Silo

About Silo

Silo is the spiritual guide who is arising in these convoluted, violent and hopeless times. His message is simple and at the same time profound. His work transcends all frontiers and his followers are found in the most diverse cultures on all the continents.

Silo’s public life began in 1969 with two important events: a talk entitled The Healing of Suffering, addressed to a handful of people on May 4th at a small Andean town called Punta de Vacas located near the border between Argentina and Chile. There Silo also wrote The Inner Look, which was published in 1972. The talk and the book form the cornerstone of Silo’s teaching. In the talk he proposes the root of suffering – “…Only inner faith and inner meditation can end the violence in you, in others, and in the world around you…” – while in The Inner Look he elaborates on the true meaning of life – “Here it tells how the non-meaning of life can be converted into meaning and fulfillment. Here are joy, love of the body, of nature, of humanity, and of the spirit. Here sacrifices, feelings of guilt, and threats from the beyond are rejected. Here the worldly is not opposed to the eternal. Here it tells of the inner revelation at which all arrive who carefully meditate in humble search.”

Silo has given lectures and conferences, and has participated in massive gatherings where he has expressed his point of view and his teachings to hundreds of thousands of people, from Mexico to Mumbai, from Paris to Moscow, from Manila to Copenhagen, in Sri Lanka and Napoli, in New York and Quito. Everywhere people are adhering to his proposal of hope, of the possibility of change, and of the certainty that the human being can become truly human, leaving behind our prehistory of suffering, nihilism and violence. “…But in spite of everything…in spite of everything…in spite of these unfortunate constraints, something soft as a far off sound, something light as a dawn breeze, something that begins gently is opening its way in the interior of the human being…”

In addition, Silo has inspired a new current called Universal Humanism, a line of thought that is both plural and convergent, confronting discrimination, fanaticism, exploitation and violence.

In 2002 Silo’s Message was born and organized around a book by the same title, which is divided into three parts: The Book, which is The Inner Look; The Experience, consisting of eight ceremonies capable of producing spiritual inspiration and positive changes in daily life; and The Path, containing reflections and suggestions on personal, interpersonal and social life. In a short time the followers of this spiritual guide – this sage of the Andes, as he has been called – have developed communities that are spreading Silo’s Message to all corners of the globe.

Silo passed away September 16, 2010 at his home in Mendoza, accompanied by family and friends.

Other Works

His main published works are:

Two volumes of his Complete Works have also been published. These books have been translated and published in the main languages and dialects of the world and are standard reading for rebellious youth, for the New Left, for humanists, environmentalists and pacifists. Starting from the year 2002, Silo launched The Message, giving his work a spiritual dimension.

See www.silo.net

Letters

Letter between Alvaro Zarate and Negro, August 4th, 2009

Date: August 4, 2009 – 6:37 pm
Subject : conversation with the maestro

Dear friends and brothers,

I want to share with you a little gathering we had among wise ones of the Amwtas and Aymarain which we discussed the new spiritual guides. I also send a short dialogue on this I had with the maestro in which very important things arose. These truly made me see the many contradictions that I still have to surpass in this human process.

Moreover, in these times of profound change, of transformation, in which we are living in the movement and in society as a whole, it is necessary to join forces, and I was touched by the position of the Maestro, by his profound teaching of humility and his wish to bring about the profound changes that must provide the force for our actions.

I therefore ask each of you to pardon certain attitudes and omissions I may have exercised in this moment of contradictions. And now I will do my part, contributing my modest actions to the correct unfolding of the World March… and the new process we are preparing ourselves to take on.

with sincere affection,

hugs,

Alvaro Zarate

*******************************
Subject: from bolivia
Date: Sat, 1 Aug 2009 – 18:58:03 hrs.

Dear maestro…

A few days ago we had a dialogue among Yatiris, Laikas, Chamaqanis, Amawtas and Kallawayas, where several proposals were made about construction and reassessment. I was asked to sketch a description of someone I consider a spiritual guide, and I also gave an outline of the meaning of the Message…

I have also received the latest news about the Movement, and I believe we are in a Pachakuti, a time of profound change of all things…

my warmest regards

alvaro zarate

………………………….

Re: from bolivia˛

Sent : Monday, August 3, 2009

– 02:05:57 p.m.

Dear Alvaro.

Thank you very much for your letter and for the eleven files, including the several photographs.

Of course, I thank you for the document with the testimony that is not only personal but also from those who consider Silo a Spiritual Guide and Silo’s Message an important reference.

This document, entitled “Silo: the Amawta Master who announces the fifth creation of Wirajcocha,” apart from being presented in a moving style, touches us by highlighting numerous and profound truths. I think it should be read in different latitudes so that it may dwell in the hearts of the most diverse human beings. And on this point I would like to make a brief reflection.

If this document speaks profound truths, it would be a pity and a waste of time to become entangled in discussions of superficial expositive forms. I think the moment is ripe to penetrate beneath the surface, beyond the cultural forms — and to recognize truths that are pulsating in the Profound spaces of humanity. This is like saying, people may or may not agree with the statements in this document, but beyond the words on the surface lies an accumulation of aspirations and intuitive certainties that must be acknowledged.

No doubt, the proposal is difficult to accept — but it is good to recognize that in dreams, in those dreams that seem like an affront to the lucid consciousness, very frequently deep psychological registers are translated, which admit no other words than those used in the profundities of each culture and that cannot be expressed in any other way than through each culture’s symbols, its allegories and its affective manifestations.

Dear Alvaro, again I thank you for sending me this document, for which I foresee a wide circulation.

With affection,

Mario

Letter between David and Negro, January 14th, 2008

Hello Negro,

I send you a warm greeting from Sacramento.

I am writing to you today because something is troubling me about some comments that I had heard that you had made. As it was reported, these comments were made around 10 days ago. And since nothing of clarification has circulated, to my knowledge, I thought I’d ask you directly.

The matter is that, I was told (second hand) that in a certain conversation you had with a few people — I believe it was at a dinner in Manantialles — that you had said that human being could not (really) change. And that you made a few statements to that effect which negated the possibility of “true change” within humans. I took this to mean that you had reached a NEW conclusion in which you now say that Humans are not capable of an essential and deep level of change. How different it is to think this! And such a departure from what has been our current of thought.

Well, I suppose you did say what was reported… but what I wonder is WHAT DID YOU MEAN? And how am I/we to understand?

Thinking to myself I say that if I must face the fact –if it is a fact– that we humans are not capable of the type of truly Humanizing Change (transformation) — a situation which we have all worked to propagate over many years… then this makes me STOP … and search and wonder what is it then that I am working for (for others) and what is it that I am to have faith in?

Since I have heard this and thought about it, I have put all of my projects on hold including my “Siloisms” series until I am able to UNDERSTAND. We all rely on your thinking and on your judgement to a very big degree and so I must ask you if the whole Narative/Story has changed(?)

Thanks, Negro, for considering my questions…….

and just to say once again that you are always in my thoughts.

a big hug,

David

————————————————–

Hi David,

Yes, approximately 10 days ago there were some nice dinners in Manantiales, and at one of them we touched on this theme, which it seems to me important to consider.

Is profound and essential change possible in the human being? Yes, I believe it is, but I distinguish between that undeniable but slow change that began in the first humanoids, and the possibility of change that isn’t thanks to a simple evolutionary mechanic, nor to “natural” accidents, but to a direction, an intention of the human consciousness regarding itself.

The point is that the peripheral changes are making a lot of people think that these are the changes we must aspire to. We have to go beyond Science and Justice to understand this change. In fact, as we have emphasized on several occasions, whoever works for the advance of Science and Justice makes the greatest effort to facilitate the overcoming of pain and suffering, facilitating the conditions for change. But it is clear that even Justice and Science are being twisted in a hurried parabola in which the search for change is being oriented objectively, ignoring what is most important about essential change. This forgetting of self, this ignorance of the overcoming of mental mechanics, leads us to question the possibilities of change…

And here we arrive at the point of this disquieting but healthful evening, in which we were able to say: Essential change is not possible without moving clearly in that direction, and the epoch is closing the horizon of that mental direction.

Whoever has followed our trajectory for several years has observed that our work has been oriented toward “simultaneous change” and in Humanism this took on great strength. However, the effort toward changing our mental conditions has been sometimes weak and sometimes intermittent.

I put the argument in a way that is somewhat harsh: Everything that has been done up to this moment has great meaning, but it will not be enough until the people (even the nicest and kindest) decide to Convert their lives, realizing the need for a profound mental change. It is of this that our work speaks in its last phase; it is of this that the Message speaks.

I believe that in the current situation in which Humanity finds itself (and of course this includes us too), if we do not work to overcome all censure and self-censure, throwing ourselves into the meanings and works of the Message, essential change will not be possible. The direction must be toward the Profound of the consciousness to connect with the meanings that have been slowly pressing forward the evolution of the human being. Now it is urgent and we no longer have a way to make this impulse known.

When we spoke at that dinner of the difficulties that the human mind is facing, disheartenment blew like an icy wind among those present. We were left with the sensation that this way, submerged in our humanity, we are not penetrating into the Profound and if that doesn’t happen, Change is not possible. That was the saddest part of that talk, to which people replied with a certain stoicism: “… “What you say is not very hopeful!”

However, going beyond the anecdote, I believe that we have some inner connection that can be communicated, and this is possible because in each of us is the unfathomable source of the Profound, of whose waters we must drink.

My dear David, I believe that many grasped the gravity of the current moment and your letter is a reflection of what happened and has not yet stopped.

I send you the most affectionate hug,
Silo