It is only fitting that my dear and long-time teacher Peggy Rubin will be our first guest, a consummate expert on the topic of Joy! One can only be captivated in the presence of such a brilliant teacher, scholar, author, actor and evoker of the depths of human possibility.

Peggy Rubin is founding director of the Center for Sacred Theatre in Ashland, Oregon. Primary activities of the Center include the creation of workshops in Living Life as Sacred Theatre, and Sacred Studies of the Divine Feminine. Since 1987 she has also been the principal teaching associate of Jean Houston, Ph.D., in Dr. Houston’s worldwide multicultural transformational work and in her schools of spiritual studies, as well as a member of the core faculty of the School for Social Artistry, an intensive leadership training program. Working with Jean Houston, Peggy Rubin has presented classes, workshops and trainings throughout the United States, and in Australia, New Zealand, England, Ireland, Sweden, Greece, Egypt, The Netherlands, India, West Africa, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Jamaica, and on behalf of the United Nations Development Programme, in Albania, St. Lucia, Barbados, Kenya, and the Philippines.

“The idea of working with life as sacred theatre began in 1987. I was in the process of leaving my career at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival – after fourteen years as director of public relations and education, and as an actor – to become the working associate of Jean Houston, the multi-talented great soul who is one of the pioneers of the human potential movement. Jean announced over the phone one morning that our first working trip to Europe included participating in a conference given in The Netherlands on Sacred Matter. And, she added casually, ‘I’ve signed you up for a presentation on Sacred Theatre.’

“Having enjoyed wise teachers in theatre history during my studies at the University of Texas, and having always loved to track things back to their origins, I thought I could remember enough to talk reasonably well about how the theatre was once held sacred, how its origins resided in the sacred heart of the human community. I could even extrapolate how every person entering the theatre today, whether from behind the scenes as an actor or stagehand, or from the front of house with the audience, wishes to have a spectacular and holy experience, confronting gods or demons or both, and feel him/herself so caught up in the performance that the world breaks apart and reassembles ‘more beautiful than before.’

Peggy Rubin on Transforming Your Life through Sacred Theatre