Uncle Tom's Classroom: How One Public School Teacher Awakened His Students to the Cosmic Super Self Within

By Thomas Alan Berg

Throw off your chains; set yourself free.
Remember the Quantum Field Master,
you were born to be!

Excerpt from A Wake Up Call to the Kids of the World.
Thomas Alan Berg

Government defined me as a citizen who must fitin and follow the rules. Religion defined me as a sinner who must repent and suffer to gain grace. Darwin defi ned me as a lump of human flesh that evolved from the apes. Capitalism defined me as a laborer, customer and/or consumer. But it wasnt until I studied Thomas Alan Bergs teachings, that I realized - beyond the war between creationism and evolution - there is a luminous middle ground where the old millennial paradigms are transformed and integrated into a fresh new vision - the liberating Curriculum of the Cosmic Super Self! UTC offers hope for a future free from terrorized enslavement by suggesting that the next quantum leap for the American Dream is a spiritual awakening from the failed hard work=money=success paradigm. Capitalism without compassion and caring lets too many people slip through the cracks. This opus argues convincingly that we must rise above the old systems of thought to become a race of Cosmic Super Beings, Masters of the Quantum Field of Infinite Possibility.
-Frank Henshaw, Grass Valley, CA.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 11, 2007
• ISBN: 9781462828241

Thomas Alan Berg

Thomas Alan Berg (M.A., Political Science and Multicultural Education) has devoted forty years of his life to the public schools. Tom discovered his innate love for education while serving the American Government as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Venezuela and Teacher Corps Volunteer in San Franciscos Mission District. He was hired by the San Francisco Public Unified School System in 1971 and taught every grade from K through 8, up until 2005, when he retired from "active duty" in 2005, to complete his opus, "Uncle Toms Classroom". You can contact Thomas Alan Berg directly at [e-mail] See Toms official website: www.thomasalanberg.com Sometimes a wonderful teacher appears. Occasionally amazing students come forth. When amazing teachers and amazing students come together, amazing things happen. Bergland, Room 207, at A.P. Giannini Middle School in San Francisco is a perfect example of that." Jerry and Esther Hicks - "The Law of Attraction", "Ask and It Is Given", Abraham Hicks Publications "I encourage the Speaker of the House to introduce legislation into Congress to allow U.T.C.s radical educational approach to be read and debated in all public schools in America. It is no coincidence that this quantum leap towards holistic education was born in San Francisco, one of the worlds great outposts of free, democratic thinking. Allowing Mr. Bergs leading edge ideas into the classroom conversation would reassure us, once and for all, that free speech and free discourse are still alive and well in our beloved America." Charles Divina Lemme, Former Legal Counsel, City Corps/City Group, New York City Headquarters "We need a major quantum shift in consciousness. It is time for the human race to become cosmically conscious. We need a new language that will assist us in awakening to our infinite potential. We need to commit to developing a revolutionary new educational approach, where we teach kids that all real education is joyous SELF EDUCATION - a process by which we begin to awaken to the Infinite Powers of true Super Selfhood that percolate just below ego consciousness, social conditioning and economic role playing. We already sense, deep down, that we are so much more powerful, unlimited and free than weve been told by those who control the major institutions that seek to enslave the world! We are ALL fully empowered Citizens of the Universe - multidimensional Super Beings - on the verge of taking our rightful place as Co-creators of the Cosmos and Masters of the Quantum Field of Unlimited Possibilities. Happiness and creative freedom are our destiny and our cosmic purpose." Thomas Alan Berg "A Wake Up Call to the Kids of the World

Book preview

UNCLE TOM’S CLASSROOM

HOW ONE PUBLIC SCHOOL TEACHER

AWAKENED HIS STUDENTS

TO THE COSMIC SUPER SELF WITHIN

Thomas Alan Berg

Copyright © 2007 by Thomas Alan Berg.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This book was printed in the United States of America.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

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36122

A True Story

That Proves We Can All Be

Masters of the Quantum Field!

EARLY PRAISE FOR THE CURRICULUM

OF THE SUPER SELF

This book is a treasure; it is replete with golden nuggets of wisdom and truth.

—Douglas Harding, Philosopher The Headless Way

Uncle Tom’s Classroom is a positive, refreshing moment of freedom and independence, taken from the powerful mind of my teacher, Mr. Berg.

Andy Lam 6th Gr.

Before I studied with Mr. Berg, I felt trapped and scared. But after he taught me about the Super Self, I began to want to go to school. I learned about freedom.

Max Kruger 6th Gr.

Mr. Berg taught me that no matter where you go, the inner Super Self is always within you. You can conquer every fear with your Super Self. If you’re in a bad situation you can ask your Super Self for help and you’ll get an answer. Once when I was swimming and I started to drown—( and the lifeguard didn’t see me )—I closed my eyes and called on my all powerful Super Self, ‘please take me out of the water’—and the next thing I knew I was on dry land. Mr. Berg taught me how to have Super Self confidence.

Muzammel Chodhery 6th Gr.

Before I came to Mr. Berg’s class, my life was dull and I had no interest, but ever since I learned about the Super Self, I realized there was a lot of cool stuff to be learned about in the Universe.

Ryan Tong 6th Gr.

Mr. Berg’s book explains that there is nothing on the Earth that you can’t have if you want it enough.

Jack Luong 8th Gr.

I think that learning about the All Powerful Super Self is a fantastic way to learn about yourself, your Real Self. This can make you happy in life.

Marley Walker 6th Gr.

Mr. Berg actually gave me the freedom to read the Bible for silent reading and I found out that the Super Self is just like Jesus, shining out from inside of me.

Kelton Chow 6th Gr.

As the Principal of A.P. Giannini, where teacher/author Thomas Berg has been teaching, I feel that ‘Uncle Tom’s Classroom’ brings hope for the children of the world—to be seen and heard—for the beauty of WHO THEY REALLY ARE. I see Tom’s vision spreading throughout the globe.

Leslie Trook, Principal—A.P. Giannini Middle School

Mr. Berg taught me about the power of the mind. It’s a living thing inside me. Don’t be scared because I’m here to say—you are in control.

Angeline Mingfield 6th Gr.

Mr. Berg’s book has expanded thought to where thought has never gone before.

Adrian Estrada 6th Gr.

You should read this fantabulous book because it teaches you—that you are like a super hero. Things won’t bother you, because your Super Self won’t let them.

Jennifer Lee 8th Gr.

"After you read ‘Uncle Tom’s Classroom’ you will know that you are enough to meet every challenge. Just reach inside. The Super Self is there."

Jeanie Yee 6th Gr.

Bergland’s home, or ‘Uncle Tom’s Classroom’ is my favorite class. He treats us more like friends that just any old regular students. Tom’s idea of the Super Self is genius. ‘Uncle Tom’s Classroom’ is gonna be so great people will line up from one store to another all across the country.

Jeffrey Hua 6th Gr.

This book is really out of this world. I’m speechless. It stretches your imagination ’till it breaks. It’s a mind opener. It really makes you think. It’s super powerful.

Gabriel Bonilla 6th Gr.

Thank you Mr. Berg for teaching my son about the power of the Super Self within, which gives him the ability to accomplish any goal he can imagine.

C. Renee Grigoriou—Parent of Tasos

Tom Berg is a prophet of light in a dark age; his message is about bringing compassion to education. He teaches how to create lives of love, meaning, and joy.

Anne Bjornson, Teacher

Sometimes a wonderful teacher appears. Occasionally amazing students come forth. When amazing teachers and amazing students come together, amazing things happen. Bergland, Room 207 is a perfect example of that. It has been great fun to interact with you.

Jerry and Esther—Abraham Hicks

DEDICATION

To all

all the students, parents, and fellow educators

of San Francisco Unified,

who supported me, encouraged me,

and allowed me the freedom to develop a

Cosmic Curriculum of the Super Self;

and to Matt, Ben, Liney, Adrienne,

Katrina, China, Mario, Brody, Ronald,

Wendy, Zack, Alex and Jusef;

and to all of you—Dear Readers—

who have begun to suspect that,

when it comes to preparing our younger

generation for the New Millennium—

there just has to be a better way!

Contents

PART ONE

AUTHOR’S NOTES

INTRODUCTION

The Liberation of a Generation

ONE

A Common Sense Cosmic Wake Up Call.

TWO

How I Stopped Fighting the System and Began Using Quantum Physics to Teach my Kids the Liberating Truth of WHO THEY REALLY ARE.

THREE

How Uncle Tom’s Classroom Morphed

Into Bergland Youthiversity,

The Room with a Cosmic View

PART TWO

FOUR

A Virtual Classroom Discussion About

Our Next Evolutionary Leap;

And Why the Human Race Fell Asleep

To the Truth of Super Selfhood.

FIVE

The Conversation Continues About

How I Became a Free Thinker

In a World Made Mad by False Beliefs.

SIX

Welcome to the Universe, Mother Nature,

And God’s Garden Party of Infinite Possibilities.

SEVEN

Becoming Masters of the Quantum Field,

Accessing Multidimensional Miracles,

And Allowing Our Divine Power of Dominion.

EIGHT

The Super Hero Called I AM,

Probable Future Selves, Determination,

And the Power of Miracles.

NINE

Close Encounter

with the

Living Loving Light.

TEN

How to Create Your Own

Home School of the Super Self

A NEW DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE

FOR

THE COSMIC SUPER SELF

POSTLUDE

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND SUGGESTED SOURCES FOR STUDY

PART ONE

INSIDE BERGLAND YOUTHIVERSITY AND THE FIRST COSMIC CLASSROOM

OF THE SUPER SELF

Mankind stands at an extraordinary turning point.

New knowledge has given us an almost divine power

which can be used for either creation or destruction.

New technology now offers us the power of the gods,

a power that can transform our planet.

How we—individually and as a race—

choose to understand, integrate, and express

the two opposite poles of power, (creation and destruction)

will determine the future of our civilization.

We are the generation that will write the next chapter

in the ongoing story of the human race.

We share a collective responsibility to awaken now,

while there is still time.

The world will be unified either through destruction or

by means of a radical shift in the consciousness of man!

This creative shift in consciousness can only come

through a higher, more classical form of education.

We are living in what the Greeks called the kairos—

the right moment—for a metamorphosis of the gods.

Carl Jung and Thomas Alan Berg

AUTHOR’S NOTES

Humans possess an innate, inherent and amazing capacity for language.

The sudden emergence of language as a cognitive structure seems to support the idea that mankind does in fact develop through a series of quantum leaps in language acquisition. The processes by which the human mind creates language is a total mystery, and seems

to indicate that there is a Transcendent Consciousness or

Supramental Intellect operating through us and our evolution.

Daniel Pinchbeck ( p )

We are at a transitional moment in our history and in our evolution as a species. Those of us who have dedicated our lives to education have a responsibility to revolutionize the way we seek to accomplish the sacred goal of teaching children how to know. This will involve the evolution of our language in order to allow in the wisdom and knowledge that is continually being downloaded to us from transcendent realms of consciousness. Language is our chosen tool of cognition, the way we, as a species, learn how to perceive, interact and understand reality. We seem to evolve as our language evolves. This book is about how we can use and evolve language in order to awaken ourselves and our children from the self-invalidating cultural programs of the past.

I discovered, after three decades of teaching in San Francisco’s public schools, that an extremely effective way of helping my students to understand, appreciate and personally integrate the Language of Cosmic Consciousness found in much of the world’s great literature, was to ask them to paraphrase what they read in their own words. This technique empowered them to mind meld, as Star Trek’s Doctor Spock would say, with the most awake minds of recorded history and access the extraordinary power contained in the quotations.

In the following manuscript I have practiced the same strategy of paraphrasing, condensing and synthesizing some of the world’s most enlightened teachings, with the intent of conveying the powerful essence of their liberating insights as briefly and succinctly as possible. I want to give credit where credit is due to the original writings and revelations, while saving you, dear reader, from the decades of research and rumination involved in condensing the knowledge into the short, more user friendly summations offered here. So, when you see the notation (p) after a quotation, please know that this indicates an attempt on my part to restate, reword and sythesize the main points of a much larger text in my own words, as concisely and accurately as possible. I have added my own intuitive slant and downloaded insight when I felt guided to do so, from within.

There are no words large enough to express the gratitude I owe to the publishers of all the original works, to the original writers, teachers, prophets, poets, freedom fighters, philosophers and to all the great metaphysical thinkers paraphrased below for being such transparent windows for the liberating language of the One Cosmic Super Self to shine through so brilliantly! It is my hope that their perennial Language of Light may assist you, as it has me and my students, in waking up to the liberating truth of who we really really are!

The same Voice that spoke through Plato, Socrates and Shakespeare,

speaks to us today, if we would just open our minds and listen.

Ralph Waldo Emerson ( p )

If a sufficient number of individuals allow in the experience of the coming of the Higher Self, we may just possibly be spared the most destructive features of the coming transformation in consciousness.

Carl Jung ( p )

I have found that using quotes like these as daily touchstones, energizes my students to take thought where thought has never gone before. Most children really enjoy pondering ideas that come from the highest realms of Cosmic Consciousness. Once they are introduced to this enjoyable educational strategy, it isn’t long before they too begin to tune into a Higher Voice within themselves—the Language of the Super Self, announcing that the coming days of change and transformation are upon us. The human race is on the verge of an extraordinary quantum leap in consciousness, and we do not serve our children well, if we leave a topic of such momentous importance out of the educational process.

The younger generations know that the systems which control the world at this time are no longer working very well. That’s why they are angry.

Our children have so many super powers within,

which could free them from the enslavements of the past,

if only we’de teach them to remember WHO THEY REALLY ARE!

Terry Cole Whittaker ( p )

It is time to set our children free. This is the pivotal moment in history when we must begin to liberate the younger generations from the false belief systems of all old millennial thinking, while there is still time to save our world. As I write this, I can almost hear the Moses archtype within me shouting at all our cultural pharoahs, to let my people go—to LET OUR CHILDREN GO, NOW!

Let every nation know . . . that we shall pay any price to assure

the survival and the success of liberty.

John F. Kennedy ( p )

We, of the older generations, must courageously connect the dots—once and for all—and admit—that one of the main reasons America has been going through a dumbing down process, is because of how we are miseducating and tyrannizing our children into docile submission. It doesn’t take the intelligence of a rocket scientist to see the connection between the way we spend twelve years terrorizing our kids into absolute and total subservience and the way the masses have acquiesced to a new negative paradigm that sees life on Earth as a never ending war on terror. The post 9/11 new language of terror and fundamentalistic thinking that our governments and mass media have programmed into our cultural conversation, have attempted to deafen us to the Cosmic Call that is asking us to wake up, while there is still time!

Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must be willing to

undergo the fatiques of truly supporting it.

Thomas Paine ( p )

This book is offered as a wake up call to begin the difficult but necessary process of freeing our beloved young people from the post 9/11 reign of terror while there is still a chance to save our world civilization from self-destruction. We can only accomplish this by no longer educating our children—these living treasures—and our only hope for the future—to be afraid and live out their lives as unthinking slaves to the huge indoctination systems that enslave the world. We must literally evolve a whole new language in order to wake ourselves up from society’s despair, and so we can remember WHO WE REALLY ARE in the grand cosmic scheme of things. Uncle Tom’s Classroom is just such an urgent call to liberate ourselves and our young people from all the old ways of thinking and talking, that actually made us forget that we are ALL extensions of the One Cosmic Super Selfhood, born on Earth in this New Millennium, to become fully awakened, connected, magnificent Masters of the Quantum Field!

I have had so many evidences of Divine Direction . . . so many instances when I have been controlled by some Other Power than my own will. I cannot doubt that this Power comes from above. All creation is a mine . . . and every man a miner!

—Abraham Lincoln ( p )

INTRODUCTION

The Liberation of a Generation

This little volume is about . . . the liberation of a race,

with a tender character, unlike the hard and dominant race . . .

a race hitherto ignored . . . by society.

—Harriet Beecher Stowe ( p )

A Race Called Every Child

I am the voice of every child,

Crying out to the giants of the world,

Cut not my wings,

Blind not my eyes,

Deafen not my ears,

And fill not my mind

With all your age old fears.

Just teach me please

The truth of who I am,

Tell me where I came from,

Tell me why I’m here,

And teach me that

No matter what I dream,

I always, always CAN!

Please, please unchain me from your past,

Don’t force me to forget my Source.

I have a divine right to learn the Truth,

Of who I really REALLY AM !

Thomas Alan Berg

One of my favorite times during a typical day teaching middle school was when I stood at the door of my classroom and greeted each of my one hundred and thirty students as they changed classes. I enjoyed that brief moment when I shook hands with them, connecting in a personal way. This was one of the few opportunities during my hectic daily schedule when I had a moment to speak directly to each and ever one of my kids. I say MY kids on purpose, because I always felt that, once students were assigned to one of my classes, they became MY responsibility for the duration of our year together. Passing time was also the perfect opportunity to check in with them, as to whether or not they had handed in their assignments on time, and if they had a special concern or problem to discuss with me.

The homework that week (my last week teaching in the system), was one of my most cutting-edge assignments ever, a task that required my kids to take thought where thought had never gone before. I got the idea from two sources—Einstein’s famous quotation about the imagination being more valuable to the development of the mind (and civilization) than memorizing facts—and the quantum physics’ theory that we live in a universe of many parallel, probable, realities. I asked my students to stretch their minds and imagine an alternative, probable American history in which the Europeans did NOT destroy the Native American cultures, and did NOT enslave Africans. I asked my students to visualize an American virtual history in which the Europeans, the Indian tribes, the Africans—and all the other immigrant groups that traveled to the New World in search of freedom—had chosen to work together in unison, to create a nation of true equality and justice for all. It was during passing time that I had a chance to find out if any of my kids were late finishing their assignment, or needed an extension.

Hi there Helen, did you turn in your homework? I asked Helen, as she tried to sneak out of the room after fifth period class. I don’t see your work here in my stack of papers. Helen was one of my best eighth grade students. She was a sweet Chinese American teenager, very studious, quiet, supremely intense, and usually very conscientious about completing her social studies assignments right on time. She often slumped when she walked, and usually looked a bit sad. I didn’t really like pressuring her about the work, but I was curious as to why she hadn’t been completing her recent homework assignments, which was so very unusual for her.

I didn’t have time to do it, Mr. Berg, she said, tears welling up in her eyes. I’m really sorry. She began to cry softly.

Would you like to talk about it after school? I asked, immediately feeling bad that I’d caused her such obvious misery. I’m here for you Helen. Don’t worry. Remember, I’m ON your side.

Yes, she answered, "I know. I would like talk to you privately. I’ll be back at three thirty, if that’s OK with you?"

She did return that afternoon, which gave me an opportunity to find out what was truly bothering her. She walked in the room, threw her heavy backpack on the floor, sighed and squeezed into a chair far too small for her five-foot frame.

I hate my life, she began. "I hate myself. My parents don’t care about me. They don’t understand me. They are always just pressuring me to work, work, work. They make me go to Chinese School too, take piano lessons, do all the chores around the house, AND compete in track. I hate track. I never have any free time just for myself. I don’t even have time to think, She cried softly for a few minutes. I just feel so trapped, really, really trapped. There was just no way that I could get myself to think about your idea of an alternative American history," Tears poured down her bright pink cheeks.

I’m sorry if I added to your problems, I tried to console Helen, for she had always been such an accomplished student. I knew that what she was describing was a fairly accurate assessment of her stressful teenage life. I know that it must be rough.

You wouldn’t believe it Mr. Berg. I have no freedom at all. NONE! My parents keep bossing me around from morning ’till night, pressuring me to make a 4.0 grade point average on my report card, get into the best high school in San Francisco AND submit my science project on time for the ‘All City’ competition. I can’t take it anymore. I feel like my brain is being filled up with everybody’s demands and I don’t have any say at all. I’m a slave! Sometimes I imagine jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge just to get free! She put her head down on her arms and cried quietly.

Don’t worry Helen, I’ll call your parents in for a conference, and talk to them about this. I’ll ask them to get off your back a bit. In the meantime, just forget about my assignments for a few days, and focus on what your mom and dad want you to do. School’s almost out! There are much better ways to find your freedom than to contemplate ending your life through suicide. Your mom and dad just want you to succeed, you know. They think they know what’s best for you. They want you to have the life they never had. I know your mom. She loves you very much, she really does. And your dad works those two jobs just to give you a better chance in life, a chance they never had back in China.

I know, Helen said, wiping tears from her cheeks. But they’re driving me crazy. They don’t respect me as a person. They have no idea how tired and unhappy I am. And they don’t really appreciate how hard I work, She blew her nose and tried to smile. "What they want for me isn’t what I want for myself. Their dreams aren’t MY dreams."

"What do you want Helen? I asked, sensing that I was beginning to help her calm down. What is your bliss?"

I want to be a teacher like you—more than anything—but my parents say they can’t afford to pay for college tuition, and the only way I can go to college is if I get all A’s and win a full scholarship. So I have to get A’s, or else my life is ruined. Oh, Mr. Berg, it’s so hard. And I’m so tired. I’m not even getting your assignments done any more, and you’re my favorite teacher.

Don’t worry about it. I don’t care about that assignment, I said. You have already proven yourself to me, many times. I know you are brilliant and dedicated. I know that you can follow through on assignments. Your Project of Bliss this semester was one of the most outstanding projects I’ve ever received from any of my students, so your A on the final report card is a sure thing. She nodded, looking up at me gratefully, through misty eyes.

Helen had created an extraordinarily detailed scale model of a classroom of the future, with thirty-five little chairs and desks and a small statue of me standing at a little podium, lecturing. She had also included a little statue of her, made up to represent her as an adult, working as my student teacher. The fact that she was visualizing us teaching together in some future, probable reality, made me very proud and happy. Above the door of the model classroom, she had designed a sign that proclaimed in beautiful calligraphy, Bergland Youthiversity—First Cosmic School of the Super Self. The scale model schoolroom was so professionally constructed, that I had displayed it downstairs in the Main Office, where it had won enthusiastic, school wide acclaim! Her focus on architectural details was amazing!

"Remember Helen, what society wants of you is just like a computer program. You always have the choice as to whether you are going to let society, or anyone outside of you, program you to hate your own unique life, or not. Your Super Self gives you the ultimate power of free choice, to help you log OFF of any outer program that tries to make you fit into a specific mold, or lose track of your own unique bliss path. And, what’s most important is that your inner Super Self can help you stay logged ON to your own program, your own desires, dreams, wishes and wants, no matter what!"

I KNOW that you have what it takes to handle all the demands that your parents and the educational system are placing on you. You have shown me already that you know how to access your inner powers. But, remember, you must fight constantly to stay focused on WHO YOU REALLY ARE, and to hold onto the vision of what you really, really want—all the time—no matter how often some well meaning adults may try to steer you in other directions. Your inner Super Self is infinitely ingenious. It has super miraculous ways to make all your dreams come true within the Quantum Field of Infinite Possibilities. The challenge for you today—right now—is to stay tuned into your real inner identity, to your inner program and to all those dreams of yours, even when the older generation seems to be bossing you around, and trying to get you to do what they think is best for you.

Who looks outside gets lost in the world,

but who looks within, awakens.

God is apparently trying to be born in and AS man.

—Carl Jung ( p )

You’re right Mr. Berg, I just have to keep remembering to stay logged on to my Super Self, Helen smiled broadly, looking up at me with a glimmer of renewed hope shining in her eyes. "I keep forgetting how powerful and cool my Super Self really is. I know It’s IN me because I can feel It. I have to remember that—no matter what anyone says—I really am ‘lawa’! (Lawa is the Hawaiian word for ‘enough’ that I taught my kids to use as a mantra, whenever they felt overwhelmed). My Super Self helped me create my Project of Bliss, and I felt totally good enough when I was doing that. You know, I feel better already, Mr. Berg. You always seem to know exactly what to say to help me remember WHO I REALLY AM.

And, who ARE you Helen? I asked.

I’m a Cosmic Super Self! I am all powerful! I am connected to the Super Self of the Universe! I can feel It! In fact, my Cosmic Super Self just downloaded a really cool idea into my mind for your homework assignment. I’ll bring it in tomorrow. I promise. She grinned, picked up her backpack and left, yelling back, I am going to take thought where thought has never gone before—just like you always tell us to! Just the mere mention of the Super Self and its inner power had shifted her energy to a higher vibration of self-confidence and opened her up to a vast array of new possibilities!

My heart went out to her though, as I saw her run down the long empty hallway of our school, to her last track meet of the year. Just hang in there, Helen, everything will work out for the best. And don’t forget, when you turn eighteen nobody will ever be able to boss you around ever again—as long as you remember—the Force IS WITH you! I yelled after her, NEVER against you! She turned around and offered me the Hawaiian hang loose sign which we often used in class to remind ourselves to relax and chill out when the pressures of the system seemed too great to bare.

It is so easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion;

it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is

he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness

his own independence, and does not conform.

—Ralph Waldo Emerson ( p )

Helen was caught in a cultural bind. And—the harsh truth is—no amount of positive thinking could lessen the immense challenges she faced. The competitive paradigm of our highly secularized society was weighing more heavily on her shoulders by the day. I felt so much compassion for her. Our materialistic culture HAD caught her in its clutches, and was demanding that she conform to its expectations. Her frustration was palpable. She was becoming more and more enslaved to the ‘system’ by the day, and all my happy talk about the Super Self was a mere drop in the bucket compared to the pressure she was under from her parents and everyone else around her. It would be an uphill battle for her to retain the knowledge she had learned while in Bergland. The pressures would be enormous to make her forgot about the Super Self within, and substitute that wisdom with the capitalistic equation of hard work and struggle equals success, happiness and money.

As I watched her leave that afternoon I vowed once again to find the time to write about the grueling life of modern teenagers who have to attend public school. Somone needed to honestly and courageously examine what their dark predicament can teach us about ourselves, our beliefs, our culture’s chosen gods, the future of education, the future of our great nation, the future of civilization and the future of the whole world.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness. Only the light can do that.

—Martin Luther King Jr.

Helen, like so many other children today, has been made into an unwitting slave to so many ignorant belief systems, with so many different agendas, that she has almost lost her will to live. The older generation is instructing her in a way that is placing a mental matrix around the inner light of WHO SHE REALLY IS. Every day more laws, rules, expectations, definitions and regulations are placed around her life, imprisoning her in an old paradigm of materialism, competition, economic servitude and cultural conformity. So, it’s no mystery why she feels so stifled, exhausted, dispirited, subjugated and disempowered. She is being forcibly programmed to acquiesce to society’s many out-dated plans and purposes for her life, rather than encouraged to discover and follow her own unique, individual ‘path to bliss’. Society wants her to become a governable, malleable, subservient, unquestioning Uncle Tom.

Adhere to your own purposes and you will soon feel as well as you ever did.

On the contrary, if you lose the power of keeping your own resolution,

you will regret it all your life.

—Abraham Lincoln

Helen is experiencing first hand, an unrecognized, but insidious and unrelenting pressure from society, to surrender her inner will, her own deep, inner personal purposes, to the outer expectations and self definitions of the familial system, to the school system, to the cultural system, to the governmental system, to the economic system—AND even to an intricate indoctrination system based on media and peer pressure. Helen is being enslaved every bit as harshly by the institutions around her, as was the legendary Uncle Tom, who was so brutally chained to the old plantation system back in the days of Uncle Tom’s Cabin. It is so strange that the institutions of today treat our youngsters as if they are an inferior race of beings, a race that the older generation seems to believe must be rigidly controlled, dominated, programmed, hypnotized and threatened into becoming compliant consuming capitalists, rather than the cosmic Super Beings and masters, they were created to be!

(Even as I write this I can see a class of uniformed high school kids being forced to run around the Marina Green for gym class here in San Francisco. Hurry up—don’t stop! the P.E. teacher yells at them incessantly, as they round the green. Some of the kids are lagging behind, looking exhausted, struggling as best they can to keep up. It’s obvious to me that they are feeling very much like the slaves they are being trained to become. I wish I could run over to them, and free them all from their indentured captivity! Perhaps this book will help.)

They keep you doped up with advertisements, religion and TV.

And they tell you that you’re clever and classless and free.

But you’re still peasants as far as I can see.

John Lennon ( p )

John Lennon knew what was going on, and his great music reflected that awareness clearly. We must wake up and recognize the insidious mental conditioning that has turned us into a race of unquestioning lemmings, and programmed us to live in unnecessary limitation and bondage. And, we must stop passing that indoctrination on down to our children under the guise of so-called free public education. This is why I am writing Uncle Tom’s Classroom. I intend to offer some radical new ideas about ways to liberate our children (and ourselves) from all institutionalized belief systems and limiting definitions of self. There IS an alternative to the present dictatorial tactics now being used to program our kids into submissive subjugation.

The human race is not evil. It has just allowed itself to become a manipulator’s dream. It has given up free thinking so much so that it hasn’t even noticed the cultural coup d’tat that has happened to the mind.

What is needed is a reconnection with the Higher Dimensions, so we can begin to enjoy our natural and holistic connection with the Multidimensional Self.

David Ickes ( p )

I call my new holistic approach—the Cosmic Curriculum—and I know it can free kids to remember, reconnect with, and become WHO THEY REALLY ARE! I know because I actually saw it happen in my classroom. The Cosmic Curriculum of the Super Self is able to release the inner genius within kids because it helps them log on to their real identity and the super powers that flow from that identity. I’ve used this approach in my own cosmic classroom by the sea for the last few years and the results have been absolutely extraordinary, to say the least. I will extrapolate on this radical educational adventure in much more detail in later chapters.

It is my desire to prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, why we owe it to our kids to end their enslavement to all imprisoning beliefs that would seek to chain them to the unworkable worldviews and limited paradigms of the past. This awakening process will take courage and some very deep and honest soul searching. In order to wake up and liberate our young, we of the older (controlling) generations will have to be willing to pull our ostrich heads out of the sands of old nineteenth and twentieth century thinking long enough, to take a good hard look at what we are really doing to our kids in the name of education. At some point over the past hundred years, education, as it was meant to be in its truest, classical sense, has been replaced by institutionalized brainwashing, indoctrination, cultural conditioning, and unrelenting mental programming.

Let me reiterate here that I am not suggesting that there is anything intrinsically wrong with institutions in their purest form. Most systemic structures are basically neutral. Forms are neutral. Institutions are organized systems, which can be used for good, or not. What the huge monolithic institutions accomplish in the world is always up to the people who run them, as well as the people who participate in them.

Modern civilization has emerged like an impersonal brute force, and unethical, unspiritual mind, driven by a violent drive for power over. It has been characterized by overdevelopment, intensification of ethnic and religious hatreds, destruction of the environment and unending growth of the military industrial complex. The systems act like parasites, sucking out the individual’s life energy, offering us gadgets and high tech toys, instead of the truth of Divine Consciousness.

Dianel Pinchbeck ( p )

What I am suggesting is that many of our great institutions like capitalism, government, public education and even organized religion have been taken over by people who have hidden agendas that often seek control and domination. They are using the institutions to foster a greedy, rigid religion of fear, dictatorial domination, unending labor, passive compliance, social stratification, and unbridled competition.

Those who deny freedom to others, do not deserve it not for themselves,

and under a just God, can not retain it for long.

It is the destiny of the United States to demonstrate this Truth to the world.

In giving freedom to those who are enslaved,

we assure freedom to the free.

—Abraham Lincoln ( p )

I became a teacher because I love learning about, and sharing, the wonder, glory, and power of great ideas. I love watching how beautiful ideas, values, and ideals have the power to grow into 3D reality. And, I admire the way the original (mythical) American Dream was based on great ideals like life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all! This amazing promise of freedom filled me with pride when I first studied it way back in the 1950s. I grew up feeling profoundly grateful to have been born as a lucky beneficiary of the American Dream. Learning how the Bill of Rights and the Constitution guaranteed me a lifetime of freedom, to enjoy life, liberty and pursue happiness, convinced me that I was truly blessed to live at the perfect time and in the perfect country.

America . . . It is a fabulous country; a place where miracles

not only happen, but where they happen all the time.

—Thomas Wolfe ( p )

I was born in 1944, and raised during the optimistic post-war years when anything seemed possible for America. I was brought up to believe that America was the greatest hope for freedom, equality and justice for all that existed anywhere on the planet. I was educated into an absolute and unshakable confidence in the high ideals that the Declaration of Independence and our Constitution described, and I firmly believed that my life in America would eventually prove these words to be absolutely true! I was born free BECAUSE I was American. I had freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and I was equal with everyone else. I was told that I was guaranteed a whole array of other rights, which allowed me the liberty to pursue happiness wherever that led! WOW! I really believed that I was living in a truly free country, and I loved the idea—ideal, the cultural mythology of America the Beautiful with all my heart, and soul, and mind!

But, as they say in some circles, things are NOT always as they seem. I now realize that the great freedoms I once believed were my absolute Divine Right, as guaranteed by the United States Government, do not really exist in their pure form. Perhaps they never DID exist. This is the reason I have decided to write Uncle Tom’s Classroom. The idealistic promises contained in our Declaration of Independence, Bill of Rights, and Constitution are NOT being realized, especially in the way we treat our teachers and students in our public school system. It may sound shocking, but the public school system, which was supposedly built to foster free-thinking and democratic principles, has become a dictatorship for both students and teachers alike. Both adults and kids within the school system are treated like Uncle Tom’s, who are expected to behave, conform and follow the program We are being told what to do, what to think, what to focus on, what to believe in, and what to expect of life, so we can become part of the human herd mentality that still dominates much of this planet today.

My thirty years of teaching in the school system have shown me that my students and I have NOT been offered true freedom of speech, or equal justice under the law. We have not been allowed to follow our bliss, explore WHO WE REALLY ARE, or even discuss the purpose and meaning of life. We have not been given the liberty promised us by our own Constitution. Our public school system has degenerated into an indoctrination center for producing good little worker-bees rather than a platform for launching our children’s minds and hearts towards their highest and best dreams. Our public schools have become more like cultural concentration camps than creative centers for free speech, free discussion, free self-exploration, free self-education, free self-realization and full self-actualization!

I love the idea of free education, and I love the liberating power of learning. And I know that there are thousands of brilliant educators in the public school system who are truly dedicated to helping kids learn the basic skills necessary to create happy and productive lives. If it wasn’t for such great teachers in my own life, I wouldn’t be where I am today. But, I now feel somewhat like Neo in the movie Matrix, in that I have awakened from the cultural dream just enough, to see that—when we turned our minds and bodies over to the system’s state mandated curriculum—we inadvertently allowed our lives to be sucked into the system’s narrow minded agendas. No wonder there is such despair and frustration in America and around the world today. Billions of us have been educated out of the self knowledge that would set us truly free!

I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty

than those attending too small a degree of it.

—Thomas Jefferson

The challenge before us begins to come into view, once we start to wake up and ask ourselves if there just might be more to life than merely preparing ourselves (and our kids) to become laboring cogs in a worldwide economic merry go round. I cannot believe that teaching this one world view was the primary intention or goal for public education in America, when it was envisioned so long ago. I have always believed that the vast majority of Americans are basically good, kind and freedom loving. My love for America’s public school system has come from my idealistic conviction that the most enlightened founders of the American Dream intended for schools to free minds and empower kids, not turn them into unquestioning worker drones or greedy, overly competitive consumers of a disproportionate percentage of the world’s resources.

Only the truly educated are free.

—Epictetus

I have spent most of my life inside the world of public schools, either as a student or a teacher ever since 1949, when I started kindergarten. I have remained in the realm of public education, in one capacity or another, ever since. I absolutely love being around people who want to teach, learn and play with great ideas. There is no greater joy for me than to be involved in the great adventure of learning, teaching, building dreams and helping kids grow exciting new futures. But, the many decades I have spent in the school system have shown me that what has really been happening in many of our classrooms, under the guise of public education is not helping our children wake up to their true potential. In fact, the system as it functions now, is actually putting kids to sleep and turning them into numbed out cultural clones.

It took me many years of inner struggle, but I finally began to see that the public system of education has morphed into something quite unlike the great temples of learning I dreamt of inhabiting when I became a teacher. A creeping superficiality and materialistic mind-set have transformed the school system into more of a training camp for young laborers, than a think tank, or center of learning for creating a generation of free thinkers, innovators and trailblazers. The system has gotten so bogged down in surface concerns, competitive test scores, and economic indoctrination, that the real needs of the whole child the multidimensional, inner child—are being almost completely ignored!

Can you imagine studying about the wholeness of an orange without peeling off the skin to look inside—or studying the biology of the human body without examining the organic systems that make up the body? Can you imagine studying an atom without looking into the subatomic particles that make up the atom, or studying the Earth’s geology without looking deep within the Earth? Can you imagine studying automotive mechanics without examining what’s inside the car? And yet, the present public school curriculum, as mandated by federal, state and local governments, only deals with superficialities, surface concerns and outer forms, never with the inner content of kids—never with the mysterious, multidimensional consciousness that really makes our kids the glorious, life affirming creatures we know they truly are! It is time to stop being afraid of our younger generation, which has resulted in our misguided attempts to tyrannize and imprison them—and begin instead—to treat them with the honor, love and respect they deserve.

The (real) purpose of education (should be) to replace

an empty mind with an open one.

—Malcolm Forbes ( p )

In this book, I will explain how I broke out of the old three dimensional paradigm that focused only on outer, surface concerns, and transformed my Bergland classroom—from being a crucible for creating compliant capitalists—into a free thinking, educational domain, where I used quantum physics to empower my kids to explore the science of Super Consciousness. In Bergland, I allowed, even encouraged my students to look deep within themselves, to explore their innermost core identity, and what they found within completely changed the way they saw themselves, and how they interfaced with reality. I intend to show how I helped my students give up the old paradigm of seeing themselves as mere humanoid worker bees, and introduced them instead to the great adventure of discovering and exploring the vast, unlimited potentialities of the multidimensional Cosmic Consciousness that lives within!

In this book I will share with you the classroom strategies I developed, that helped my kids understand the empowering idea that we humans, like everything else in the Quantum Field of Infinite Possibilities have both inner and outer dimensions—inner and outer aspects that make up our whole being. I showed them how the outer world of face and form is complimented by an equally important inner world of consciousness, thought, and feeling. These worlds depend on one another, and compliment each other. They cannot exist separate and apart from each other. We are both particles (bodies) and waves (energy). We are both form and content! We are both physical and nonphysical. We are both consciousness and energy. We are both visible and invisible—AND—most importantly, we are both human beings as well as Super Beings. We are both human selves and super selves! There IS an inner space within each and every kid that houses an extraordinary cosmic Super Self of infinite wisdom, power, potential and possibility, and I opened their minds to that awesome idea.

We will eventually become entities of cosmic wisdom when we reach full self-consciousness. Earth CAN and will become a planet of fulfillment.

Rudolph Steiner ( p )

The more I talked about our dual nature, as both form and content, as both bodies and minds, as both creation and creator, as both physical and nonphysical, light bulbs started going off in my students’ minds. Once my kids began to talk about, explore and experience their inner selves as cosmically conscious Super Beings, every aspect of their lives took off. They quickly began to develop their inner powers—those multidimensional abilities that become available to all who awaken to true selfhood. Like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz my students began to access enormous reserves of wisdom, courage and love from deep with themselves—and they discovered that the ultimate wizard with all the answers needed—was actually their own connection with cosmic Super Selfhood.

We studied about Einstein who explained our dual nature succinctly with his brilliant equation, E=mc2. We poured over his theories about time and space, and his ideas about material and energetic dimensions. Together, we discovered that below and beneath the surface appearance of every child, a powerful Super Being of unlimited power, intelligence and potential lies in waiting—yearning to be released! This means of course, that when it comes to real education in the most classical sense, the exploration and development of this inner dimension, this inner life—is not only AS important as the outer—but is actually crucial in the ongoing evolutionary unfoldment of the overall cosmic plan.

Society everywhere is in a conspiracy against the manhood of

every one of its members. Society is a joint stock company.

It loves not realities and creators, but names, customs,

and the securing of bread for each shareholder.

Trust thyself. Accept the place that Divine Providence has found for you.

God will not have his work made manifest by cowards.

God needs a Divine Man to exhibit anything Divine.

—Ralph Waldo Emerson (p )

Our educational system has become a coconspirator in perpetrating a false religion of materialism, consumerism, economic competition, greed and fear. We must face up to what we have done. We have created a Frankenstein monster of dominance and control and we call it public education . . . The American public school system has become a brainwashing service for preparing kids to fit into the economic paradigm that now runs much of the world—a capitalistic system that many great thinkers now believe is totally out of control. Because of this—our great nation and our kids have fallen into an unprecedented period of self alienation, anger and ever growing fear. Capitalism, like any other system, is neutral, but the way it is being used today—to control the wage earner, and turn us into consumers—is NOT! Capitalism has made money into a god, and programmed kids in the West, to make that god the center of their educational attention!

This covert religion of acquisition and materialism has caused teachers and students alike, to become disconnected from the truth about WHO WE REALLY ARE as cosmic co-creators. The standardized curriculum of consumerism, conformity and competition has attempted to make us all forget why we are really here! We were NOT born to be mere laborers, consumers or wage earners. We are incarnating on Earth at this time in history to wake up and learn how to become Masters of the Quantum Field. Let me say here, I have nothing against either the capitalistic system or the public school system! What I AM saying, is that they have been taken over and turned into gods by some power hungry people who do not have the best interests of our children at heart.

Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history. We hold the power and bear the responsibility. In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free.

We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of Earth.

The way is plain, peaceful generous, just—a way which followed, the world will forever applaud, and God must forever bless.

—Abraham Lincoln’s Message to Congress, 1862 ( p )

Free education—the acquiring of true, liberating self knowledge—is the best foundation upon which we can transform our American society into a genuinely free organism that fosters and nourishes individual creativity, happiness and mutual cooperation. To succeed in this great cause, education must be reinvented as a freeing tool, not as a strategy for programming the younger generation into robotic compliance, cultural conformity, and competitive economic warfare. It must be used to open up minds, open out possibilities, open up the cultural conversation, and open up future potentialities that even our Founders would have had a difficult time imagining. As Lincoln suggested, it is our generation, the older generation raised in the Twentieth Century, that holds the real power and which bears the enormous responsibility to recreate an America that the world will applaud once again, and that our Creator will forever bless and nourish! We really do owe it to our children to give them the kind of holistic knowledge base they require to become the fully liberated cosmic beings they were born to be at this pivotal time in history.

Man is a stream whose Source is hidden.

Always our Being is descending into us from we know not where.

—Ralph Waldo Emerson

Many people complete their time in school, graduate, disconnect from WHO THEY REALLY ARE as multidimensional super beings, and then, try to fit into the main economic matrix by finding the perfect job. We are so programmed into joining the working ranks of the global job force that we forget to look back and ask, "What really happened to me during all those years in school?