Scanner Retreat in Puglia, Italy

Did a radio show today with good producer Matt -- he in Corfu, I in New York City -- all about the wonderful place where the spring and fall retreats take place. Tomorrow I'll add some links to photos of the beautiful masseria on Flickr.com, but right now you can see the shots we took last time at www.geniuspress.com

And here's the long and ugly link, well, not exactly a link, I hear. You should be able to play the thing from here (and I promise to learn how to do tiny urls next -- spent the weekend bouncing around Twitter, one thing at a time...)



Oh my. That looks like a sentence from The Magic Mountain.

(OH MY, NO IT DOESN'T! Will you look at that? :-) Life is good.)

The show went on longer than expected and we didn't have time for callers because I'm obsessive about this issue, and I couldn't stop talking about this remarkable population, this group of people that have so many interests, are so curious, love learning new things, and are torn between the dread that they'll be stuck in some suffocating, dull job and the dread that they'll never amount to anythng because they can't focus.

But Scanners have to know there's not a damn thing wrong with them, first and foremost, if they know nothing else. What a costly and cruel mistake it's been for these smart, multi-talented people to get caught up in the age of specialization that respects only single-minded achievers and doesn't know who they are.

Their families and teachers and communities are bewildered and disappointed in them. But then, these same people would have called Ben Frankiln a dilettante, and told Aristotle he had attention deficit disorder. They'd have been dismayed at the wasted life of Leonardo da Vinci (if they didn't know his name!) because he was so talented and just didn't stick to anythng. and told they're dilettantes, lazy, neurotic -- that they fear success, they're trying to sabotage themselves, or they're just foolish, no ability to concentrate, no character or self-discipline.

It's funny to call them renaissance people, as if it were odd that someone has more than one interest, and most of them shy away from the grandiosity of the term. But I guess that's what they are.

Tomorrow I'll talk about the other thngs Scanners need -- and why I wish I could run more retreats because they make such a huge difference in the lives of these talented people.

Bad enough they're told these things, they believe them! They repeat them when they describe themselves.

And their reactions when they find out it's all been a huge mistake is a level of relief that often brings tears. I'm going to start quoteing some of the letters I've been getting for years now.

Nothing's more important than a Scanner knowing there's nothing wrong with her or him.

But there are a few more essentials Scanners must have. I'll tell you all about them tomorrow. (Of course, if you can make that monster link above work, you can rest your eyes and listen to it.)

Watch this space.