Janet Adler Memorial

Janet loved bowls, she loved vessels. And she loved the light. The bowl in her studio — in the kiva — filled and emptied, emptied and filled, with stones, apples, water, flowers, and sometimes the empty bowl was filled simply with light. 

In 1995, while preparing her first book, Arching Backward, for publication, Janet had a vision —one of many visions — this one of a light-filled arc in the bottom of a shallow bowl. She wrote:

…This arc glows

warm, a hope

a new vessel

to receive others

who take their turn

after me…

Janet was hoping her words, this book, would support others who were having initiatory experiences, that they wouldn’t be as lonely within the challenges of their experience as she had been.

As I read this passage recently, though it was written almost 30 years ago, I realize it expresses well the warmth and generosity and hope that emanated from the vessel of Janet’s entire life. Her life, her embodied presence, shaped itself into a bowl, a vessel that received others incredibly fully. Her being glowed with a light and a love that was a profound offering to anyone who was open to receiving such energy. In my experience, this inner light shone and reflected and refracted through every gesture and every word Janet spoke. The light that shone from the vessel of Janet’s life was prismatic.

Her life’s wisdom, sourced in the lives of the female mystics from ancient times, shines through today and will shine long into the future within the offerings she left behind. The offerings of her life are innumerable, centering in her family and community life. Her life’s work is highly remarkable, especially in the development of a new and contemporary mystical practice, the Discipline of Authentic Movement. This feminine and highly relational path of the development of embodied consciousness is a breakthrough in the field of consciousness studies, the significance of which I believe will be revealed more fully in the future. Janet was a pioneer on the frontier of human consciousness. Responding to the wishes of many of her students to preserve the lineage of this work, in recent years Janet founded Circles of Four, a program that prepares teachers of the discipline. In doing so, and in many of her efforts during these recent years, she has offered a further transmission of the light of her being, for those who never had the privilege of meeting her while she was alive.

Janet’s work will serve future generations. It seems to me, in the short time since her death, that Janet’s energetic presence continues to serve us now. I have felt her energetic touch, as I imagine many of you have. Though I very much miss the touch from her human form, I am entirely grateful for the transmissions that continue within an energetic field. I trust that this light that emanated from the arc of Janet’s life shines through this room right now, through each one of us.

I invite each of you to feel the warm glow from the arc of Janet’s life, to let her love touch you, and move through your being. I invite you to sense the warmth of her being, and maybe to feel it permeating this room. I wonder if any of you can see the colors or the shapes of the glowing arc of light and love that emanate from Janet’s life? I wonder if any of you can directly feel her energetic touch. Perhaps some of us might of hear her voice unexpectedly, one day in the near future, or receive a vision of or from her, or simply feel guided when we wonder what step to take next. What might still manifest, now that Janet’s cellular body has dissolved? Will we continue to allow ourselves to be touched and moved by what we have learned from this dear woman about longing to see ourselves more clearly, longing to see others more clearly? We are the ones continuing to take our turns now, and we can follow the path of compassion Jan so clearly delineated.

The prism of Janet’s life is a prism of love and light that is boundless in its journey, knowing no restrictions of time or space. Her physical absence invites our attention towards her favorite territory, that which is invisible. To quote Janet once more: “May the quality of consciousness that is emerging collectively within our world outweigh the quality of unconsciousness that suffers on our planet. May all suffering become compassion. May we be ready, may we be able.”

May your lives be blessed.

– Bonnie Morrissey

October 8, 2023