Memorandum

To: John Caldwell From: Marc W. Saxe Date: April 19, 2013 Subject: ECTS 5023, BR2, Way of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman, Saxe

Daniel Jay Millman (born February 22, 1946) is an American author and lecturer in the self-help field. Born in in Los Angeles, California, his pursuits as a youth included modern dance, martial arts, trampoline, , and . He won the Gymnastics Federation (USGF) national title on the trampoline and was voted Senior Athlete of the Year as a high school student. He attended U.C. Berkeley. In his freshman year he won the 1964 Trampoline World Championships in London and earned All-American honors winning an NCAA Championships on vault (1964) and a USGF championship in floor exercise (1966). Millman won four gold medals in gymnastics representing the United States in the 1966 and was voted Senior U.C. Berkeley Athlete of the Year in 1968, graduating with a B.A. degree in Psychology. Millman became director of gymnastics at in 1968. He coached U.S. Olympian Steve Hug and brought the Stanford gymnastics to national prominence. He’s trained in Aikido, T'ai Chi, and other martial arts. He became assistant professor in physical education at in 1972. He practiced various yoga and martial arts disciplines in , , , and . Millman became a published author with Way of the Peaceful Warrior in 1980. He began producing audio and video programs, and to present seminars and professional keynotes in 1985. Although difficult to categorize, his books are generally related to the human potential movement. Way of the Peaceful Warrior, was adapted to film as "Peaceful Warrior," with Nick Nolte as Socrates. Millman produces a series of quarterly newsletters in addition to speaking engagements.

Bibliography of Other Works by Dan Millman (Wikipedia, Amazon):

1979: Whole Body Fitness 1980: Way of the Peaceful Warrior: A book that changes lives 1985: The Warrior Athlete (rev. ed. of Whole Body Fitness) 1990: Sacred Journey of the Peaceful Warrior 1991: Secret of the Peaceful Warrior (children - illustrated by Taylor Bruce) 1992: No Ordinary Moments: A peaceful warrior's guide to daily life 1993: Quest for the Crystal Castle (children - illustrated by Taylor Bruce) 1994: The Life You Were Born to Live: A guide to finding your life purpose 1995: The Laws of Spirit: A tale of transformation 1998: Everyday Enlightenment: The twelve gateways to personal growth 1999: Body Mind Mastery (rev. edition of The Warrior Athlete) 2000: Living on Purpose: Straight answers to life's tough questions 2006: The Journeys of Socrates 2007: Wisdom of the Peaceful Warrior: A companion to the book that changes lives 2009: Bridge Between Worlds: Extraordinary experiences that changed lives 2010: Peaceful Warrior: The Graphic Novel (illustrated by Andrew Winegarner) 2011: The Four Purposes of Life: Finding meaning and direction in a changing world

Synopsis of Way of the Peaceful Warrior (“Peaceful Warrior”):

Way of the Peaceful Warrior is somewhat based on the story of Dan Millman, a world champion gymnast and student of martial arts. The book is a meandering trip through a plethora of events tied to lessons of human growth, magical spirituality, Zen Buddism, gymnastics and recovery. His guru, possibly a figment of his imagination, whom he names Socrates, leads him through his journey challenging him to give up his mind in an effort to find true consciousness and universal happiness. He confronts both inner and outer demons, within himself, from Socrates, the world and his efforts and arrives at the other side richer for it.

Personal Value:

It is certainly difficult to question Millman’s credentials for writing books around gymnastics, martial arts and the journey of a competitor on the road to wisdom and happiness. What I can question is his storytelling, writing and the philosophical foundations of this unwieldy mashup of spiritual concepts between the covers of Peaceful Warrior. My critique begins on page one and continues through the entire text. Does Millman have the right to attempt to share his personal journey? Absolutely. Is it a journey worth visiting? That depends.

The questions I have start with whether this is Millman’s journey at all. Certainly within every chapter, if not every page or two, Millman indirectly references story lines found in numerous “human potential” writings of the late 1950’s through the late 1970’s (the period of the book). Given that he was in San Francisco and the general Bay Area from his U.C. Berkeley days through his coaching days at Stanford, it would almost impossible for him to have not been greatly influenced by other “counter culture” philosophy common in that area during that time. It may be because I was in and out of there from the early ‘70’s through the early ‘80’s somewhat regularly, that I am aware of elements of other works and stories that wound their way into Peaceful Warrior. Maybe, the references are just too obvious to miss.

To start, Millman’s guru, Socrates, is almost a direct parallel to Carlos Castenada’s Don Juan, simply located in a different setting. Castenada’s works were common reading from the late 60’s, when Don Juan, A Yaqui Way of Knowledge, was first published. The idea of a mysterious, spiritual teacher, magically finding his way into the hero’s consciousness is the story Castenada tells. Don Juan is written much better, and delves deeper into the meaning of hallucinatory revelations that are the core of Millman’s piece. It would be almost impossible for Millman to have lived during that time in that area without significant exposure to Castenada. He was common reading.

The basic theme is taken almost directly from Dr. Richard Alpert’s, Remember, Be Here Now. Alpert is also known as Baba Ram Dass. Dr. Alpert, a Harvard professor of psychology was known as a partnering with Timothy Leary in the early experiments with LSD. When this work provoked, but failed to answer his spiritual questions, he went to India and became Ram Dass. Ram Dass was a well known consciousness guru. Be Here Now may have been one of 5-10 essential books in the San Francisco counter culture’s personal library. There is no way Millman could have lived in that area at that time without exposure to it. There are many references throughout Peaceful Warrior to messages that would have been shaped by Ram Dass, with meditation being the most clearly defined. It is difficult to not read some version of psychedelic experimentation into Millman’s hallucinations and Socrates references to living in the now in Peaceful Warrior. The influence is clear.

The next area of philosophical borrowing comes in the methodology of Socrates in dealing with Millman. Again, during that same era, San Francisco was one of the focal points for the resurgence of early 1900’s discussions around the teachings of G.I. Gurdjieff. As Gurdjieff’s teachings were relatively obscure, there is somewhat less chance that Millman literally picked it up and used his work directly. But, his influence is definitely there. Gurdjieff is known as a Russian spiritual teacher and leader of the turn of the century famous for mysterious travels in his attempts to crack the code of consciousness for himself and his numerous disciples. He wrote Meetings with Remarkable Men, a story of his travels and journey, In Search of Being, The Fourth Way to Consciousness, Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson: All And Everything, among others. The best telling of Gurdjieff’s teaching methods are found in P.D. Ouspensky’s work, In Search of the Miraculous. These works were commonly discussed in coffee shops and seminars in the San Francisco area at the time. Each of these is a clearer telling of the tale of the difficult journey to personal consciousness. Gurdjieff’s work clearly defines the process of attainment as confront certain, almost pre-determined, barriers along the way. The way Socrates handles Millman is very reminiscent of Gurdjieff’s stories about his work with his disciples.

Next, the reference to Socrates is not appropriate. Socrates was known for using mostly deductive logic in a dialectic form to elicit learning from within his students. Although there is a smattering of that in Millman’s Socrates, the real jolts Millman receives comes from Socrates’ direct contact imbuing spiritual hallucinations. I found this very difficult to get through. These references were so strikingly out of place that Millman’s credibility as a writer was damaged. These mental excursions seemed psychedelic.

One could go on and on about the story line and mismatched references. A few include those to the harsh Zen master attempting to crack through with a difficult koan, the vague reference to Dicken’s “A Christmas Carol” with Socrates as the ghosts of past, present and future. There was even a somewhat prophetic one resembling Tyler Durden from the film Fight Club. You could find a bit of “The Miracle on Ice” in the gymnastics portion of the book. It would not be difficult to find a few to Werner Erhart and EST, also spawned in the region at that time. There was even a little bit of “Galaxy Quest”, “Never give up…never surrender”, although that came later. This book was a mashup of a variety of self- improvement and personal consciousness works.

To give him credit, there is the underlying tale of seeking, the journey, the barrier, the redemption and solution. If this is truly loosely autobiographical, I have no problem with his journey. It’s as admirable as his career. The outline of the story is good. The telling is so messed up, it’s very difficult to get to any underlying message even with him attempting to beat the reader and the first person teller over the head on every page.

My best guess is that Millman came out of his athletic career at a time in which personal growth was a burgeoning industry and he decided to take advantage of it. The writing is sophomoric at best. The story line was parallel to others, common in the day. The philosophy is a mishmash of a variety of the numerous self-improvement, higher consciousness works of the time. For that, he created a following not unlike many other happiness gurus, wrote a number of books for his followers and made a buck or two. This is the one that got him started.

References

Amazon, “Dan Millman’s Page”. http://amzn.to/XVs7Cp, (2013).

Wikipedia, “Daniel J. Millman”. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_millman, (2013).