of his inner life, including his own struggles with formal schooling and the game of grading. He also turns to the writings of imperfect yet inspiring Henry David Thoreau, who turned within and discovered the blessings of being lost. Not Till We Are Lost posits that climate crisis is ultimately a spiritual crisis calling us to reset the compass. Humanity is called by inner intelligence in sympathy with ecosystem intelligence and, still further, the soul of the world. As Thoreau modeled, such deep listening, and then acting on what we learn, is the deeper measure of being educated. Lest we lead lives of quiet desperation, we desperately need an educational system that mirrors this reality, embracing the infinite extent of our relations.
