The Hoop and the Tree: A Compass for Finding a Deeper Relationship with All Life

by Chris Hoffman

Overview

This is a book for seekers of personal development and planetary healing. Imagine a vertical axis running through the center of your being, from your deepest roots up to your highest aspirations. This is the Tree, which anchors and centers you. Now imagine this Tree encircled by concentric rings of family, friends, all of humanity, and the encompassing beauty of nature. This is the Hoop of relationship. This simple yet life-changing volume fully explains for the first time the power of these two ubiquitous symbols to bring us a whole new understanding of ourselves and our place in the world. Through explorations of their deep meaning in psychology, Native American and other spiritual traditions, myth and fairy tale, author Chris Hoffman shows how we can use the Hoop and the Tree to be happier in our relationships, increase our connection with nature, create a more functional society, and live lives of balance and fulfillment. This twentieth anniversary edition, revised and expanded, offers additional insights into practical applications, describes the initiations needed for a fully lived life, and gives simple exercises for visualizing and integrating one’s own deep structure of wholeness.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781641604949
Publisher:	Chicago Review Press, Incorporated
Publication date:	04/06/2021
Edition description:	Second Edition, Second edition
Pages:	256
Sales rank:	999,218
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Chris Hoffman has facilitated human and organization development in a variety of clinical and organizational settings, including for Naropa University, several community mental health programs, and a Fortune 500 energy company.  He now devotes most of his time to volunteer climate protection work and writing. A widely published poet and retired licensed professional counselor, he holds a BA from Yale University, a Masters degree from Northeastern University, and an MBA from University of Colorado. He lives in Colorado. See more at his website, www.hoopandtree.org.

Table of Contents

1 The Shape of All Shapes 1

The Shape of the Model 4

Evidence from Around the World and Throughout History 8

The Hoop and the Tree in Our Own Lives 18

Can It Really Help? 21

Setting Off 21

2 All My Relations: The Hoop 25

"No Man Is an Island, Entire of Itself" 27

The Interpersonal Ring of the Hoop: The Social Atom 28

The Wider Hoop 30

The Ecological "Ring" of the Hoop: The Ecological Atom 34

Building and Maintaining Relationships 39

A Hoop of Many Hoops 42

How Is Your Hoop? 60

3 The Holy Tree 63

An Ancient, Widespread, and Potent Image 65

This Tree Grows Within You 67

"Comfort from a High Place" 69

The Tree-and-Hoop Process of Development 80

A Modern Tree Story 82

"Support from a Low Place" 83

The Tree Centers the Hoop 104

How Is Your Tree? 106

4 The Hoop and the Tree: The Deep Structure of the Whole Self 109

The Hoop-and-Tree Process of Development 111

Growing to Wholeness in the Ecological Hoop 115

Two Forms of Intelligence 118

When the Hoop Is Undeveloped 120

When the Tree Is Undeveloped 122

Addiction and Codependence 124

Working Toward Psycho-Spiritual Wholeness 127

The Fully Developed Self Is Ecological 131

5 Go in Beauty 137

Our Current Situation 139

The Deep Structure of the Healthy Society 141

Bringing the Hoop and Tree into the World 146

The Individual's Journey 153

Paths to Wholeness 155

Who Are You, Really? Really? 157

Go in Beauty 160

6 The Hoop and the Tree for Healing and Transformation: A Twenty-Year Perspective 165

The Hoop and the Tree and Our World Situation 171

Initiations 176

Initiations into the Human Ring of the Hoop 179

Initiations into the Ecological Ring of the Hoop 180

The Millennial Adventure of the Soul 187

Getting Stuck: Initiation Failures or Regression 197

The Perilous Return: Gluskabe and the Four Wishes 198

Hoop-and-Tree Aspects of All Initiations 199

The Hoop and the Tree for Personal Growth 201

Further Exploration 214

Once You Have "Finished": Growing with It 222

Getting Down to Work 223

Acknowledgments 225

Notes 227

Editorial Reviews

The Hoop & The Tree: A Compass For Finding A Deeper Relationship With All Life is a ground breaking treatise offer the reader a practical integration of psychology, spirituality, and ecology. Chris Hoffman draws from world mythology and scared traditions that include elements of Native American teachings, Taoism, Kabbalism, Sufism, Druidism, Buddhism, and contemporary psychology. Highly recommended reading for students of metaphysics, spirituality, psychology, and personal growth, The Hoop And The Tree makes clear that there is a direct relationship between human psychology and environmental ecology, and that the mature self is necessarily ecological in nature.

"Groundbreaking…Highly recommended." —The Midwest Book Review

"A persuasive view of balance, focus, and personal and global wholeness." —NAPRA ReView

"Therapeutic, enlightening, and a joy to read." —The Bloomsbury Review

"Gives us tools to heal our psyches and bring us closer to experiencing the deep inter-connectedness of all life." —AHP Perspective (Association for Humanistic Psychology)

"All those interested in ecopsychology, as well as anyone concerned with therapy, mythology, spirituality or personal growth, will find rich and rewarding material here.  I recommend it highly."  —Elizabeth J. Roberts, Ed.D,  co-editor of Prayers for a Thousand Years, Earth Prayers, and Life Prayers

"I loved it. An integrative, life-sustaining, eco-spiritual point of view and practice. This book helps us to widen the boundaries of our compassion." —Ralph Metzner, Ph.D., author of Green Psychology

"Compelling, grounded, full of hope… can be easily followed in our daily activities." —Marc Bekoff, author of Strolling With Our Kin, Minding Animals, and The Ten Trusts (with Jane Goodall)
 

From the Publisher