mythical

From summer 2025 till summer 2026

Soul-Circle Meetings

Amor Fati Interplay around Seven Life theme’s

Soul Circle I:

Programme: Arts Dialogues Guidance around the Amor Fati board-game!

    • Who: QfWf-Soul Circle and the participants of the Amor Fati try out
    • Practical info: The intercultural enriched board-game
    • Dates: starting Friday 29 august 2025
    • Time: from 10.00 to 14.30
    • Location: Quest routing
    • Requests: info@questforwisdom.org
    • Free for: the QfWf-Soul Circle en QfWf-friends, who have experience with the Amor Fati board-game
    • Kosten: please donate to the Quest for wisdom foundation to become a ‘friend’ for € 45,= per year on bank account IBAN NL14TRIO0777827654 of the Quest for wisdom foundation in Weesp.
    • Info: Playful Wisdom for the Cosmopolis…: in seven playing rounds/ life themes Authenticity – Intercultural Bildung, Happiness and Tragedy, Crises and the Strange Other, Finding your Destination.

Soul Circle II

Programma: Arts Dialogues around a board game:

  1. Introduction of the play round and chapter of the book Amor Fati by Heidi Muijen
  2. A creative interplay with the Soul Circle towards an artistic expression of the Amor Fati-life theme
  3. Arts Dialogues on how this theme provides a foundation for world citizenship
  • Who: QfWf-Soul-Circle
  • Practical: Bi-monthly meetings starting from
  • Date: Saturday 21 june 2025 around the theme:

    How are you in your element? <> interplay with an elemental dance by Juanita Ho: Which elemental qualities ground practices of world citizenship?

     

    The QfWf-Circle is welcome on the Seasonal Meetings:

    Fall: 18 October 2025
    Winter: 24 January 2026
    Spring: 21 March 2026
    Summer: 20 June 2026

  • Time: from 12.30 till 16.30 hours
  • Location: Region Weesp-Amsterdam
  • Entrance: apply to bestuur@questforwisdom.org
  • Costs: please, become a ‘QfWf-friend’ by means of a donation and you will get the book Amor Fati as a welcome gift! If possible a € 45,= yearly donation on IBAN NL14TRIO0777827654 of the Quest for Wisdom foundation in Weesp.
    The QfWf appreciates every donation from the heart!
  • Info: Interplay emerges between people ― in this way an Amor Fati is composed: one of the world games of the Quest for wisdom foundation
  • Requests: info@questforwisdom.org

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Four Winds

World GamesAmor FatiFour WindsAdinkraQuintessence-game

Around the playful dialogue tablecloth

The ‘Four Winds’ take you on a journey of discovery in four rounds, around the colourful dialogue tablecloth, full of symbolism. These symbols enrich your conversation with mythological wisdom and intercultural perspectives.

The playful materials help to visualise what is at stake on a quest: “What does your issue look like as a journey? What mythical creatures and animals will you meet along the way? What other questions become relevant when you look at the issue from others perspectives?” A multidimensional approach is enhanced by means of philosophical and intercultural sayings on the playing cards. In the fourth and final circle, the four basic colours green, blue, yellow, and red in the

creative excersise in-between the dialogue

four quadrants, symbolise the reaping of concluding visions from the conversations in the four rounds. With a Quintessence drop, you unroll the dialogue as a journey across the dialogue tablecloth: this symbolic act helps to imagine the essence of the exploration of the issue at stake and to express this in a poetic form

Dialogue as an art: listening, asking questions and answering authentically

Playing Guide Four Winds

Through a dialogue guide, you explore a challenging issue as group of friends, family or team, or, each individual can investigate their own question with the group.

Depending on the size of the group (2 to 8 players), the game will be completed in two hours, half a day or a full day.

It is also possible to engage a host dialogue coach from the Quest for wisdom foundation.

In four rounds of dialogue ― visible as the four circles on the dialogue tablecloth ― participants move from the outside in, to the inner circle in which the Four Winds are depicted.

Images tell a story

Butterfly, Scorpion, Fenix

The colours on the dialogue table refer to the four elements earth, water, air and fire. These are connected in the game with a basic symbol, which opens a space for encounter, such as the eye as a ‘mirror of the soul’.

“I dreamed I was a butterfly… or am I a butterfly dreaming of being a human?”
Zhuang Zi (369-286 BCE)

The four rounds

  1. Symbolic objects to enricht the dialogue
    In the first round, the images (and rich objects) in the outer circle of the dialogue tablecloth invite participants to imagine the theme they want to investigate.
  2. In the second round you are given one of the eight symbols for philosophical tools with intercultural perspectives: these represent qualities for the art of living to be able to deal with the issue more wisely.
  3. In the third round, you roll the coloured dice and see which creature or animal you encounter in the mythical landscape on the dialogue tablecloth. How could the virtues and vices, as well as divine qualities that they embody, help you to realise the good life?
    Playing materials for a dialogue workshop
  4. For the fourth round, the wind rose in the four elementary colours on the dialogue tablecloth visualizes the four cardinal directions, from which the harvest of the game might help to get the issue in the right direction. Participants describe their harvest from the dialogue on the Game Fill-in form as a quatrain.
  • Cards with intercultural perspectives, rich objects around the playful dialogue table.
  • Duration: 2 hours to one (half) day in a small group up to 8 players.

Playing material

Also in a Dutch version:

Box with:

  • Plyaing Cards Four Winds
    Dialogue Guide:
    explaining the game and the symbols
  • Playing Field:
    1 Dialogue table cloth
  • Game attributes:
    1 mirror;
    1 key;
    1 hourglass as rich object on the Dialogue table;
    Small weights;
    1 quintessence marble;
    1 small talking stick;
    1 hour glass
  • Dialogue Tablecloth with symbolic objects
    Playing Cards:
    8 Philosophical Tools with Western perspectives
    8 Philosophical Tools with intercultural perspectives
  • Fill-in forms:
    Double sided with instructions for writing a quatrain

Revised edition of the Beeldendialoogspel
Purchase: Vier Winden (NL)

Purchase: Four Winds (EN)
Inquire info@questforwisdom.org

Update 2025-02

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The Wheel of Intercultural Art of Living

The Wheel of Intercultural Art of Living visualizes the philosophy and mission of the QfWf

The wheel was developed as a multidimensional and multifaceted approach to the intercultural art of living with the help of the following:

  • Colours/medium – representing the five natural elements (earth, water, air, fire and ether)
  • One focus — the circle with an edge and a centre that represents the dynamics of the wheel two-dimensionally with a centripetal direction from periphery to centre and vice versa as a centrifugal movement —
  • The wheel consists of sixteen spokes representing wisdom traditions
Under the Wheel the six pictograms as the dimensions

The sixteen spokes use the pictograms drawn by Louis Van Marissing to refer to wisdom traditions from East and West, North and South. The Wheel vizualizes these different approaches to wisdom, acknowledging its many different forms from various cultural traditions: wisdom as quest and not as a ‘canon’ of dogmas in a holy book.

These religious and spiritual roads, philosophical and mythological directions are expressed both verbally as well as artistic. The different forms of expressions are typified by the six dimensions, also indicated by pictograms under the Wheel: visions, myths, rituals, symbols, praxis (arts, meditation and crafts), actuality and personal experience.

Increasingly, the three Quests have begun to flow together: the development of the programme for the annual Meeting Day (Quest 3) runs hand in hand with the collection of wisdom from all corners of the world (Quest 1) and the development of intercultural programmes (Quest 2) in artistic and educational forms — texts, images, stories, music, …. In this way, an annual theme around Global Citizenship emerges every year on the QfWf digital platform The Golden Ratio.

Symbolic bridges between cultures

The wheel visualises intercultural bridges through the symbolism of the five elements: these are depicted as five elementary fields with their own pictogram (eye, heart, spiral, hand, lemniscate) symbolising natural wisdom that makes us human, and, within them, the spokes of sixteen (inter)cultural paths to wisdom.

The QfWf dissociates itself from racial and ethnocentric provisions by presenting the language play of the five elements emphatically as a symbolic arrangement of the Wheel. Within this, sixteen wisdom paths are assigned in an associative way, without wanting to interpret the (folk) nature of cultures, tribes and peoples. The focus of the QfWf is to develop intercultural exchange and connections on the basis of a symbolism that occurs as a mythical and artistic language in almost all cultures. In this way, the QfWf remains outside philosophical, theological and political debates about the appreciation of cultures. Whereas the intercultural symbolic language touches the soul and thereby it makes the old wisdom from all corners of the world alive for actual contexts.

Symbolism of the five elements

In almost all cultures, the natural elements in mythical, philosophical and religious stories play a basic role. That is why the five elements in the Wheel form pillars for building inter- and transcultural connections. Compared to the Western natural philosophical debate, these concepts are given a dynamic and symbolic meaning in the three Quests.

As can be heard in original and heroic stories from almost all cultures, the process of separating and reconnecting the elements symbolizes an alchemy as a process of creation. A natural order arises out of an original chaos, emptiness or by a divine creation. Also, in all wisdom traditions, paths to a good life have been developed – aimed at connection from within – which are called differently: ‘salvation’, ‘enlightenment’, ‘moksha’, ‘compassion’, ‘humanity’, ‘walhalla’, ‘the eternal hunting ground’, ‘The kingdom of God’, ‘Heaven’, … This ‘mystery of scuaring the circle’ is expressed by the archetypal form of the Wheel and its symbolic depiction of the intercultural art of living:

  • The four elementary fields – earth, water, air and fire – symbolise a movement towards the periphery, the four corners of the world, where the value of diversity becomes visible. The movement towards the centre, through three groups of (inter)cultural paths on the elemental fields of earth, water, air and fire, focuses on the coherence between cultures and the development of transcultural connections.
  • The fifth elementary field – ether – symbolizes in the centre the place of connection from within (the place that is not a place, the unity of opposites, the philosophia perrenis). Visualized with four pictograms are encounters between cultures 3 through history and time, manifesting themselves as interfaces, intersections and rifts in history and between eras.

Rotating around the core, the Rad visualizes the development of
intercultural art of living from the three layers:

  • Layer 1: the five elementary fields of wisdom
  • Layer 2: the sixteen (inter)cultural paths to wisdom
  • Layer 3: the six dimensions

From the perspective of the Wheel, religious, scientific, literary, artisanal, philosophical and artistic expressions appear equally as symbolic forms and building blocks for intercultural connections. The diversity of cultural expressions and visions on the good life are symbolically arranged as an intercultural art of living by means of the Wheel:
* by symbolically characterizing the five ‘elementary’ fields 
* by linking expressions of wisdom and (inter)cultural wisdom paths to these five fields
* by visualizing an ‘in-between’ a space for dialogue and exchange based on cultural forms of wisdom.

Exchange, development and cross-fertilization take place along five elementary fields by rearranging wisdom from religious and cultural traditions according to their cultural- historical origins on the one hand, and, on the other hand, according to intercultural and transcultural forms of wisdom as seen from the elementary symbolism of the Wheel. For example, the Tree of life is a transcultural symbol that expresses both a kinship between cultures as well as a concrete form of a particular expression of a Tree of life as recognized within a specific culture.

The five elementary fields of wisdom

The wheel with the five elementary fields

The symbolism of the five elements generates a bridge language between cultures with the aim of further developing an intercultural art of living.
Just as in the poetry of mystics as well as in mythical stories in all corners of the world the symbolism of the eye and the earth, of the heart and the water of life, of the spiral and (inner) space, of the hand and the (inner) fire, and of the lemniscate and the field of ether (akasha) serve as symbolic expressions of wisdom:

  • The green quadrant with the eye is associatively connected to the earth and unlocks a symbolism around eye power, the seeing of the (strange) other, earthly and grounded;
  • The blue quadrant with the heart is associated with water and opens up a symbolism around heart power, spontaneous expression including flowing and counter-flowing movements;
  • The yellow quadrant with the spiral is associated with the air and opens up a symbolism around light and darkness and the rhythm of breathing;
  • The red quadrant with the hand is associated with the fire and opens up a symbolism around fire (offerings) and the power of transformation;
  • The white circle around the centre with the lemniscate is associated with ether and opens up a symbolism around an eternal movement of cultural-historical appearances and links ether as the fleeting cosmic element.

The five fields have been characterized as forms of the art of living with the help of symbolic icons:

  • Earth – the eye – a meaningful field of natural connection and physical, grounded presence;
  • Water – the heart – a symbolic field giving meaning to lovingly meandering together with the natural currents and counter currents;
  • Air – the head (spiral) – a meaningful field of breathing, coordination inside and outside, insight and being attentive;
  • Fire – the hand – a meaningful field of sacrifice, transformation and acting change;
  • Ether – the quintessence (lemniscate) – a meaningful field of the interplay of the four elements, of alchemy and encounters, connections and fault lines.

Wisdom traditions and wisdom are given a place on the elementary fields of wisdom and the sixteen (inter)cultural wisdom paths appear as the spokes of the Wheel.

Wisdom traditions – from Buddhism to Nordic mythology, from Christian rituals to Indian myths – can be organized according to their cultural-historical origins as well as a source for developing an intercultural art of living in the context of globalizing society.

The intercultural art of living is growing from its cultural-historical roots and will be nourished from (inter)cultural studies by which wisdom traditions can be kept alive in a global context.

Both personal expressions and stories handed down as contextually embedded wisdoms, as well as practical and art-based forms of the art of living, are given a symbolic rearrangement by means of the Wheel: as inspirational examples of ‘elementary’ – earthly, meandering, airy, fiery, ethereal – expressions and forms on how to live life well.

The symbols in the Wheel (namely the eye, the heart, the spiral, the hand and the lemniscate) therefore represent, both on a collective and personal level, the elementary existential qualities for the development of a basic attitude of openness and interest, around a pivot of love and wisdom, the quintessence, the loving willingness to connect, meet and open up for intercultural dialogue.

The development of intercultural art of living through the Wheel

In the philosophy of the Wheel, these elementary existential qualities – of the open heart, the embodied eye, the hand of co-creation, the attentive path spiraling in and out, and the lemniscate of living encounters and the infinite creation of meaning – form the indispensable pivotal points for the development of an intercultural art of living and transcultural forms of living the good life. The QfWf stimulates this development with educational and artistic materials in order to stimulate an open cosmopolitan society. By highlighting both the cultural-historical roots of wisdom and to keep the natural wisdom alive between people in groups and communities as a (collective) art of living. Therefore, the Wheel points to a culturally connecting symbolic language of the soul: with ‘elementary’ symbolism of the — earthly, meandering, airy, fiery, ethereal — good life

Cultural diversity is visible on the periphery of the Wheel. Towards the centre the elementary fields and intercultural bars (spokes) touch the hub (pivotal point). The hub symbolizes a transcultural dimension that transcends cultural determinants. Through the colourful differences there is an elementary focus on what connects people: by moving beyond the opposites on the surface level of (collective) opinions and interests to the deep dimension of humanity and loving wisdom (the pivot) in the centre; where the opposites coincide, the quintessence.

By means of ‘bricolage’ (the way an engineer (bricoleur) uses just the available tools and materials to make structures) with insights and forms of praxis of multiple cultures one can develop a global society for the purpose of becoming human (becoming who you are) and developing local communities with a cosmopolitan spirit.

For example, with regard to a focus on ‘the right middle’ (Aristotle) according to the practical wisdom (‘phronèsis’) of the community, there is a relationship between Greek classical virtue ethics with insights from Ubuntu and from Confucianism and values of ‘communitas’.

A Golden Section of Wisdom

The wheel with the five elementary fields and sixteen spokes, depicting intercultural roads

The Wheel represents therefore above all a performative philosophy: a vision that emerges in co-creation through the language of the arts: a sym-philosophizing to be developed in intercultural circles of concern.

In the Wheel, the wisdom traditions are both contextually embedded according to their cultural-historical origins, depicted as sixteen spokes as examples of paths and sources for intercultural wisdom. This ambiguous positioning arises from the symbolical bridges, the symbolic language of the five elements, providing a twofold orientation: both towards philosophical unity and transcultural forms of life, as well as towards the periphery of cultural diversity. The inter- and transcultural dynamics at the corners of the elementary fields is symbolically characterized with pictograms.

There are two levels of developing wisdom:
At the collective level of wisdom traditions:

  • earthly paths of wisdoms give expression to a grounded quality and embodied see,
  • meandering roads of wisdom are expressive of a heart-quality: coagulating and liquefying the status quo,
  • wisdom of the air and breathing that expresses the rhythmically inwards and outwards spiralling connection of natural being with the macrocosm,
  • fiery ways with wisdoms that give expression to community ethos and co-creating (hands on) qualities,
  • ethereal pathways expressing an eternal lemniscate movement of finding meaning: volatilizing and deconstructing and then materializing and socially
    constructing again;

on the individual level of the personal art of living:

In a globalising society, people can draw on various wisdom traditions without the need to join as an adept of a particular tradition. Wisdom paths in all corners of the world give direction to personal growth as well as the collective forms of wisdom, like rituals and storytelling. The Wheel is meant as a compass to be able to orientate oneself in the diversity of directions. The five elementary fields open up intercultural fields of finding meaning through exploring various cultural wisdom traditions and transcultural values.

The Wheel provides symbolic signposts for personal growth through the development of elementary existential qualities of natural and intercultural wisdom:

  • eye-power through the embodied seeing and from imagination (mythos)
  • the open heart, depicting compassion and enthusiasm (compassion and pathos)
  • the spiral, depicting resonance and tuning in to the rhythm of breathing, connecting inside with outside (logos)
  • the hand, depicting action and starting a change with movement from within and hands-on (ethos and cocreation)
  • the lemniscates, depicting the space between ‘frames’ and the infinite process of giving meaning and meeting ‘the other’ (quintessence).
The sixteen (inter)cultural paths to wisdom are grouped per elementary field.
They are represented with their own icon.

The elementary field earth and the (inter)cultural earth roads

Earth roads in the Wheel

In the elementary field of ‘earth’ three icons have been placed that characterize wisdom paths of tribes and peoples living traditionally from natural contexts. In prehistoric times this ‘pre- modern’ way of life was spread all over the earth. As a result of modernization and colonization, this way of life has been reduced, but is also alive as wisdom from within each human being, and can still be found mainly within: African; Indian; and Aboriginal peoples, Maori and other indigenous peoples of Oceania.

Earth roads

The elementary field of water and the (inter)cultural water roads

Water roads in the Wheel

In the elementary field ‘water’ three icons have been placed that characterize wisdom roads as the natural movement of ‘go with the flow’ as well as the cosmic laws following ways of life (such as astrology).
These meandering wisdom roads can still be found as wisdom from within, as well as, for example, be recognized in wisdom traditions such as: Confucian; Dao; and Sufi movements.

water wegen

The elementary field air and the (inter)cultural air roads

Air roads in the Wheel

In the elementary field ‘air’ three icons have been placed that characterize wisdom roads as pathways of insight and breath based on wisdom traditions. This orientation can often be recognized in connection with the symbolism of light and darkness within your soul, as well as in the following perspectives: 
Buddhist, advaita vedanta; gnosis, mystical and hermetic philosophy; Germanic, Celtic and Nordic mythology.

Air roads

The elementary field of fire and the (inter)cultural fire roads

Fire roads in the Wheel

In the elementary field of ‘fire’ three icons have been placed that characterize religious and spiritual traditions, in which, especially, the meaning of fire and the struggle between good and evil, sacrifices and transformation play an important role. This orientation can be found in each individual in a different way, as well as recognized within cultural wisdom traditions such as:
animist-shamanist; Hindu; and monotheistic – zoroastrian, jewish, christian and islamic – directions.

Fire roads

The ether field and the (inter)cultural ether roads

Ether roads in the Wheel

The ‘ether field’ symbolically refers to the fact that the longing for connection and the quest for wisdom – although culturally different and colourfully designed – occur in all human beings and cultures and is nourished by:
encounters between cultures, and profile gets through interfaces, intersections and fractures in history and
between eras.

ether roads

The six dimensions

The six dimensions of the Wheel characterize wisdom in many forms on the continuum between theory and practice; multi-layered by means of different medial forms – verbal, musical, visual, ritual, narrative, dancing, … – in which the quest for wisdom is expressed.

By giving space to the diversity of medial expression, the various wisdom traditions can be highlighted in a multifaceted way, showing inter- and subcultural forms, dominant and minority voices.

For example, the elementary field of air (insight) show different paths, such as a variety of forms of ‘Buddhism’ from Zen Buddhism to mindfulness. The diverse wisdom traditions include both visions as well as forms of praxis, a mythology and other narratives and stories, cultural customs and rituals, musical and other artistic expressions of wisdom. The six dimensions of the Wheel are:

  • visions, philosophy
  • stories, myths,
  • rituals, rituality
  • symbols, symbolism
  • praxis, arts and crafts
  • social actuality and/or a personal vision or survival.

With these six dimensions, the Wheel expresses (inter)cultural diversity from the historical roots as well as current practices and expressions of the art of living, shown on the continuum between theory and practice.

The six dimensions

The complete wheel

  • the five elementary fields,
  • the sixteen (inter)cultural avenues
  • the six dimensions

The three layers form the complete Wheel of intercultural art of living.

 

The complete wheel of intercultural art of living

The Wheel makes visible how the periphery shows cultural diversity and the core presents connections from within, such as the transcultural value of ‘compassion’. The in- between space (between the periphery and the inner core) evokes intercultural dialogues and a cosmopolitan art of living through a Golden Ratio of wisdom traditions, like the budding of a flower which is always through nourishment from cultural roots.

update 2025-02

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