"Here is the thing; a person means persona which is a mask. A corporation is a corps / dead body and a corporation sole is when a man wraps the dead body / corporation around themselves and puts on a mask and lives as a dead corporation. My vision is to teach people about this fiction and help them to stop living like a dead person and start living as a man. You may be familiar with the process where you go from being dead to being alive?...Resurrection! It is time to get rid of the dead and start to live. What ever form that may take. It will be interesting."
A Man of Action
Rob in the Pagé Family was a former successful IT professional who ended his career after 20 years on the job to move his family into the country to build an off-grid home, grow their own food and establish the Pagé family domain. In a period of over 3500 hours, since July 2008 testing the theories learned, his teaching on self governance, freedom, sustainable living and balanced living began started to gain widespread recognition. Rob’s teachings have gathered tremendous respect from his students who attend his classes each week in Edmonton city located in Alberta province, encouraging many to be the change they want to see in the world. One of his students was Ben Stewart , filmmaker for Kymatica, who,along with his brother was inspired to create “UNGRIP” that they released on October 1, 2011 which features Rob’s home, his work and his philosophy on life.
I am blessed to have Rob as my guest this evening, this movie and his story speaks to my soul and has awakened in me, not the answers I needed to see but the questions that I always had in me...and perhaps in the hearts of many others. Do we know what truly matters most in life? Are we aware of what enslaves us? Are we truly free?
In a nutshell, who is Rob Page?
Who am I? Well, I AM that I AM. That is a huge question with an answer that I am still trying to figure out. I know that what I 'do' does not define me but helps me answer a few questions along the way. In the end it is not what I have acquired or the jobs that I have worked that makes the difference but what impact I have had on the lives of other people. I know that I can change but one man and that is me. So I focus on my life and willing to expose and share my story in the hopes that I can influence others who like what they see. This is such a deep philosophical question to ask that there is no way I could do this any justice. So a bit of a Bio; I grew up on a farm in northern Alberta, attended collage to study computer systems and worked in the IT industry for 20 years. I am married with two sons and I quit my job to move out onto the farm to live off grid. Lots of that story you already know from the film. What you may not know is that I suffered from depression for most of my life where it nearly took my life (suicide attempt) in 1999 and 2000. I recovered by surrendering my ways to learn a new way of living and I learned that through confrontation and support through a group therapy program. I learned a lot of my deep emotional, mental, physical and even spiritual lessons from that group. About 3 years later I really explored my spirituality when I came to the point where everything was good, but I was asking "now what?". there is more to life than this. That is where I started my spiritual work and exploring my relationship with the Creator (God) and the Christ Consciousness. My take on the Bible is not typical nor traditional. I studied Taekwondo for 10 years and taught for many of those years. That experienced re-enforced what I learned in my recovery from depression. I also use what I learned in the martial arts to help teach about sovereignty and self determination / self governance. It is the blocks that we place upon ourselves that limit what we can and cannot do. I work on pushing people through those barriers so that they can realize their own power and potential.
What passions are you able to enjoy right now?
I love living on the farm too but I love teaching. What I teach though is very difficult for people to swallow as it requires a compete shift in consciousness and having to "let go" or "Ungrip" their current life style. 99.999% of the people I've taught understand and like what I teach but they are not willing to make that shift yet. Taking 100% responsibility for their lives means letting go of many of the benefits and privileges they have in their lives and that is too much for them to let go of. Ironically though, it is those things that are causing a lot of the problems we face in our lives to date too.
How has life changed for you since you went off the grid?
I do find that now that I have no "job" I am busier than ever. I don't know how people can work a full time job and get all the other stuff in life done. I've built two earthships, garage, sheds and a home for my mother-in-law in the past four years. yes, my mother-in-law has moved out here with us and I've pledged to care for her as community and family should. I feel it is duty to family that binds the family together. I am willing to do that.
I find that with no "job" it permits me to go out and help others, even at the last minute. Spending time with somebody is the best gift one can give as time is the most valuable thing we have. It is also what helps build strong relationships. I feel life is all about relationships; with the self (most important) and the creator, family, friends, food, environment, etc. So I like to work on those relationships the best I can.
Let's say someone approaches you and says "I'd like to do what you're doing go off grid" What's the first thing that that person must do?
What I've done has taken 6 1/2 years. It takes time and patience and help. I teach Taekwondo so what I do is I ask this question: Let's say you are in my class, and let's say I stack 5 bricks and ask you to break these bricks. Would you be able to do that? Probably not. Even if I believe this a vast majority won't be able to do so, not because they don't have the strength but because they lack the confidence that they can break them. What I did to go off grid is similar to this. So I start training people to break one board, slowly over time. This increases their technique and ability to bust down the belief that keeps a student from thinking that they can break concrete blocks.
So I tell them to make a list. This list would have all the things that they are dependent on. Let's say grocery, utilities, banks, parents, a spouse. And then I ask them to take a look at that list and identify one thing that is fairly easy to knock out of all dependencies. That way confidence is built and slowly the rest gets knocked out over time, until 100% is knocked out. I don't want people to want to do what I'm doing. I want them to figure out what they want to do. And to figure it out themselves.
How did you get to start working with Ben Stewart? What is it about him that made you said YES LETS DO THIS.
I met Ben in Toronto when I did my very first workshop. We have been talking on an off since then and he then approached me in 2009 to make a film about my life. I was surprised to say the least, so he came up here in the winter of 2008/2009 to make some film. That would be the scenes you saw on UNGRIP that had snow on the ground. Then in the summer of 2009 I got scared and I told him 'no'. the fear was very intense. But over the next 12 months he and I did a lot of growing and talking. In the spring of 2010 we decided to move ahead with the project and he came out to take some more footage. That is where the summer scenes are in the film. At that point there were delays, reworks and many different versions of the film. it has matured a LOT since 2010 as you can very well imagine. But I kept telling him not to worry. It will be ready at the right time and the message will be exactly what it needs to be. needless to say we were both very surprised to watch world events unfold around the release of the film. I am still amazed at what is happening around the film, people broadcasting it against buildings in downtown LA. amazing.
I respect Ben a lot. his ability to see different points of view and to make me think is amazing. His first two films reflected a lot of the views I had but were not really able to articulate. He has a wonderful way of communicating and I think his artistic abilities serve him very well in that capacity. He is extremely creative and I trusted him explicitly to express the intent behind my work. He did such a beautiful job I am still in shock and awe. I love that man tremendously.
I'm interested to hear your views on the Occupy Movement.
I think this is an extremely important event to occur. Not that I will protest anymore now that I've taken steps to be an adult, but I see this as people expressing some anger and frustration. Emotions that are very real and positive. There is no such thing as negative emotions. What is negative is how we respond to the emotions we do have. (addictions is one way to respond negatively) you can read my "evolution of revolution" document to get a better sense of this child / adult thing too. Either way, people will find that the state will not "change" much or if it does, people will replace it with a model that will corrupt over time just like all revolutions have for thousands of years. However, I believe we can break the cycle by governing ourselves just as our creator intended us to do. But that takes a lot of work and effort - as all things do when you do something 'new'. The learning curve is intense but doable. I believe the solution is simple. hard work, but simple. That solution is to see us for who we are, the 'I AM'. We are God's off spring and we are hear to learn how to govern the self so that we can move on to other and better things. This three dimensional world is here so that we can learn to create and how to respect the other 'I AM' that we are co-creating with. I can quote many scripture to support this but I suspect you are right along with me on this anyway.
So the protesters will find this as a learning opportunity if they embrace it for what it really is. One cannot change another due to free will, so they will go home and either surrender to the state or take the steps to govern the self. That is the message from the film and I feel that consciousness is sweeping across the face of this earth as we speak.
On Love
I don't believe Love is an emotion but an action and actions speak louder. There are emotions behind it and part of it is tough love. At a time I couldn't see it as love, because tough love could be painful. But I think that the most loving thing that you can do to people is to challenge and confront them so they can realize the truth in them. It's difficult to see what we are doing sometimes because we lie to ourselves. We lie to ourselves to justify certain behaviors and sometimes we need a third party to show us that.
I've gone through a long period of depression too, and when I got over it I still couldn't say I'm healed completely, because that would be lying to myself. Sometimes it comes back. and I am pulled to go back to my old ways. Is this something that you experience as well? And if so, what particular advice can you share to people who are dealing with the same situation.
I recognize that this is probably something that I'm going to deal with for the rest of my life. So I made myself a life motto which consists of two words: "VIGILANT" and "PERSISTENCE". Vigilant is always being aware of how I am feeling, recognizing certain behaviors that lead to inappropriate actions, if I do persistence comes in and I work my way through it. It's not gonna be that dark and gloomy place where I tried to kill myself. And what I did to remind myself of this was to engrave these two words - vigilance and persistence - on my wedding band, in Korean, because it was in Korea where Taekwondo originated. And it is through this sport that I achieved strength and mastery of these two words in training. So, when I get depressed it's not as bad as it used to be.
This is a life-long endeavor and life is movement - what are your next steps now that you have established this way of living?
So now that UNGRIP is out, my vision is to help people get to the point where they can govern themselves. I came up with a greenhouse design to grow food all year around in northern Canada - off grid using rammed earth/earth ship type technology. I want to build these things in community gardens and everywhere where we can. hundreds if possible so that people can take back control of their food. We give away so much of our power, I am trying to teach people how to keep that power to empower themselves and be more conscious as to where they give the power away; eg giving it to family, friends and communities rather than dead corporations and government entities.
Here is the thing; a person means persona which is a mask. A corporation is a corps / dead body and a corporation sole is when a man wraps the dead body / corporation around themselves and puts on a mask and lives as a dead corporation. My vision is to teach people about this fiction and help them to stop living like a dead person and start living as a man. You may be familiar with the process where you go from being dead to being alive?
Resurrection!
It is time to get rid of the dead and start to live. What ever form that may take. It will be interesting. I believe the Christ Consciousness has already descended upon the face of the earth and it is up to us to feel that energy and incorporate it into our lives. Being balanced and centered is key.
Your ONE MESSAGE to the world.
My message to the world? All I can really think of is a quote from one of my favorite people in history; Gandhi. He said "be the change you want to see in the world'. He was absolutely correct. the only one we can change is ourselves. but we can make a difference in the world by walking the path and setting the example and having the courage to share that story with others. I was scared out of my mind up to the release of the film, and I am glad I fought through that fear, otherwise we would not be talking right now. So I continue to walk the path I believe is right for me and ask that people do not believe a word I say. Go figure out the truth for yourself. Go do your own thing. Go follow your own heart and work everything out for yourself. When we do that, we will co-create something bigger and better than anything we have done in the past. I am so excited to see what we create out of all this and I am happy to be a part of it. Looking forward to seeing how we live as a group of kings and queens!
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To find out more about Rob please visit his
www.ConsciousSelfGovernance.ca
