The 39th Beethoven Letter
Dear Friends,
Thank you for your kind and generous support over the years. This keeps me going in all ways. Your good care via these pragmatic gifts are the bread and butter of my life and a delight to receive. Thank you for years of including me in your generosity.
Writing this winter was a good hard work of getting down the stories of my life. It was more than difficult to write about early hurt, echoes reverberate through my whole body. I trust these stories in my third book will be a help to others seeking more than survival, thriving with less pain. The remaining task will be writing the stories of my four decades of work as a Quaker healer studying trauma in many settings. My editors request your help by sending a short blurb as to how my work may have helped you to go in the front of the book.
Seeing all my doctors this month. So far, so good. I’ve more energy a year after the heart attack and activities increase. It’s unclear if I can return to the full health I had, but there’s lots of living just as I am, thank goodness. I’ve been cruising in the breakdown lane, but now I’ve picked up a little speed.
I apologize to those contacting me for help and teaching. I’m in a time of rebuilding. I’m not ill, but I am still recovering energy and strength. There are encouraging signs of returning physical health bringing bits of my gifts back. There are three signs in particular-
- My hands have begun to heat up again, though the amount of energy coming through is less than half of what it was.
- I’ve begun to receive messages again about the nature of others’ pain, though I do not engage with each message or person.
- When I was overcome with illness, I had an ache in my chest whenever I had an empathetic response to someone in trouble. That ache is now gone. I don’t have the stamina to engage, but I often see the nature of our human knots.
I still publish stories on behalf of The Quaker Initiative to End Torture- QUIT! on our FaceBook page. I am the founding convener of QUIT! beginning in May of 2005. There is progress and there is much work to do, especially in Uganda.
Thank you for all your care and support. I will continue writing this memoir and seek better health. I am writing my best stories of moving from wounded to healing. Thank you for making my work possible over the years. Please help with your gifts, supporting what I can do.
In the Light,
John Calvi, May 2023
The 38th Beethoven Letter
Dear Friends,
I am turning 70 and celebrating 40 years in the work of helping people to heal from trauma. It’s humbling even to write this and even more humbling to know it’s all been possible due to your support. I am awash with gratitude. Thank you for this long ride together!
My education began in the rape crisis in 1982. I learned how the safety and trust I had established in pre-school classrooms was necessary for survivors. I studied the damages and recovery through body/mind work, all under a spiritual leading. In the fall of 1983, I began work in the AIDS pandemic. While outcomes were distinct, the paths were similar – how to release pain and confusion. I began work in prisons in 1985, with tortured refugees in 1988, and with ritual abuse survivors in 1991. My spiritual gift to release pain grew as my disciplines and surrender to this work increased. It’s been the adventure of my life, to learn and to teach.
Several years ago, a new type of fatigue began that was not restored by rest. Doctors found nothing to explain the fatigue/shortness of breath that was increasing each year. I had noticed that the bright Light and overwhelming rush of energy during work was no longer a flood of Light and mercy. It had decreased to a trickle, no matter my rest or other preparations. The gift that had been growing since my 20’s was now decreasing along with the capacity for an energetic life of service. Things became clear when I had a heart attack in March.
My doctors say I will recover. There was no damage to the heart muscle. But about 90% of my gift is gone. Teaching, hands-on healing, and traveling in many states has ended for now. It’s not clear that my spiritual gift to release pain following trauma will return as my heart heals. I was a Quaker healer, but now cruising smoothly in the breakdown lane. I have not engaged in any work since August 2021 (see YouTube). All attention is to my own health.
Adjusting to this new reality, I find myself lacking grace. I’m not angry so much as bewildered and frustrated that all the patterns and routines of the past 4 decades are now set aside. What is left is my writing. This is a relief and a release. Work on a third book, a memoir, continues, though much more slowly. I often hear that I’ve helped many, some of whom I’ve never met, by describing my experiences and what I’ve learned. Writing the stories of my own healing and becoming a healer for this third book will go on, plus I’ve other books in mind.
Your support now in my later years is especially important. Income from teaching and hands-on clients is gone. Your continued gifts make for a tidy, smaller life as I do what I can from my writing desk. Thank you for your every consideration. I trust and hope that as you view the state of the world and our country, there is a place for me in your generosity and care. Thank you for that and for valuing my life’s work.
In the Light,
John Calvi, May 2022
The 37th Beethoven Letter
Dear All,
I’m probably not dying. Not right away, not anytime soon. It may be years. But I’ve been disabled to the point where I can no longer teach or use my healing touch. My healing gift has become greatly diminished. There is no consensus among my doctors. It’s mainly fatigue and shortness of breath if I speak for too long or walk too fast. I am not in pain and I don’t feel I am in immediate danger. I am not suffering. There is no prescribed treatment yet, as we don’t know what is wrong. Will I get better? Will I get worse and leave? Will I stay as I am? This is not yet known. I am tidying up a few things in case. I am saddened, but not afraid.
I have been feeling these changes coming on gradually the last few years. I’ve felt a lessening of energy in ways that rest did not restore. It became critical last fall when breathing got very difficult. I’ve not worked since that time. More tests are coming. It’s a very big change.
I gave myself to a life work of healing trauma through a spiritual gift of releasing pain. This began in the summer of 1982. My last teaching engagement was in the fall of 2020. It’s been 38 years of a traveling work with much Light speaking to great need. I’ve worked in the crises of rape, AIDS, prisons, tortured refugees, ritual abuse, among others. All this by invitations to work and gifts of support. This was within the tradition of Quaker ministry and following a leading. I’m also the founding convener of The Quaker Initiative to End Torture – QUIT! since 2005 and still publish news of American torture on the QUIT website and FaceBook. Note my calendars – 1982 to 2020. I’ve been well used. There has been much Light and much work.
Both my books are available on Kindle- paper from Quaker Books and paper & Kindle from Amazon. Progress on my third book, a memoir of healing my own life wounds and becoming a healer, is my current work- along with clearing my archives to be given to a Quaker college library. All this goes slowly as you can imagine. I am 69 on May 14. Every day is not a good energy day. I expect my excessive qualities of stubbornness to prevail as I continue to write.
To be clear- I am not in pain or current danger. I am not suffering or homebound, but energy is quite limited. I am grieving that a grand work that took years to learn and perform gracefully has for the most part ended, at least I think so. I’ll write and will put archive audio/video recordings on my website. Marshall & I have much to adjust to. He’s been my anchor.
I have lived and worked primarily by invitations and gifts since 1982. I still need your gifts. My living has been simple- a small home, limited income- i.e. no dental work and snow tires purchased in the same month. Your help over the years has been the lifeline that kept me going. It still is. I hope you will take this message to heart. Please be careful – I have no capacity for the burden of others’ grief. It’s a time be glad for what has been a great ride. Imagine a person doing good works, people seeing it, and supporting it for nearly 4 decades. Amazing and humbling! Thank you, thank you, thank you. And please send a gift.
In the Light,
John Calvi, May 2021
The 36th Beethoven Letter
Dear Friends,
Looking back over 38 years of travel work, I’ve had few interruptions. Beginning with work in the rape crisis in 1982 and AIDS pandemic in 1983, I’ve been able to move and learn as necessity demanded and keep going. There has been a car emergency here and there, a few sick days, and no natural disasters. Not bad for almost four decades of traveling through and working in 47 states and 5 countries. I’m grateful for all of it.
Now comes this virus so contagious and fast moving that all my habits of packing the car for yet another tour come to a halt, dangerously total and non-negotiable. A breath may cause another’s death. What’s to be done? Requests to move online came in early March. “Could you give that keynote via video?” “Could you speak to our yearly meeting about pastoral care online?” Calls and notes come from front line workers seeking encouragement. Suggestions were needed in the new, indescribable conditions that threatened thousands. “What shall we do with our fear?” It and grief now come by truck loads. “What disciplines are possible?” “Can witness be made gracefully?” I’m now on YouTube to say how.
So the work shifts. Maybe I won’t be back on the road for a while. What I have to share about difficult work in hard places, where the witness is painful, the threats real, and the tasks impossible – well, that’s my neighborhood and I have lots to offer. My history has been preparation. The trauma of this new pandemic calls for good work by many. I’m glad to be of use on many levels. Is seems paid work is decreased and my dependence of gifts is larger now. Not being one who is easy with this kind of suspense, I hope you will help me keep going. I hope I will have it soon and over the coming year. Thank you for all these years of pragmatic support and practical care. Your kindness and help has meant more good work gets done. Much good needs doing. Thank you.
In the Light,
John Calvi, May 2020
The 35th Beethoven Letter
Dear Friends,
When I began my work in 1982, I had some idea that I was entering a new life. It started with massage therapy for women rape survivors. Then I was nearly overwhelmed by demand for massage for people with AIDS. Then came work with inmates, tortured refugees, and war vets. Each group became part of my education. I helped them in their pain and learned the nature of healing trauma. My gift for releasing pain became more graceful and my disciplines for avoiding burnout grew stronger. I began to teach massage and energy work for trauma, plus avoiding burnout. It’s been my life since. I help the wounded to heal and help many to learn the way of reverence & warm hands.
The work took another surprising form. I have worked mainly by invitation and lived primarily on gifts since before the 1st Beethoven Letter in 1984. A meek income grew slowly became better known and well used. Living on gifts is more difficult now.
Still later, I also became an author. My first book, The Dance Between Hope & Fear, (2013) has wonderful reviews by both professionals in the field and trauma survivors. I am immensely happy to celebrate with you the May release of my second book, How Far Have You Traveled? This book is about goodness and knowing your own goodness as important to life, work, and healing. I hope you will enjoy it. It’ll be available at Quakerbooks.com and Amazon. As founding convener of The Quaker Initiative to End Torture- QUIT! (www.quit-torture-now.org) I continue to teach about American torture.
My calendar shows a good bit of travel and a variety of need. Speaking to Great Plains Yearly Meeting in June is my 10th yearly meeting keynote. I make my regular stops at Pendle Hill, the Vermont People with AIDS Coalition, Powell House, and Friends General Conference Summer Gathering. I will continue so long as my healing gift to release pain remains clear and strong and invitations to use it keep coming.
Some of you will read this as news from an old friend. Some of you will read this as a fundraising letter and ponder whether to give. I hope it will be both and you will celebrate with me 37 years of a life’s work, a new book, and support by community.
So many of you have helped me along the way over these 4 decades. It’s good to see you on my travels and to receive your notes of care and support. In the current economic atmosphere, living on gifts is tough! My support does not come from the 1%. I hope you will consider this work worthy of your care and support. I hope you will send a gift. If you should care to give me a raise, that would be more than wonderful. Thank you.
In the Light,
John Calvi, May 2019
The 34th Beethoven Letter
Dear Friends,
Thank you for all your help and support. This letter comes as I celebrate thirty-six years in the work. As you can see by my calendar, helping people to heal from trauma and mentoring healers has continued with many wonderful teaching opportunities. This is where most of my time and energy goes each year- hands-on for the wounded and teaching healing. I am so grateful that this is my life, my life’s work.
While there are no prisons or refugee centers listed on my calendar, each year I get my hands on people from all such situations and more among the general population, and increasingly each year. Every teaching trip engages the life wounds of individuals who carry the worst of it in heavy hearts, rounded shoulders, painful joints, and mental anguish- all the while saying they are fine. Warm hands have a hospitality all their own that brings out secrets, that longing for wellness, and to let the burden go. There is plenty of need for my gifts. Increases in poverty alone is a national trauma that brings more suffering, more wounding of innocents, and more need for my gifts- not to mention constant war and our vets.
The Quaker Initiative to End Torture- QUIT! is thirteen years old. I have been teaching the history and current status of American torture as the founding convener of QUIT all this time. Each night I search for news of American torture for teaching- Guantanamo prison has new construction, etc. I offer presentations and publish news stories. Please see our new website – www.quit-torture- now.org.
Writing and publishing are a great joy for me. My first book, The Dance Between Hope & Fear, about healing from trauma, continues to bring me high praise from healthcare professionals, clergy, and survivors. My second book, How Far Have You Traveled, is being wrangled by editors with the hope of going to print this year. This second book focuses on having a sense of ones goodness, a powerful idea in healing and all of life. December 2017 I was in a solitary retreat in the California desert to work on book three- the stories of my own healing and spiritual adventures. While writing is not an easy or natural act for this learning disabled high school graduate, it has become a necessity and a great joy.
I’ve been invited to give the keynote plenary to Great Plains Yearly Meeting in Wichita, KS. This is my 10th yearly meeting where I’ll give a keynote. This recognition of my gifts helps me to do more.
For 35 years I have worked primarily by invitation and lived mainly on gifts. All this time you and many others have kept me on the road- teaching, doing hands-on healing energy work, and reporting new hope from difficult places. I need your help to continue. I need your practical and pragmatic support to do more. I’ve just turned sixty-six years old and I know there’s more to come. Please help.
In the Light,
John Calvi, May 2018
PS Here is a special thank you to so many of you who stepped up when my car died in December, amidst a 4 state work trip! What appeared to be financial disaster became a declaration of We Are With You! This was a great comfort in personal and practical ways. Thank you very much.
The 32nd Beethoven Letter – John Calvi
Dear Friends,
There is a burden to compassionate work and it is simply this – it will break your heart and we must let this happen. We must surrender and melt until all boundaries are gone and we come to know that we really and truly are all part of one another. The pain and confusion in each of us is the pain of the world and of each person. The grief of loss, the fear of illness that makes a smaller life, the anger of the betrayal of love- the witness of all this in our own lives and in each others’ is the attentive living that insists on our learning what is important. It also teaches how we can see so much and still keep going.
For me, there is also an element of loneliness in this work. There really aren’t words for that moment of grace when someone’s pain passes from of their body, to mine, and out — to our mutual relief. The traumas and the transformations are not only beyond words, but they are also private, confidential, and to be held in quiet gratitude with reverence. There is much to tell of bright Light and change that I can’t.
I am writing this letter as I prepare for another year of travel work. My life’s work began in 1982 when bodywork relieved the wounds of a torture survivor. In massage school I began with lots of work in the rape crisis and then AIDS. Later with work in prisons and with tortured refugees, I came to know that the external details of pain vary widely but on the inside it’s very much the same. And sometimes in a quiet moment, not always, I can help lift that pain out and away. Of course it’s not me – I can’t even get ice cubes out of the tray- but a gift that comes through me and is beyond simple description.
I first sent this letter out in 1984 and began my travel work in 1985. Since then I’ve worked mostly by invitation and lived mainly on gifts. This allowed me to help those without resources. At times, it’s felt risky – who does such a thing? And yet here I am at 64 writing the 32nd Beethoven Letter.
This is all possible because your support makes it so. I continue to travel and teach about healing from trauma using massage and energy work. Teaching to professionals and families about avoiding burnout while doing compassionate work in crisis situations is very welcomed. I continue as the founding convener of The Quaker Initiative to End Torture- QUIT! to end American torture, which still goes on.
“The Dance Between Hope & Fear”, my first book, is available from Quakerbooks.org and Amazon. My wonderful editor, Shelly Angel of Dallas, has had to withdraw, so I am working on the manuscript of my second book “How Far Have You Traveled?” It focuses on having a sense of goodness. This should be out later this year. This winter, while on a three month writing retreat I began a third book, the stories of my own healing and spiritual adventures. This will be all new writing.
Will you help me? I need your kindness to continue. I need your generous and practical support so that I can teach and touch where I’m called. I know this is not an easy time financially, but you know that I live carefully and have come far on little. Please help me to do more.
In the Light,
John Calvi
PS Marshall and I celebrate 30 years together this fall!
The 31st Beethoven Letter – John Calvi
Dear Friends,
Good work continues and I am well used still, after all these years. I have
just returned from work with tortured refugees in North
Carolina, a stop in Texas for
final edits on my 2nd book due out next month, and soon will teach near Boston. (new book – How
Far Have You Traveled?)
You might wonder, how does the work come- usually, word of mouth. I’ll be
invited to teach somewhere and it might seem a plain almost boring setting. But
within all groups will be some people with life wounds seeking relief, some
consciously and some not. And so it is that the neighbor, the grandmother, the
janitor seem to be quiet regular people. Then within the context of a healing
workshop, some old sadness, some trespass, some large anger releases from a
sore arm, a lost memory, a depression held so long and then life is different.
The quiet regular one becomes the bright and glad to be here one. You don’t
need a war zone to find trauma. You just need some quiet reverence and some
trust to believe even the impossible can shift.
Can it really be this letter has gone out thirty-one years and I have been
working by invitation and living mainly on gifts all this time? It seems to
have worked out well enough. The kindness of many people created this special
circumstance where I can be of use in lots of places to many different kinds of
hurt. Since 1982 I’ve worked in prisons, refugee treatment centers, schools,
colleges, massage schools, religious conferences, AIDS clinics, and dozens of
Quaker meetings in 4 countries. Financial support essentially comes to mean
choice. My choice has been to use your gifts to be of help, to say yes. It’s
made a life work and a life time of gratitude for true.
Now we celebrate the 10th year of The Quaker Initiative to End Torture- QUIT!
We still teach about American torture – still used in our prisons at home and
abroad. Our new website www.quit-torture-now.org has lots of information. I am
the founding convener of QUIT. After several decades of work with survivors, I
wanted to speak to the root causes. QUIT continues.
It might be that you’ve been thinking you’d come to one of my workshops,
speeches, retreats sometime. Well, I turn 63 May 14th. I’ve been doing this
work for 33 years. How much longer do you thing this can go on? Neither of us
is getting any younger! I’d say come see me while I still make relatively good
sense, such as it is. This gay Quaker healer is not to be missed.
I hope you will send a gift. I know times are tight and donations don’t come
easy. I trust you understand that each gift is used carefully in a simple life
given to service and care. Your support means I can go out and say yes. It
means more good work given where it’s needed. Will you help me now? Thank you,
for all these years, thank you.
In the Light,
John Calvi
May 2014
The 30th Beethoven Letter – John Calvi
Dear Friends,
Thirty years ago I sent a letter
to 100 Friends to say I was providing massage to people with AIDS and needed
financial support for the work. Half of those people said – Yes! I had already
been working with several women rape survivors and AIDS was a new work. I was
in Boulder, CO and had been out of massage school 3
months. So, what would it look like to work with those who maybe cou
don’t pay and live mainly on gifts?
Then some invitations came
to teach across country. So, it would be a traveling work living mainly on
gifts. Over time invitations would bring me to teach healing sexual abuse,
massage for people with AIDS, teaching crisis workers to avoid burnout and make
compassion pragmatic, teaching massage to convicted rapists/murderers, working
with tortured refugees, and advocating bodywork for trauma survivors, among
other things. A spiritual gift to release pain following trauma has many uses.
I am older, shorter, and
rounder now. Thirty years is a long time, especially at this level of
intensity. But some things still hold true. I still live mainly on gifts. I
still have a traveling work mostly by invitation. And my focus has been healing
trauma in all possible forms all this time. It’s been a life’s work. And it’s
been a wonderful ride!
My book, “The Dance
Between Hope & Fear”, came out last June. The reviews have been
sterling. Three decades of journals, letters, speeches, etc. made readable by
my most fabulous editor, Shelly Angel of Texas.
We’ve begun work on a second book. The 1st is available from both Quakerbooks.org
and Amazon. I hope you will enjoy my book.
A few milestones this year
along with 30 years of The Beethoven Letter- Marshall and I celebrate our 25th
wedding anniversary, and The Quaker Initiative to End Torture – QUIT! is nine
years old (see the great new website – http://www.quit-torture-now.org/quit/home/.
And I’m replacing my 8 year old SAAB. So your support is especially welcomed.
I have great delight that my
teaching has become more heartfelt over time. My workshops fill up faster and
always at least a third are returning attendees. My gifts in the work have more
polish and my book offers companionship and guidance. This is the joy of lots
of work going well over many years.
So many have helped me to
continue all these years. Will you help me now please? I am extremely grateful
that my life is this particular story and that you are part of it. Please send
a gift and please check my calendar and come see me as I travel and work this
year. Our time is finite and it would be good to see you.
In the Light,
John Calvi
April 2014
The 29th Beethoven Letter – John Calvi
Dear Friends,
A new adventure has taken me. My years are full of invitations to teach and touch. Once in a while the schedule gets thin and I know some new arrangement is being made. A light schedule in 1990 allowed me rest at Pendle Hill. In 2008 I was able to celebrate 25 years of trauma work with a sabbatical. Now something new.
Last year a very brave editor asked for everything I’ve written on healing. Shelly Angel of Dallas, Texas has now edited 30 years of letters, journals, speeches, lectures, and articles creating my first book. The Dance between Hope & Fear will be available in June from Amazon. I expect it will also be available at both FGC and Pendle Hill bookstores. Shelly has done an amazing job of working reams of poor spelling, jumbles of punctuation, and heaps of over-written pages into a good look into my journey as a Quaker healer with a gift for releasing pain following trauma. My light teaching schedule made way for tons of rewrites and choosing what must wait for a second volume. This is miraculous for me and a great joy.
My traveling work continues as you see by my calendar? Pendle Hill very soon, Friends General Conference Gathering in July, with various stops before and after with the usual meetings, conferences, and annual gatherings. I am about to be 61 and have been on the road learning about healing from trauma since 1982. And your good invitations to teach massage, energy work, avoiding burnout, and deeper spiritual life through good selfcare have kept me going all this time. Thank you for making this life work available for so long and to so many. Working by invitation is a dance we’ve done together.
Living mainly on gifts has lots of suspense to it. Generosity seems to depend on the general economy, personal connection, and what is possible. I have used your gifts now for 30 years to reach into places with no Light and bring care and comfort to those in need. I am grateful for all we’ve done together and I hope you will help me continue. I need your help.
In the Light,
John Calvi
The 28th Beethoven Letter by John Calvi
Dear Friends,
Thirty years ago a young woman
climbed on to my massage table with a nervous condition doctors were unable to
name. My hands became quite warm and she became much better after recalling an
earlier abduction, rape, and torture. That brief session 30 years ago was the
beginning of a life’s work as a Quaker healer with a gift for releasing pain
following trauma. I turn 60 on May 14th and realize I’ve given half my life to
this traveling work of touching and teaching. It seems a very long time. I’ve
experienced it as a large mosaic moving quickly- fast, full, and very good.
I was honored with the Quaker Initiative to End Torture- QUIT! last July with
an invitation to speak at Friends General Conference. This talk on healing America by
ending torture is available at the FGC bookstore. As I began with torture, this
was a culmination of 3 decades of study and work. All together it’s been an
experience of much Light and learning.
As you can see by my calendar, I am busy with various situations where healing
is needed. I began working in the rape crisis in 1982, AIDS in 1983, prisons in
1985, tortured refugees in 1988. And I’ve continued with each of these groups
over the years, going where invitation calls me. I am writing more and an
editor has come bravely forward to gather and edit my collected writings and
journals for a book. Many have enjoyed the writings on my website and blog. Now
much more becomes possible.
I have continued to live mainly on gifts all this time. I have never quite
relaxed into the suspense of it all and I don’t recommend this during world
wide economic downturns. But over the years I have been given wonderful
generosity to go forward, never refusing my work to those in need for lack of
funding. This has been a great blessing. I can put the emphasis on getting good
work done thanks to many who know my gifts and send support. I need your help
celebrating 30 years and going on.
Working by invitation, living on gifts- it’s been a fairly simple arrangement
that has made for much good work in the world. Please help me continue. I am
grateful to have had so full a life with so many of you along with me.
In the Light,
John Calvi
April 2012
The 27th Beethoven Letter by John Calvi
Dear Friends,
I am still here, still on the road, still at work ? not brave so much as stubborn and happy for it all. I am seeking your support to stay at work. As many of you know, my life work has been to help heal trauma as a certified massage therapist and a Quaker healer with a spiritual gift for releasing pain. I’ve been at work on this now since 1983- that’s 28 years of experience, travel, and seeking on behalf of survivors of all manner of hurt. First I learned about the rape crisis and did lots of work with survivors. And I still do since the sexually abused constitute the largest group of wounded on the planet. Next I did lots of work in the AIDS epidemic, even before we had the word AIDS or knowledge of transmission. Then I began work with refugees who had survived torture and inmates and others. A very busy 28 years (stories on my website) & I’m only 59 in May!
As my calendar shows, I am often on the road teaching by invitation to places and topics diverse and important. The healing of trauma is vast and I am a devoted tho slow learner. Sometimes I can help make small changes. Sometimes I can help make large changes. The gift that comes through me tends to be a gentle quiet shift to peace and calm and new understanding. This may not seem like much to many, but for someone who’s survived the worst that can be imagined- it’s a very large gift indeed. Calm for any survivor is very good medicine. A break from despair and glimpsing a future with less pain has power. Sometimes a change is larger than I have words for.
In 2005, I gathered with five other Quakers to form The Quaker Initiative to End Torture- QUIT! We have been engaged in education- informing people that US torture abroad hasn’t ended and has migrated to prisons at home. This too is my work and a leading that has given me much Light to continue, even though it’s burden is great. I still learn pacing and disciplines to be at my best. Even my husband Marshall Brewer after 25 years together says sometimes I don’t work too much.
Imagine such a thing- I have been able to travel and teach and get my hands on many people each year because of the support that comes from people who’ve seen this work and understand it’s important that it continue. I didn’t know I was going to live and work mainly on gifts. I wasn’t planning on quite this much suspense in my life. Nor do I find a dragging world-wide recession convenient. But I have found that support has come come each year with this letter, enough to go on and say- Yes, I can come teach maybe sometimes even if you can’t pay me because I have help.
There’s one question- Will you help me this year? Will you help me keep on and teach and touch in this time of great need from all corners? Brutality seems to be on an upswing. Compassion seems to be in danger of exhaustion. I work at ground level- a gracious way of saying cheap and easy. I would very much appreciate your kindness and generosity. I would like to stay in the fray and make more years of service. Can you help me please? I would like to be of use and I’m good at helping. And there is so much good that needs doing. Here we go again this year, are you with me?
In the Light,
John Calvi
April 2011
The 26th Beethoven Letter by John Calvi
Dear Friends,
There is a particular discipline that comes with my duel works of healing trauma and ending torture. It is a discipline of attending to the immediate particulars while keeping an eye on the far horizon. While attending to the moment of right now, I keep in mind the time to come and bridging the two with great possibilities. I listen to the story of pain in one person while hearing what can be lifted and washed. I teach yet another group about continuing American torture, careful to set a tone that a time is coming when there will be no torture. This discipline has gotten steadier within me over the last 28 years. It is as necessary as breath and water. It is a tone as well as a posture, a perspective as well as a philosophy. Hope is not some random feeling of optimism but a tool, a great torch to be carried into places without Light.
And so spring comes and I am on the road. Marshall and I were legally married in Vermont a week after our 20th wedding anniversary and the town clerk asked if I was sure about this man. Since my work began in 1982, invitations to work and gifts to live have been my growing regular schedule. This year I am honored to be an invited speaker to New York Yearly Meeting as the founding convener of The Quaker Initiative to End Torture. And to be joining others for QUIT’s 4th conference taking place September 24-26 2010 at Quaker Center in Ben Lomond, California. I continue to teach healing at Friends General Conference, Pendle Hill, and Powell House. And I’ll make several new stops as invitations and my calendar grows- updates on my website. Both works continue with great need and few changes.
I need your help this year particularly with replacing my car. My 10 year old Saab insisted on retirement and a wonderful 4 year old Saab took the challenge thanks to my honest Mennonite mechanic, Al Scott. He keeps me on the road in safe affordable winter cars. Your help with this new debt would be a wonderful support I’d be very grateful for. Your generosity will be carefully used and deeply appreciated.
Many parts make my work possible. First there is the leading and spiritual gift to release pain. Then there is you- from you come the invitations to teach and the support that make work and living possible. It’s not easy to live on gifts- suspense is more than interesting. But it’s a dance we’ve been in now for 27 years. And I am very grateful for your part and mine. Please help me to continue a life work in these times.
In the Light,
John Calvi,
April 2010
The 25th Beethoven Letter by John Calvi
Dear Friends,
I am back on the road after a year of sabbatical. In 2009, I’m teaching in some of my old favorite spots- Pendle Hill, Quaker Center, Powell House, and Friends General Conference. Plus new places- North Pacific Yearly Meeting, Colorado Regional Gathering of Friends, Wellness Works in CA.
I return to work from the luxury of rest. To do something for a long time and work hard to get good at it is a blessing. To rest from the work, wonder at it’s meaning- brings focus to doing more. I am so very grateful for this. Sabbatical brought the inspiration of overview and the gratitude of accomplishment for balance and continuance. Also clear from sabbatical is that spiritual life is cumulative. I may not move as fast at 56 as I did at 30, but I do more with less effort and fewer missteps, thank goodness.
In addition to my usual, I’ve been at work on 2 opposites. The first is the cleansing of the noise, fear, and rush of modern life from individuals by teaching simple massage and energy work. The second is to continue the work of ending American torture that is practiced in US prisons and military training involving doctors. To this end, I join with others of the Quaker Initiative to End Torture- QUIT. These two are similar opposites-to be clean of fear brings Light and to end torture is to stop the worst humans do. These, among other works, keep me very busy. A new journal blog on my website offers new and old writings to you- www.johncalvi.com
Life with Marshall in Vermont is better than ever- 20 years married now. But can an itinerant Quaker healer/teacher continue in a worldwide depression to work by invitation and live mainly by gifts? So far, yes. I began working in the rape crisis in 82 and then with AIDS. Work with inmates and tortured refugees followed. A spiritual gift of releasing physical and emotional pain following trauma grew with my work. The life pattern of work by invitation and gifts also grew. I trust I’ve been brought this far to continue. Your support makes this possible. To live on gifts in a manner of service is an old idea, simple and basic. To do so now fights the gravity of financial and cultural fear. I need your gifts to continue.
In the Light,
John Calvi
April 2009
The 24th Beethoven Letter by John Calvi
Dear Friends,
Sabbatical is very wonderful and different. Each month I find a lower gear in resting from overwork. It began with a trip west to see Marshall’s family in Southern California- some time in the desert, some time at the coast, and the start of abandoning my desks, computers, emails, and phones. My sabbatical task is to move all my energies in caring for others towards my own well being. This is odd and I recommend it. I began a news/newspapers fast and focused on painting the upstairs of our little house. A deep blue now makes all the wood trim glow golden in morning and evening light. Remind me to tell you about the wall falling down. I’ve no talent for painting or repair, but delight in every improvement.
To not take care of anyone has been an adjustment. I resist the urge to call any number of people to check on their trauma recovery and instead care for myself- nap, read, or begin the next house project. I changed the toilet seat in the outhouse. This new discipline prepares me for work to come.
Spiritually, sabbatical restores my humor, gratitude, stillness, a quiet mind, and a clean connection for seeking. I can feel my ragged edges reshape to the dovetail of knowing and learning. I have good things to wonder about- how has my leading grown since 1982, can I keep my improved wellness beyond sabbatical, how will age contour my work, what am I learning that others may want to know? One gift of sabbatical is that I can keep the questions, refine them, and await the new learning patiently.
Sabbatical is not only time out. It’s also a health necessity. A hormonal imbalance has been implicated in my struggle of the last dozen years with chronic fatigue, weight gain, and recently a diagnosis of osteoporosis. This discovery is a surprise and a relief. It is the beginning of good resolution with treatment. This sabbatical came right on time! I am feeling better than I have in years, assuring me of good energy and a fit body for the good work of the future. My homework is happily increased.
My plan is for more physical work- stacking firewood, reclaiming the field from an invasive brush species, restoring the abandoned vegetable garden, and painting the downstairs and the exterior. As blood pressure and weight continue to improve, I hope to begin a slow return to my desk to edit a collection of my speeches into a book and CDs. I return to my teaching and touch work in 2009 and include a developing calendar. More information and soon a new journal/blog will be at my website.
I am grateful for all your good care. Your generosity has made this possible. I would greatly appreciate your support now to continue to restore myself. I need your help. Thank you for your gifts.
In the Light,
John Calvi
May 2008