Great God Pan

In the Los Angeles group there appear to be about a dozen Energyites of varying degrees of commitment. Paulus, Mawri, Feisal, Sandy and I are now performing as the Encounter Group. A recent gathering at a spatial installation designed by Francois Perrin to disentangle architecture's "invisible elements: space, ambiance, atmosphere and how people experience them" drew dozens of curious young people. The enthusiastic audience joined the Group's eight members by sitting around the stage on circular cushions and participating in "group meditations on the four seasons." Paulus designed topical tunics and robes for each member representing either a season or a weather pattern. Feisal's aqua-colored winter robe was festooned with felt snowflakes and Inuit figures joining hands. My autumn-inspired earthtones featured string and feather dreamcatchers which had been hot-glued on.

The East Coast is experiencing energetic activity as well. In New York a group of guys and gals that call themselves The Joints are doing their own folk-based thing while maintaining communication with their West Coast counterparts. A rural folk duo going as Margo and Michael have sprung up also. Rumors abound of a mysterious entourage known as The Space Folk who presumably split off from their whale-admiring brethren and headed east. Reports of orgiastic dancing and psychic interference at a recent performance by art student-favorites Blood Blister at a Brooklyn loft were relayed to me by the formentioned Michael. "The Lacoste-wearing set pride themselves on making lots of noise with their computers and guitars, but they were completely unnerved by the cacophony of movement demonstrated by the Space Folk in their black unitards painted with bright planet shapes," he told me on the phone. "It was an extraordinary scene."

All of these groups fall under the banner of New Energy, yet the movement collects no dues, there are no scheduled meetings, no manifesto. What's shared is a philosophy, a style of being, and a belief that there are better ways of living than what is going on now. "Action and reaction are universal throughout nature, so your thought is action and your reaction is the response to your thought-life," Paulus explained to me. "Thought and its manifestation are one. You can?t think one thing and produce another. Your thought and your experience are one." "Beliefs tend to manifest themselves," added Feisal. "Therefore we believe what we want to be, and sometimes it happens." Prevalent within the movement is a reluctance to accept the "progress" of technology. Thoreau's goal in retreating to Walden was to live deliberately and deep, "to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life." This is an active philosophy that New Energy exhorts. "I think it was Heidegger who says that technology is a race to oblivion," said Paulus.

While Energyites generally feel little attachment towards physical objects, some seem to have a penchant for crystallized minerals. Kaisle of Little Wings for example sings of his "crystal shards," which I believe is a less an ode to a rock than a metaphor for staying sharp and focused. On one occasion I observed Paulus place his crystal in a small mesh bag and close it tight with a drawstring. With a long cord he gently lowered it into the shallow stream that ran near where he was camping. He left it there for several days. When I asked him about it he showed me several passages from a small book that interested him. The book was called "Crystal Visioning" and was written by a young lady named Serenity Peterson. "It's really a Crystal Workbook," he pointed out, showing me the blank pages in the back where he had noted things about his crystal. "Like here's where I thanked the water for its help in cleansing my crystal." At a brunch gathering thrown by a socialite benefactor of New Energy a few weeks later, attendees gathered in front of a television to watch one of their favorite films, "Liquid Crystals" by Jean Painlevé. Shot in 1976, it shows fast-motion colored crystals forming under great magnification. It is a beautiful and awe-inspiring sequence set to a lively electronic score. "Serenity tells us that crystals are capable of absorbing and holding energy patterns for long periods of time," says Paulus. "We already know this. That's where the energy is. In the earth."

One evening I dropped in on Feisal, a talented Argentinian singer and actor who has lent his gifts to the Encounter Group on occasion. He and Paulus were engaged in an encounter game that I recognized from some Esalen-related literature. It's an exercise called Eyeball-to-Eyeball in which two people kneel facing each other and stare intently into each other's eyes. This evening Paulus and Feisal were involved in an advanced deviation in which the staring is accompanied by telling the other person how they honestly feel about them. It's thought to help confront avoidance. "Paulus is a very creative person," Feisal told me when they had completed their exercise. "It is important to me to visualize how he views the world, with an eye similar to his, the eye of an artist."

It is common practice among Energyites to frequently change their names, or rather, bequeath their group name onto a new member or initiate. It is one manifestation of what they call "Sympathetic Understanding." It is thought to be an exercise in empathy, wherein "the transfer of your own feelings and emotions to another" results in deeper understanding of the views and motives of others. The procedure also seems to function as a path of tutelage as the newly-named individual benefits from the teachings and lessons (not to mention respect) learned from his or her namesake. I myself have been given the name Arrak, formerly held by the tall dancer in Kaisle's group. Arrak himself has taken the name Eroc, which I later learned was the name of a member of a German progressive rock group that he admires. I noticed a record in his room by the original Eroc entitled "Wolkenreise" or "Cloud Journey." Apparently the new Eroc felt some camaraderie with this musician whose duties, according to the record's liner notes, included "percussion, electronics, and acting."

Of the original Energyites, only Eroc is currently in Southern California. I spoke with him briefly via telephone and he informed me that he had been spending most of his time designing and testing tensile structures. Nice Chichen spent the winter in a cabin in the interior of Sweden with a Scandinavian sculptor. Her current whereabouts are unknown. As for Kaisle, he is currently somewhere in Denmark resting and re-energizing after months spent sharing his music with Europe, Japan, and Australia. His emails have been frequent and insightful. "Li (Lee Baggett, Kaisle's accompanist) and I have grown both together and in relationship to our audiences," he wrote from Osaka. "Now it's time to turn inward. I feel a change coming over me and want to grow from within." He plans to return to California soon to "spread love and energy," and to reconnect with the core of the movement. After that who knows. There has been talk of setting up a colony in Portugal due to its California-like climate and surfing potential. "Most of us speak some Spanish," explained Eroc. "I think some of the words are the same in Portugal."