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Six Key Themes
The Life with Principle DVD is divided into six thematic chapters. Each one reflects a concept found in Thoreau’s writing:
Teachers or facilitators may choose to study just one theme, several, or all six through the course of several lessons or discussions. Corresponding questions and activities are outlined in the accompanying study guide and curriculum guide.
Hearing That Different Drummer general concepts:
- independent individual; thinking for yourself
- standing up for your principles; living with your conscience
- self-reliance
- trusting your own thought
- non-conformity; individualism
- knowing oneself
- living with confidence
- polarities: us vs. them; conflict inherent in this structure
- maintaining solitude, even within a crowd
- the importance of having dreams
Being Awake, Aware, and Alive general concepts:
- being observant,
- recognizing the nobleness; seeing the miraculous in the commonplace
- the importance of the journey, not the destination
- being in the present moment
- understanding simplification
- seeing a connection between expectations and being awake
- Emerson’s “transparent eyeball” state
Examining Desperate and Deliberate Lives general concepts:
- lifestyle choices
- what’s important; what’s not
- simplicity
- deliberateness and mindfulness
- self-examination
- awakening to the possibilities of how one lives
- evaluating our choices: what was Thoreau’s basis for doing so?
- when to/how to change directions
Living in Society general concepts:
- being an ethical and responsible member of society
- balancing solitude and community
- the questioning citizen
- confronting injustice and taking the consequences
- civil disobedience
- slavery and freedom
- being able to be a “majority of one”
- determining one’s responsibility to take action to correct wrongs
- determining one’s connections and responsibilities to others and society in general
Living in Nature general concepts:
- being an ethical and responsible part of natural world
- nature/human nature
- stewardship, environmental conservation
- fitting into the outdoors
- idea of wildness within and without
- what we define as “nature”
- the connection of all elements of nature with each other
- why nature inspires us
- cooperation and conflict in nature
- what nature can reveal to the human being regarding the purpose of the universe
Confronting the Mean and the Sublime general concepts:
- the savage and spiritual nature of the human animal
- day-to-day actions (the mean) vs. spiritual goals (the sublime)
- understanding why we act as we do
- violent and peaceful conflict resolutions
- limiting/restricting forces (societal pressures, attitudes, and economy) vs. forces leading to personal expansion/development (e.g. literature, nature, thought, etc.)
- understanding and accepting different, often conflicting, elements of our character
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