WAKING UP WITH EVERYONE AROUND US
Available in print, digital and audio formats
USA: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Audible.
Canada, UK, Europe, Australia and elsewhere: please visit the Amazon site for your region.
Waking Up With Everyone Around Us is a step-by-step guide, a book of poetry, a memoir, a life's work all blended together to form an alive manuscript for how we can support one another in Heart Awakening and co-creating a Culture of Connection.
Heart Awakening is about a radical change of perception. Instead of feeling separated in life, we awaken into feeling connected to everything and everyone. It’s an evolutionary leap that gives us amplified access to reciprocal love and collaborative wisdom.
The timing for our collective bloom couldn’t be better. More than anything else, our planet has a rising fever and requires unprecedented cooperation to bring her temperature down. Our survival depends upon our awakening together.
This book is about Heart Awakening, but not in the way you might expect. Instead of presenting some new or old way to awaken individually, Tej is sharing specific, reliable ways we can change our existing friendships, families and organizations so that they support us in Heart Awakening rather than hinder us. This book is a guide or blueprint showing one way in which we can do this.
I’m not being cynical when I say that members of most social groups in our current Culture of Separation have little interest in personal awakening. They may have no frame of reference for what it means to watch their thoughts, feel their emotions, intentionally open to love, or follow what they truly want. Without a framework, getting members of any group to successfully sit together and talk about purpose, presence, emotions, love, and heart-direction is unlikely to happen. Not only may there be a wide variation of interest levels, but the self-reflection these Five Ways of Being require, can activate our deepest fears around being open with one another.
Most groups in our current mass culture are either Doing groups, organized around a functional purpose, or Being groups, whose members stay busy to avoid simply being. There are voices within these groups that don’t recognize the value of any heart-awakening process when there is work to be done. In most families, there is that uncle or teenager who just rolls their eyes when asked if they want to go deeper into family connection. “Uh…no, thanks.” At school, there will be the conservative principle who says, “We’re preparing our kids for four years of college, not for a night in a California hot tub.” And if you suggest bringing heart awakening agreements into your local prison, the superintendent will probably confuse you with a dog dressed up in a tux, speaking in tongues. We need practical ways to bring these agreements into groups, while respecting those who want nothing to do with them.
Passage from Waking Up With Everyone Around Us
REVIEWS
This a timely well-crafted, thoughtful, and thought-provoking book on small group dynamics and honest heartfelt communication. I recommend it to any and all interested in small groups and greater personal self-awareness, self-acceptance, and compassion for others. It's a very practical guide to forming and experiencing Heart Circles, and it's subtly and powerfully spiritual without being at all religious or dogmatic. Tej Steiner has been a leader and facilitator of small groups for over 40 years in the US and abroad. He knows of what he speaks. He writes clearly, honestly, and with humility. Waking Up With Everyone Around Us should be a valued part of any sociology, social psychology, counseling, seminary, or social work library. It's a valued part of mine. — C. S.
Love this book, the poems, and the kindness and love with which Tej writes the book. He feels so honest and truthful, and his ideas he expresses are life changing if we implement them. I love the title and the idea of waking up in community, together with others and not alone. — Elizabeth Smith
I've been a part of a Heart Circle for 4 years that Tej helped construct. I know no better way to understand and create a Heart Circle than by reading this book. — Jennifer Morrow
A totally inspiring book for a way to bring real connection with each other, no matter where we live on this planet of ours. — Hilary Reading
I recommend this book to everyone who longs for heart-filled purpose in their life, who feels the pain of existing in today’s society and wants to find a way to heal. — Maureen Torres
The most important book of our time. I learned so much about Life, Love, and my and our purpose for being here on this planet. Thank you for sharing your great wisdom, heart, and art with all and for translating that into a pleasurable and delightful read. I'm enlivened and inspired to continue to live into these teachings and explore how to share them with the world. At this juncture in history, our survival as a species literally depends on waking up with everyone around us. I feel a great alignment happening with my purpose in my personal life and in what I want to offer the world through reading the book. It's a gorgeous work of art, heart-fully moving (I cried several times), funny ( I also laughed out loud many times), clever, insightful, and is so practical, grounded, and clear! A manual for how to awaken our hearts in community. There is nothing more critical. — Jill S.
A brilliant book that eloquently describes the principles that allow us to awaken in the "we" space no matter the purpose of the group. A mix of poignant stories, ageless wisdom and a step by step guide, Tej Steiner's book is an essential practical map for all of us in these times of disconnection. This book is for anyone desiring to elevate the coherence and effectiveness of their organization. I am grateful for Tej Steiner's inspired and refreshing contribution to heart-intelligent governance. — T. J.
Incredibly insightful and intuitive. A road map for sanity and serenity ... — David Smith
Written with great heart and great insight, I love this book. It took me on a journey through Tej's own awakening process, entertainingly. It is written in a light-hearted and poetic spirit. And I love the premise that we are in a time of mass awakening - so hopeful in our stressful political environments. — Pamela
Very thought provoking as well as practical conversation around how we can form deeper group dynamics and connections. At times, it reads as though Tej was writing what I was thinking in my mind. I also enjoyed that the ideas and paradigms in the book were offered rather than prescribed. Thank you for bringing this conversation into the world! — T. Melberg
Tej Steiner's insight into the bigger picture of what it means to be human and heart centered in a rapidly changing world culture is grounded and enlightening on many levels... He has a special way of communicating what we all know is the imperative of our time. — Richard Gannaway
This book rates with one of my very favorites on this subject. Coming from his uniquely experiential perspective, Tej took me on his journey, while also giving me his deep insights into the human condition...which catalyzed in me a deeper understanding of concepts I have been reading about for years. This book felt GOOD! — Gordon Hopkins
The primary basis for my five-star rating is the content and the importance of the information for humanity in this book. It is a short book, yet contains the most relevant content to actually ignite a real transformation in the world, as it does not look to outside authorities, but right at ourselves and our caged-in hearts. Steiner implies that there is no need for perfection, just our willingness to commit to practicing The Five Ways of Being with others. — Adam Rose
Each nourishing page breathes living, vibrant space into me, beautifully illuminating the separation and murky recesses I had been unable to see. — Marc Adams