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| Tim and Lily Boyd pose with Singapore Young Theosophists. |
Printed in the Summer 2015 issue of Quest magazine.
Citation: Boyd, Tim."President,s Diary" Quest 103.3 (Summer 2015): pg. 114-115.
At the end of January my wife, daughter, and I left Adyar to return to the U.S. Along the way we stopped in Singapore. I had scheduled a visit with the TS group there. Singapore is a remarkable place. It is a country that its recently deceased founder, Lee Kwan Yew, said should not exist, not because it did not deserve to, but because geography, politics, and demographics all would seem to argue that as a nation, it is impossible.
The TS group there is a dynamic bunch of people. Not too many years ago its membership had declined to seven. Under the guidance of Sanne and Lily Chong the group today has 400-plus members. Although our meeting with the group was unscheduled and on an unusual day for them, around 100 members turned out.
From Singapore I traveled on to Krotona for the annual Partners in Theosophy program. Every year at the end of January members from around the country gather for the week-long program. This year I facilitated our exploration of the Three Objects of the Theosophical Society. Since last year I had been looking forward to cofacilitating the get-together with the Krotona School director, Maria Parisen. Over the years Maria and I have done a number of retreat-type programs together. Although our previous combined efforts have been well received by the participants, my enthusiasm for conducting it was somewhat selfish. I love working with Maria. Unfortunately, because of unforeseeable circumstances she had to withdraw at the last minute. Joy Mills, Betty Bland, Pablo Sender, and I ended up leading the group in an inspiring program.
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| John and Anne Kern, after John’s talk at Krotona. |
In addition to the partners and mentors, each year John Kern, adviser to the trust for The Kern Foundation, also attends the full term of meetings. This year, on the Tuesday when the Ojai Valley Lodge gathered for their weekly session, they had asked John to talk about his life and experiences working for the TS. It was a packed house. John’s intimate acquaintance with the people and history of the TS made for a riveting evening. It was a view of a side of TS history that no one else could have presented. More than four decades ago John retired from his own lucrative business career to work, gratis, solely for the Theosophical organizations served by the foundation. (The MP3 of the talk can be listened to or downloaded at https://www.theosophical.org/announcements/3512).
From Krotona it was finally back to Olcott in time for our February meeting of the board of directors. As always, the members of the board came to the headquarters for the three and a half day meeting. Currently our board is composed of long-time members who hail from Louisiana, New Hampshire, Florida, Wisconsin, Colorado, and Oregon. It’s a diverse, passionate, and very efficient group. Unlike the previous board, which was 50/50 male-female, this one is primarily female. Besides me the one lone man is Dr. Doug Keene from New Hampshire. It could be viewed as an enviable position to be in.
This year the dates for the meeting coincided with Adyar Day. For more than 100 years, February 17 has been a special day for the TS. The commemoration began as a remembrance of Colonel Olcott, the first president and cofounder of the TS, on the date of his passing. In 1922 Annie Besant shifted the emphasis to serving as a memorial for all of the TS’s past leaders and as a day to remember and give support to the TS international headquarters. All around the world programs are held and donations collected for the various works going on at Adyar. For a number of years in the American Section we allowed this occasion to slip. This year I gave an impromptu slide presentation of Adyar —a view from the inside. It was not on the schedule, but still attracted about thirty people. All of the board, a number of staff, and some members of the public turned out.
Whenever I have shown images of Adyar to a group, I am fascinated at the audience’s sense of novelty and surprise at seeing the scope of the place and the work. It should not surprise me. Until I started regularly traveling to Adyar, I was the same way. It always seemed like such a mysterious place. I had no mental images to help me grasp its dimensions. Since I became international president, three of our staff members have made extended visits to Adyar and have done significant work while there. Over the years I have noticed that those members who have spent some time at the international headquarters come away with a deeper understanding and commitment to the work.
In March I was off to the San Francisco Bay area for three programs. I was mainly going because for about a year a good friend and founder of the Greenheart International organization, Emanuel Kunzelman, had been trying to coordinate the details for a public conversation between Michael Murphy, founder of California’s Esalen Institute, and me. (See more about this discussion in my “Viewpoint: A Great Idea” .) Given everyone’s hyperbusy schedule, it was difficult.
The event was a two-hour conversation moderated by Emanuel. The description advertising the event went like this:
This historical evening will bring together Michael Murphy of ITPI (Integral Transformative Practice International) in a conversation with Tim Boyd, international president of the Theosophical Society, as they discuss how the Theosophy of today meets evolutionary theory. Join us for this lively dialogue moderated by Greenheart International president, Emanuel Kuntzelman, as we hear from these two titans of spiritual thought.
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| Tim Boyd converses with Michael Murphy at their discussion program. |
I like it. Titanic! It was a wide-ranging exchange that seemed to bring out the best in both of us. We plan to get together in the future to flesh out our discussion of some of the subjects that came up that evening. (To hear the entire two-hour conversation go here:
https://www.itp-international.org/library/dialogue-michael-murphy-tim-boyd-and-emanuel-kuntzelman.)
We set a date for the conversation that also allowed me to schedule visits with our TS groups in San Francisco and Oakland. So next it was a meeting with the San Francisco TS group. The SFTS has been a dynamic center in the area for many years. Although as a group they are keen students of the Ageless Wisdom teachings, they have always focused on more than mere study. Application and experience have been the emphasis since the days of their famous member and guiding light Joe Miller—an entirely unique and inspired student/teacher/friend. As a young man, Joe had met Annie Besant and formed a bond with the TS. Years later he would say, “Everything I have in life I owe to the Theosophical Society.” They are a group who in quiet, behind-the-scenes ways have been a tremendous support to the TS work. We met at their building, which is right downtown, almost at the top of San Francisco’s famous Nob Hill.
Two days later it was back across the Bay Bridge for a meeting with the Oakland TS. The Oakland group has a long history. It had been almost twenty-five years since I had last visited with them. Many things have changed since then. For a time the group had become inactive, only coming back to life again in the past couple of years. Because their normal meeting place was too small, we met in a lovely hall in the Berkeley public library. Members came from Oakland and the surrounding area. Also a group of friends from Turlock, California, about 100 miles away, came for the talk. I had a meal with the group members, then we drove to the library for the talk. It was a good day, and I am expecting very good things to come out of the Oakland branch.
At the end of March, it was back to Adyar (where I am now writing this piece). I arrived in time to inaugurate and speak at the South Indian Conference. Every year around 150–170 members from some of the Indian states in the south come together (Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka). It is a three-day event that for the last several years has been hosted at Adyar. The subject for this year’s gathering was The Voice of the Silence.
Unlike the Midwest, where we have the four distinct seasons of winter, spring, summer, and fall, the Adyar area is said to have three—hot, hotter, and hottest. Right now is the hotter season, with everyday temperatures in the mid- to upper 90s. It’s surprising how quickly one adapts. Leave Wheaton, Illinois, and 50 degrees, get off an air-conditioned jet plane in Chennai, sweat profusely for two days, and voilà, you have acclimated. Give it a try.
Tim Boyd