Iain Trousdell
Posted on Tue, Jun 23, 2009
I came to Emerson College with my wife Alison in the summer of 1975 and stayed until the winter of 1978, when we returned to New Zealand expecting our first child. After our return we have raised four fine sons and helped foster an equally fine daughter.
The time at Emerson College was a postgraduate experience for us, one that exemplified how such studies should really be, or so it seems to me. I immersed myself in everything that I could find - all the arts, epistemological philosophy, Goethean Science and hydrology, curative teaching and above all, wide-ranging learning from reading Rudolf Steiner and soaking up the marvelous teachings of very alive teachers who visited and who lived on the campus.
Francis Edmunds, Jesse Darrell, Adam Bittleston, Lionel Elin, John Wilkes, and many others as inspiring influences, all added to my life story. Without them I would not have understood what it was to make commitments to a life worth living. It was also during this time, with their support, that my inner life opened up into new vistas, forming the basis for decades of enriching and at times, demanding transformative work.
I saw, and see now, Emerson College as a modern grail castle that, through a fortunate destiny, attracts its many students and then encourages them to fan out around the world to help culture where they feel most able.
In my case, back in NZ by 1980, I helped pioneer ‘Raphael House' Steiner School in Wellington, New Zealand's capital city, by taking its first full Class 1 through for four years and being involved with its building program and adult education program. Moving to Taikura Steiner School in Hawkes Bay in 1990, I spent another 10 years taking a class through the middle school and working in the upper school and in adult professional development in Taruna College. In intervening years I also taught in State schools using Waldorf methods while focusing on creative and scientific work around water in the many hours not spent in schools.
Throughout these teaching years, I led a small group involved with Flowform® design, research and installation, enabling over 400 Flowform® projects in many different applications around the South Pacific.
Since 2001, I have been focused entirely on developing the Healing WaterTM global initiative with John Wilkes, gathering Flowform® eco-technology arts and therapies into a coordinated international business that can help water support life in nature and communities worldwide.
As part of this endeavour we have relaunched the Healing Water Institute within the Emerson College campus in Sussex, but also in New Zealand and America. Our Healing Water Institute projects include our book Flowform Water Research 1970 - 2007 being published and the film Divine Water being made, as well as ongoing educational, research and design activities.
Please visit www.healingwaterinstitute.org.nz and also www.divinewaterfilm.net as well as www.flowforms.net All are websites in development, so do come back regularly to see new and old developments being better shared, step by step.
With best wishes for courage and insight in your own lives and adventures,
Iain Trousdell