GETTING BACK TO NATURE:A visit to Maroon Bells wilder- ness park is part of the Aspen seminar experience.“We’re at 8,900 feet, and there’s a different kind of lightness of being and a different sense of energy,” said the Aspen Institute’s Todd Breyfogle.
upon the original Goethe centennial—which 60-plus years ago brought to Aspen “philosophers and playwrights and businesspeople and musicians [who were] all exchanging ideas and stimulatingeach other to think about the present predicament of civilization,” Breyfogle said. “The Ideas Festi- val, which I think started in earnest maybe seven or eight years ago, is a larger festival of ideas in which participants can get a taste of many different topics and…are able to dis- cern new ideas or explore new paths because of the combina-
MUSIC FOR THE SOUL:An internationally renowned classical music festival, the Aspen Music Festival is a training ground for young musicians. “I think the profound experi- ence of music has shaped the aesthetic culture” of Aspen, Breyfogle said.
tion of things [presented, which are] usually treated in sepa- rate or specialized categories.” Exploring new paths in the mind—and on terra firma—
is central to the Aspen experience of seminar and conference participants. (See “A Natural Occurrence,” below.) They are encouraged to “take solitary time” Breyfogle said, on and around the Aspen Meadows Resort campus, where the Insti- tute is housed. “Simply beingon that campus, where the sky and the mountains and the meadows campus itself, all say ‘think’ and ‘be’ and ‘don’t worry,’” he said. “That’s true of
A Natural Occurrence
How does a natural environment affect a conference participant’s mindset? “Whenever we’re removed from our customary surroundings,” the Aspen Institute’s Todd Brey- fogle said, “there’s a kind of transition that takes place and we leave behind our cares and concerns—we’re stimulated by new and beautiful things that are not commonplace. And I think what we find over the first couple of days [at the Aspen Institute’s seminars and conferences] is that people shed their work skin and re-inhabit something that’s a little closer to their true selves. That’s in part just being removed from the distractions of everyday life, just being at a physical remove from our regular surroundings.” Beyond that, a beautiful natural setting helps us to “feel
connected to something that’s bigger than ourselves,” he said. “It allows us to refine our perceptions of the world, of other people, and of ourselves. And if we wanted to go
really neurobiological or sociobiological, we could say that as a species we’re accustomed to being in nature and it’s really only in the last couple hundred years that we are as a species more consistently removed from nature—so I think there’s an almost primal facet to being back in our natural environment.” Breyfogle said that one of the things participants take
away most profoundly from their Aspen Institute experience “is the reminder tospend time with themselves and by themselves and in a natural setting—togofor walks where natural beauty ushers in contemplation and deep reflection.”