This is how I see it. You don't have to look at it this way. It started for me with whooping cough at age 2. The only way to survive it was to die psychologically. If I fought it and kept coughing I would have died. So I gave in and passed out unconscious so I might live. So I died over and over to live. It became a terrifying theme of my young life. Later at age 10 I got childhood epilepsy likely caused at least partly by whooping cough and once again I died to live about once every 6 months at night when I was asleep from age 10 until age 15 when it finally stopped for good.
However, the PTSD, (mild version)(Post traumatic stress disorder) caused in my life from first whooping cough and then childhood epilepsy likely is similar to rape victims. Only with whooping cough and childhood epilepsy there is no one to blame. But the traumatic after effects are about the same.
When Mom passed on almost a month ago now I was relieved for her because she hasn't known who she is or who I am for about 2 years now. However, for me, the birth to 21 year old inside me feels pretty lost but the 21 to 60 year old inside me is okay--sort of. Both Mom and Dad are gone now(Dad in 1985 when I was 37 and he 69). Now I'm 60 only 9 years away from when my own father died. So I don't know if I'll check out when my own Dad did or live to 100. It's hard to say these days. I hear a Great Grandfather of mine lived to 105, so anything is possible.
I was trying to explain to a grief therapist that my wife and I have been seeing about once a month since her Mom died in 1999 how I see life psychologically. I embrace death, at least psychologically because it was how I survived whooping cough and epilepsy when so many others died. It also, I think ties into the worldwide terminal macho and sacrificing oneself for the greater good like many soldiers do. More young men died my age(born 1948) in the Viet Nam War than any other. I always knew I would have easily gone and died there while saving my buddies' lives. That's why my Dad made sure I didn't go. He knew I was always a daredevil and embraced death too. This kind of fearless bravado runs in my family. My father told me that one time his father took on 13 men in a fight and won. That's not my style, though. By the time I was born intelligence was more important than getting yourself killed. I'm thankful for that. However, before my time I knew many men's lives ended over stupid things. Some mens lives still end over stupid things. And it's only by grace that I'm still alive too. And I'm not ashamed to admit it.
Psychologically, it works something like this. Many men run from some kinds of danger. For a man, the single most dangerous thing on earth is a woman. However, I have always run toward women and they toward me with both good and bad results obviously over the years. However, many men I have known have mostly run from women except for maybe the right one. However, because I have always been a little narcisistic in that when I got over being afraid of women falling in love with me at about age 15, I started to find when I had reached age 21 that if a woman was interested or in love with me, generally I was happy to be with her to if she was single because if she was in love with me that was good enough for me. I always needed to be worshipped because I was an only child and my mother and grandmother sort of made me their life's ambition. This made me revere women. I was kind of horrified today when I realized why I revere women. It came because I felt so victimized by whooping cough and epilepsy that I identified with how victimized women had been for thousands of years. This makes sense when you understand that I was 15 in 1963 before women had all the rights they do today. They could vote but the birth control pill which completely changed all the rules only became available to all in 1960. So it wasn't until 1969 or later when women started to really get some rights to their bodies and their lives.
So I have always loved women and they have always loved me. Their mothers also liked me because I was always a gentleman and took an interest in their psychological needs too, because of my close relationship with my mother and Grandmother. I was close to my Dad's Mom too but she lived several thousand miles away so I didn't see her much after I was 4 years old.
So, starting especially in my 20s after relationships usually were sexual as well, women became a way to embrace death. For in death comes life. But when life becomes too solid I get scared because since all is in cycles death will come and bite us next in the butt. So I find it is better to embrace death on your own terms before you physically are dead from it all.
So, the death I'm talking about is psychological, or metaphorical, but it is no less real than physical death. Psychological death and physical death are often intertwined. In fact, the 100,000 year old charactor found in male and female forms in all tribes on earth, the shaman or medicine man or woman is often defined as: one who has psychologically died but whose body still remains on earth.
So, when I studied Cultural Anthropology and really understood this one concept I realized I was a natural shaman and valuable to all beings because I naturally transit the worlds both of the living and the dead. This might freak you out but that is not my intention. I find the world of the dead much easier to cope with than the land of the living most of the time.
For example, I have watched many friends and relatives when they first die having a hard time navigating and figuring things out for the first few months on the other side after passing on. But usually after 3 to 6 months they get pretty good at the whole thing.
It is a lot like watching someone who has never used a computer teach themselves how to use it. At first they are swearing but after a while they really enjoy themselves. Many people just newly on the other side are like this.
Some refuse to believe they are dead and it is important for family and friends to pray for this type of person so angels can come and move them to a better, happier dimension. Others lived on the other side while alive, like ministers, priests, some therapists and healers etc. and usually have no trouble much except missing friends and relatives when they get to the other side. It all depends on the experiences and skills on has here first on earth before they pass on.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Monday, October 6, 2008
The best place to be now
I am not speaking now where the best place to be now financially. I am speaking of the best place to be physically. We are looking now likely given the way things are going at something at least temporarily as bad or worse than the Great Depression worldwide. Going into the many many causes of this or assigning blame doesn't keep people alive through it, even though that will be necessary for the world to come out the other side in one piece eventually.
No. I'm speaking now about where physically is the best place to survive what this all looks like now for those who can financially
afford it or who feel unsafe where they presently physically are.
Strangely enough third world countries that use almost no electricity but have abundant farms and clean water sources would be an option. For example, I've heard of many college educated young people going to Belize and Guatemala when they lost their professional jobs when their county or city employer went bankrupt. It is much less expensive to live there than here for 1 month, 6 months or even 1 year until things settle down a little.
Another choice would be to go where there is plenty of water and farms where it costs less to heat ones home, especially where the population is small in forested areas where one can get a permit to cut their own wood for under $50 for the winter from the forest service. In this way you gather the wood, build your fire in your wood stove and save thousands of dollars heating your home. However, unless you are familiar and safe with Chain saws and cutting down dead trees I wouldn't do this.
Also, unless you are cutting down dead logepole pines most wood needs to be split with a wedge and mall or a gas powered splitter.
Cities, generally, except in the wealthiest areas are going to become much more dangerous as millions of people lose their jobs, their unemployment compensation runs out and then become very desperate in trying to feed and house their families. Don't wait until you are homeless and all your money has gone to move to a better situation for example around family that can all help each other for example on a family farm where all could eat and help each other.
Create a strategy with all the elements necessary for physical, emotional and mental and if possible financial survival. Be sure to plug in as many new variables that you see coming down the pike in order for you and your family to survive what appears to be coming now!
No. I'm speaking now about where physically is the best place to survive what this all looks like now for those who can financially
afford it or who feel unsafe where they presently physically are.
Strangely enough third world countries that use almost no electricity but have abundant farms and clean water sources would be an option. For example, I've heard of many college educated young people going to Belize and Guatemala when they lost their professional jobs when their county or city employer went bankrupt. It is much less expensive to live there than here for 1 month, 6 months or even 1 year until things settle down a little.
Another choice would be to go where there is plenty of water and farms where it costs less to heat ones home, especially where the population is small in forested areas where one can get a permit to cut their own wood for under $50 for the winter from the forest service. In this way you gather the wood, build your fire in your wood stove and save thousands of dollars heating your home. However, unless you are familiar and safe with Chain saws and cutting down dead trees I wouldn't do this.
Also, unless you are cutting down dead logepole pines most wood needs to be split with a wedge and mall or a gas powered splitter.
Cities, generally, except in the wealthiest areas are going to become much more dangerous as millions of people lose their jobs, their unemployment compensation runs out and then become very desperate in trying to feed and house their families. Don't wait until you are homeless and all your money has gone to move to a better situation for example around family that can all help each other for example on a family farm where all could eat and help each other.
Create a strategy with all the elements necessary for physical, emotional and mental and if possible financial survival. Be sure to plug in as many new variables that you see coming down the pike in order for you and your family to survive what appears to be coming now!
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Don't Panic
If there is any single thing I've learned in 60 years of being alive on Planet Earth it is: "Don't panic unless a large truck is barreling down the road and if you don't move you will surely die." Even then don't panic just move quickly!
There is a story told about sailing ships of old and this is also true of ship sinkings the last few hundred years as well. If there are survivors of a sinking ship they tend to be over 25 or 30 years of age. The primary reason for this is to my way of thinking that men over 25 or 30 have already survived such crazy things in their lives that they think while facing death in the ocean, "First, don't panic, gather your energies and you might just survive this too." Whereas younger men might just think, "We're going to die!" because they might not have faced death before. Older men by age 25 or 30 often have faced death one or more times and so tend to take dying more in stride because they know this kind of thing happens every once in a while.
The whole world is facing this kind of financial calamity. In some ways we are all on the Titanic sinking and we can all panic or play music or jump overboard to freeze to death in the water. Or because this sinking ship is all metaphorical we can just change the rules and do something different individually or en masse on earth.
It's time for a better idea(ideas!). When crises occur it always brings out the best and the worst in everyone. But mostly the best comes to the fore in us all. Because all of our necks are on the line. The more we can share useful information with each other now, the more likely we and millions and even billions of others will still be alive 10 years or more from now. It's up to all of us individually and en masse. What can you contribute to making things better on earth and lessening the suffering of mankind, your friends, your family?
There is a story told about sailing ships of old and this is also true of ship sinkings the last few hundred years as well. If there are survivors of a sinking ship they tend to be over 25 or 30 years of age. The primary reason for this is to my way of thinking that men over 25 or 30 have already survived such crazy things in their lives that they think while facing death in the ocean, "First, don't panic, gather your energies and you might just survive this too." Whereas younger men might just think, "We're going to die!" because they might not have faced death before. Older men by age 25 or 30 often have faced death one or more times and so tend to take dying more in stride because they know this kind of thing happens every once in a while.
The whole world is facing this kind of financial calamity. In some ways we are all on the Titanic sinking and we can all panic or play music or jump overboard to freeze to death in the water. Or because this sinking ship is all metaphorical we can just change the rules and do something different individually or en masse on earth.
It's time for a better idea(ideas!). When crises occur it always brings out the best and the worst in everyone. But mostly the best comes to the fore in us all. Because all of our necks are on the line. The more we can share useful information with each other now, the more likely we and millions and even billions of others will still be alive 10 years or more from now. It's up to all of us individually and en masse. What can you contribute to making things better on earth and lessening the suffering of mankind, your friends, your family?
The Horror of Credit Default Swaps Worldwide
I'm not any kind of expert nor do I pretend to be. However, I do study world financial markets at least 2 hours a day Monday through Friday and have done so for several years now. I just listened to the scariest financial news in my lifetime while listening to several experts talk about unregulated and totally secret credit default swaps worldwide.
The only good news I heard is that contained within the 700(850) billion dollar bailout rescue package is the option of Paulson to make U.S. taxpayers preferred stockholders of any banking institution they fund(sort of like what happened with AIG).
Credit default swaps look something like this: imagine all banks are people who secretly bet on things(sort of the way people bet on football games among friends). Only this time they are betting whether stocks or companies are going to tank. This is called hedging your bet. However, the reason banks worldwide are not lending money to each other is mainly because of Lehman Brothers. When that institution was allowed to collapse many leveraged debts were lost and there was no money to cover the bets because of leverage. Now, if you have studied history it was individual leveraged investors who caused the great depression. This time it is secretly leveraged banks worldwide. And they are not lending to each other because they don't know what secret bets(wagers)(insurance?) have been made because they are all secret and unregulated.
Imagine (10,000 people) in reality banks worldwide secretly bet 1 billion each that Lehman Brothers wouldn't fail but only had 200 million each to cover their bet. But as long as Lehman brothers didn't fail they made 20 million dollars a month profit as their insurance fee. But when Lehman brothers actually was allowed to fail 10,000 banks didn't have 1 billion dollars to pay up on their secret hedging bet with whoever, they only had 200 million each. Do 10,000 banks have to fail now? Here is where we are theoretically. However, the real picture is much worse than this.
It is worse because this whole thing worked REALLY well as long as the value of everything(stocks, real estate, everything invested in) went up. But when it started to go down to the point where investment banks and regular banking institutions worldwide started to fail it affected everyone and it will continue to affect everyone for months and years to come(at least 10 or more).
Like I said the ONLY positive thing now even with all these things going on is that if Paulson allows taxpayers to own failing institutions with preferred stock then when things turn around all the profits will belong to the taxpayers of the United States.
The only good news I heard is that contained within the 700(850) billion dollar bailout rescue package is the option of Paulson to make U.S. taxpayers preferred stockholders of any banking institution they fund(sort of like what happened with AIG).
Credit default swaps look something like this: imagine all banks are people who secretly bet on things(sort of the way people bet on football games among friends). Only this time they are betting whether stocks or companies are going to tank. This is called hedging your bet. However, the reason banks worldwide are not lending money to each other is mainly because of Lehman Brothers. When that institution was allowed to collapse many leveraged debts were lost and there was no money to cover the bets because of leverage. Now, if you have studied history it was individual leveraged investors who caused the great depression. This time it is secretly leveraged banks worldwide. And they are not lending to each other because they don't know what secret bets(wagers)(insurance?) have been made because they are all secret and unregulated.
Imagine (10,000 people) in reality banks worldwide secretly bet 1 billion each that Lehman Brothers wouldn't fail but only had 200 million each to cover their bet. But as long as Lehman brothers didn't fail they made 20 million dollars a month profit as their insurance fee. But when Lehman brothers actually was allowed to fail 10,000 banks didn't have 1 billion dollars to pay up on their secret hedging bet with whoever, they only had 200 million each. Do 10,000 banks have to fail now? Here is where we are theoretically. However, the real picture is much worse than this.
It is worse because this whole thing worked REALLY well as long as the value of everything(stocks, real estate, everything invested in) went up. But when it started to go down to the point where investment banks and regular banking institutions worldwide started to fail it affected everyone and it will continue to affect everyone for months and years to come(at least 10 or more).
Like I said the ONLY positive thing now even with all these things going on is that if Paulson allows taxpayers to own failing institutions with preferred stock then when things turn around all the profits will belong to the taxpayers of the United States.
1/3 of U.S. High School Students drop out
I was listening to Bill Gates talk in an interview on cnn today(sunday) and saying that the economic problems we are facing are nothing compared with the disaster of 1/3 of U.S. High school students dropping out before graduation. He said that in less developed countries lesser education is less of a problem than here because there are still so many menial jobs. However, more and more as menial jobs are replaced by technology like robots, there will only be less and less menial jobs here in the U.S. So this will mean there will be less and less unskilled jobs that exist in the U.S. as time goes on.
He gave the example of when there was a farm revolution at the turn of the 20th century when gas and diesel powered tractors replaced (for the most part) men walking behind horse drawn plows. Many people who had no other skills were horrified at this at the time. However, now the U.S. feeds both itself and much of the world using tractors and only 2% of its population actually being farmers as a result.
Gates said that in the long run innovation and research and development and importing really highly educated and resourceful people from other countries is what will make this country stronger and stronger.
He was asked in regard to education if any nation on earth does it better. He said that even though very small countries do it better with their education, no large nation does as well as the United States. He said on any scale the top 12 to 19 Universities on Earth are in the United States.
So, being a melting pot we do education for a large country better than anyone, even though there are extreme problems in many inner city areas in the U.S. because of High School Drop outs.
Despite these problems, the top 20% of best educated people in the United States are better educated than in any large country (200 million people or more) on earth.
He gave the example of when there was a farm revolution at the turn of the 20th century when gas and diesel powered tractors replaced (for the most part) men walking behind horse drawn plows. Many people who had no other skills were horrified at this at the time. However, now the U.S. feeds both itself and much of the world using tractors and only 2% of its population actually being farmers as a result.
Gates said that in the long run innovation and research and development and importing really highly educated and resourceful people from other countries is what will make this country stronger and stronger.
He was asked in regard to education if any nation on earth does it better. He said that even though very small countries do it better with their education, no large nation does as well as the United States. He said on any scale the top 12 to 19 Universities on Earth are in the United States.
So, being a melting pot we do education for a large country better than anyone, even though there are extreme problems in many inner city areas in the U.S. because of High School Drop outs.
Despite these problems, the top 20% of best educated people in the United States are better educated than in any large country (200 million people or more) on earth.
Friday, October 3, 2008
The 100 years War
I'm not talking about the historical 100 years war but the one the world is in now with fundamentalist terrorist Islam and Al Quaida.
I was watching NBC news on tv tonight and saw how bad things are going in Pakistan. A 12 year old boy from a Madras said, "I want to fight the sons of Bush". I found listening to a 12 year old boy telling us with his kalashnikov near by that he wanted to fight the sons of Bush very unsettling. However, this actually is what the world is in for since we didn't insist on all the Madras' being shut down. Until the Madras' or children's Islamic terrorist schools, are all shut down a never ending supply of terrorist enemies into the future will arise one by one, adding to the bankruptcy of the free world. Though these children likely will all be killed as adults one by one it will be very expensive both in free world lives lost and to both Christian, Islamic and secular cultures.
No one really ever wins a cultural war really. Unless you read the old testament where they extincted every man, woman and child of an opposing culture. War, at least for the western world is very impersonal because of the secular nature of most of the western world and the way most western people are educated. So this war, in general will be fought by the poorest educated in both worlds, with only the officers of both sides with college educations.
Also, since this is an asymmetric war it must be also fought this way, not with traditional war styles. I think the near bankruptcy of the free world is its inability to move away from traditional war styles and mostly into asymmetric warfare. Most of the money has been wasted by putting men into situations that aren't financially efficient and only lead to bankrupt nations. For the west even to maintain any stability at all, EFFICIENCY in the use of all monies must be the primary concern. Otherwise, the west WILL lose this war!
It is also VERY important that everyone possible in the Western world educate themselves about the difference between Sunni al Quaida terrorists and Shia Iranian Terrorists. Generally, the only people that the Sunni and Shias hate more than each other is the secular Christian world. So it is in the interest of the western world to foster the hate between terrorist Shia and terrorist Sunni if the western world wants to survive the next 100 years as a Christian secular world.
However, I abhor hatred toward any peoples. I would prefer understanding grow between all groups. But if one must fight to survive it is important to be absolutely ruthless about it. Otherwise one is just a poser and to be a poser is to be living joke to all sides.
The frustrating thing about history is that there will be no real winner in this war even if it lasts 100 years, only losers, only the dead and dying. In the end it is just another wasteful wasted war!
Look at the Palestinian question. Look at Ireland. Did anybody win those wars? I think not.
I was watching NBC news on tv tonight and saw how bad things are going in Pakistan. A 12 year old boy from a Madras said, "I want to fight the sons of Bush". I found listening to a 12 year old boy telling us with his kalashnikov near by that he wanted to fight the sons of Bush very unsettling. However, this actually is what the world is in for since we didn't insist on all the Madras' being shut down. Until the Madras' or children's Islamic terrorist schools, are all shut down a never ending supply of terrorist enemies into the future will arise one by one, adding to the bankruptcy of the free world. Though these children likely will all be killed as adults one by one it will be very expensive both in free world lives lost and to both Christian, Islamic and secular cultures.
No one really ever wins a cultural war really. Unless you read the old testament where they extincted every man, woman and child of an opposing culture. War, at least for the western world is very impersonal because of the secular nature of most of the western world and the way most western people are educated. So this war, in general will be fought by the poorest educated in both worlds, with only the officers of both sides with college educations.
Also, since this is an asymmetric war it must be also fought this way, not with traditional war styles. I think the near bankruptcy of the free world is its inability to move away from traditional war styles and mostly into asymmetric warfare. Most of the money has been wasted by putting men into situations that aren't financially efficient and only lead to bankrupt nations. For the west even to maintain any stability at all, EFFICIENCY in the use of all monies must be the primary concern. Otherwise, the west WILL lose this war!
It is also VERY important that everyone possible in the Western world educate themselves about the difference between Sunni al Quaida terrorists and Shia Iranian Terrorists. Generally, the only people that the Sunni and Shias hate more than each other is the secular Christian world. So it is in the interest of the western world to foster the hate between terrorist Shia and terrorist Sunni if the western world wants to survive the next 100 years as a Christian secular world.
However, I abhor hatred toward any peoples. I would prefer understanding grow between all groups. But if one must fight to survive it is important to be absolutely ruthless about it. Otherwise one is just a poser and to be a poser is to be living joke to all sides.
The frustrating thing about history is that there will be no real winner in this war even if it lasts 100 years, only losers, only the dead and dying. In the end it is just another wasteful wasted war!
Look at the Palestinian question. Look at Ireland. Did anybody win those wars? I think not.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Palin:Not ready for primetime
I was favorably impressed with Sarah Palin but not as a candidate to become president. Instead I think she might make one of the best CEO's of the Red Cross or something like that or head of the PTA but definitely to provincial to ever be president(at least for now). Likability only takes one so far. Being Miss Congeniality in the Miss Alaska contest or even Governor of Alaska does not make one ready to be president of the United States.
However, to be fair to her if she was say a Senator from Alaska in the United States Senate for about 10 years time, she might then be a good candidate for President. Right now she is just too provincial to be that close to becoming president alongside the oldest presidential candidate ever to run for a first term in the history of the United States. After all, John McCain is 72 and has a statistically 1 in 5 chance of dying in office.
However, to be fair to her if she was say a Senator from Alaska in the United States Senate for about 10 years time, she might then be a good candidate for President. Right now she is just too provincial to be that close to becoming president alongside the oldest presidential candidate ever to run for a first term in the history of the United States. After all, John McCain is 72 and has a statistically 1 in 5 chance of dying in office.
Tutelary Dieties
I didn't know even what this name meant until I met my first Tibetan Lamas after age 32. However, I experienced them my whole life growing up and was terrorized by what happened to people around me who treated me badly. It wasn't that people who were bad to me didn't deserve what happened to them. To my American sensibilities it wasn't polite. However, tutelary dieties, I found have very strict rules, sort of like spiritual and physical soldiers combined in one very spiritually and physically ethical system. I just didn't understand the system yet. When it was finally explained to me it went something like this:
The lamas said, "Tutelary dieties protect Tulkus who don't know they are tulkus until the tulku realizes what he or she is by age 40 usually at the latest. They protect the "living Buddha" until the living Buddha becomes self aware in that specific lifetime."
After I learned this and was told I had to protect the innocent ignorant beings around me from the horrendous karma of doing bad things to me, I finally had peace about the whole thing. It is sort of realizing that one has a spiritual Army. For a Christian (I was raised a Christian) It is like having a personal ongoing experience with Archangel Michael and his band protecting one every day. In point of fact, Archangel Michael and his band visited me when I was about 2 years old at Christmas and by their presence demonstrated they would protect me throughout my life. And they have. Even though as I grew older I couldn't see Michael's face anymore, I still can see his lifesize blue oval of light. I this way I recognize his presence and that he is there to protect me from some situation.
So, to see the Tibetan Tutelary dieties like Archangel Michael and his band of Archangels is very useful to those of us on the spiritual path of becoming a Good Christian or realizing that one is a Tulku. For without spiritual protection no one becomes enlightened or makes it directly to heaven. Heaven comes through Grace. Grace come from someone (including you) invoking God's angels to protect you from spiritual and physical harm.
note: When I finished this article I went to the wikipedia article on Archangel Michael. I found it very useful and informative so here it is:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archangel
The lamas said, "Tutelary dieties protect Tulkus who don't know they are tulkus until the tulku realizes what he or she is by age 40 usually at the latest. They protect the "living Buddha" until the living Buddha becomes self aware in that specific lifetime."
After I learned this and was told I had to protect the innocent ignorant beings around me from the horrendous karma of doing bad things to me, I finally had peace about the whole thing. It is sort of realizing that one has a spiritual Army. For a Christian (I was raised a Christian) It is like having a personal ongoing experience with Archangel Michael and his band protecting one every day. In point of fact, Archangel Michael and his band visited me when I was about 2 years old at Christmas and by their presence demonstrated they would protect me throughout my life. And they have. Even though as I grew older I couldn't see Michael's face anymore, I still can see his lifesize blue oval of light. I this way I recognize his presence and that he is there to protect me from some situation.
So, to see the Tibetan Tutelary dieties like Archangel Michael and his band of Archangels is very useful to those of us on the spiritual path of becoming a Good Christian or realizing that one is a Tulku. For without spiritual protection no one becomes enlightened or makes it directly to heaven. Heaven comes through Grace. Grace come from someone (including you) invoking God's angels to protect you from spiritual and physical harm.
note: When I finished this article I went to the wikipedia article on Archangel Michael. I found it very useful and informative so here it is:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archangel
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
What is important about our parents?
Having lost my father in 1985 and my mother this last month, I think I can speak to this question. Is what they believed in important? Yes. Is it important that everything they believed in be scientifically proved? NO.
For me and for most people for thousands of years on earth what is important is that they loved us, took care of us, fed us, clothed us, kept us warm when it was snowing outside, laughed with us, told us stories, traveled with us, taught us to be good citizens, good friends, good children, good adults, reinforced us at any age and gave us good counsel at any age.
What is important was not what they believed but that they loved and cared for us so we could then grow up and be good people and to teach our children and grandchildren to be good people too.
No matter the religion for 100,000 years or more this is what has always been important. All the rest is fluff compared to them loving us and keeping us alive into adulthood.
We live because of our parents. We are good people because of our parents training. We have good lives because of our parents. We owe them and all our ancestors everything. May each of us be as good a parent to future generations yet unborn as as our parents and ancestors were to us.
For me and for most people for thousands of years on earth what is important is that they loved us, took care of us, fed us, clothed us, kept us warm when it was snowing outside, laughed with us, told us stories, traveled with us, taught us to be good citizens, good friends, good children, good adults, reinforced us at any age and gave us good counsel at any age.
What is important was not what they believed but that they loved and cared for us so we could then grow up and be good people and to teach our children and grandchildren to be good people too.
No matter the religion for 100,000 years or more this is what has always been important. All the rest is fluff compared to them loving us and keeping us alive into adulthood.
We live because of our parents. We are good people because of our parents training. We have good lives because of our parents. We owe them and all our ancestors everything. May each of us be as good a parent to future generations yet unborn as as our parents and ancestors were to us.
What Makes me Happy?
The following was written on April 30th 2002 for a college creative writing class.
Begin: Recently, I went to Mt. Waterman and Twin Peaks in the Mountains above Los Angeles in the Angeles National Forest. It took me back to being a boy with my parents still in their 30s and just how great is was to hike those mountains with them and my friends and even once in a while camp, sled or ski there too. Last week I took my 28 year old son there. Even though we spent time on Hollywood blvd and the sunset strip and went 4 wheeling in our old 1989 Toyota 4runner on the edge of Big Bear, his favorite part of the trip was walking the beautiful old trails there with my stories of memories of my parents and friends there in the late 1950s and early 1960s.
My father died when my son was about 11 years old and the shock of my father's death gave my son asthma at that age suddenly which he still has. In 2001 my mother had to be institutionalized with Senile dementia because she almost burnt down her home and sat praying for the fire to stop instead of putting out the fire she had caused herself.
So my sharing stories with my son of my parents and I all being fairly young and still healthy and alive was an incredible joy that I had thought forever gone until my son and I walked these trails once again.
Traveling all over the world and meeting interesting people has always been fun for me. Girlfriends and then wives brought their share of joy and pain. However, I soon found out in life that joy eventually turned to incredible pain whether it lasted for one day, one week one year or 15 years. It seems the other side of joy is always great pain. In other words "no pain no gain". So it appears to be true that whenever one experiences incredible joy they must also be prepared for the other side which is incredible sadness and the pain when it comes. One can pretend that happiness will be forever. But at least on earth nothing is forever unless it is the earth itself. And I'm not so sure about the permanence of earth.
Family has always brought me great reward and great peace. Whether it was my parents, my cousins or my grandparents or later my wives and children I always felt very rewarded. I did not always believe I would survive breakups with either girlfriends or wives when they occurred but generally somehow things always became eventually survivable somehow, some way.
After I was 26 when my son was born my children became my primary source of joy. As I held my first son in my arms after my wife and I delivered him alone by ourselves I realized what all the intensity and dating and craziness of the 1960s and 1970s had all been about. It brought a whole new joy that I had never experienced before. My son and I bonded from birth. This became very important when 3 years later his mother and I divorced. She gave me full custody of our son. I was 29 and she was only 26 at the time we divorced. Looking back it seems we were too young to be married let alone to be getting divorced but that was then and this is now.
More than anything else, fatherhood made me accept my responsibilities as a man more powerfully than any other factor. This brought powerful joy, pride and pain.
Some people speak of their happiness coming from their careers. This has never been true for me. I have become fairly cynical about careers. I think this is because I am a very free and independent thinker like my father before me. I tend to tell people what I think and this isn't very useful in most careers. So I have found that being an entrepreneur worked best for me after struggling through other options in my 20s. So through trial and error I learned that my independent nature is best suited to creating and running businesses.
Begin: Recently, I went to Mt. Waterman and Twin Peaks in the Mountains above Los Angeles in the Angeles National Forest. It took me back to being a boy with my parents still in their 30s and just how great is was to hike those mountains with them and my friends and even once in a while camp, sled or ski there too. Last week I took my 28 year old son there. Even though we spent time on Hollywood blvd and the sunset strip and went 4 wheeling in our old 1989 Toyota 4runner on the edge of Big Bear, his favorite part of the trip was walking the beautiful old trails there with my stories of memories of my parents and friends there in the late 1950s and early 1960s.
My father died when my son was about 11 years old and the shock of my father's death gave my son asthma at that age suddenly which he still has. In 2001 my mother had to be institutionalized with Senile dementia because she almost burnt down her home and sat praying for the fire to stop instead of putting out the fire she had caused herself.
So my sharing stories with my son of my parents and I all being fairly young and still healthy and alive was an incredible joy that I had thought forever gone until my son and I walked these trails once again.
Traveling all over the world and meeting interesting people has always been fun for me. Girlfriends and then wives brought their share of joy and pain. However, I soon found out in life that joy eventually turned to incredible pain whether it lasted for one day, one week one year or 15 years. It seems the other side of joy is always great pain. In other words "no pain no gain". So it appears to be true that whenever one experiences incredible joy they must also be prepared for the other side which is incredible sadness and the pain when it comes. One can pretend that happiness will be forever. But at least on earth nothing is forever unless it is the earth itself. And I'm not so sure about the permanence of earth.
Family has always brought me great reward and great peace. Whether it was my parents, my cousins or my grandparents or later my wives and children I always felt very rewarded. I did not always believe I would survive breakups with either girlfriends or wives when they occurred but generally somehow things always became eventually survivable somehow, some way.
After I was 26 when my son was born my children became my primary source of joy. As I held my first son in my arms after my wife and I delivered him alone by ourselves I realized what all the intensity and dating and craziness of the 1960s and 1970s had all been about. It brought a whole new joy that I had never experienced before. My son and I bonded from birth. This became very important when 3 years later his mother and I divorced. She gave me full custody of our son. I was 29 and she was only 26 at the time we divorced. Looking back it seems we were too young to be married let alone to be getting divorced but that was then and this is now.
More than anything else, fatherhood made me accept my responsibilities as a man more powerfully than any other factor. This brought powerful joy, pride and pain.
Some people speak of their happiness coming from their careers. This has never been true for me. I have become fairly cynical about careers. I think this is because I am a very free and independent thinker like my father before me. I tend to tell people what I think and this isn't very useful in most careers. So I have found that being an entrepreneur worked best for me after struggling through other options in my 20s. So through trial and error I learned that my independent nature is best suited to creating and running businesses.
Efficiency
Coming from a Swiss German and Scottish ancestry I was taught extreme efficiency in everything I thought and did from babyhood. Starting at about age 15 I began applying my families efficiency to the study of God, Enlightenment, Science, Surfing, Skiing, Mountain Climbing, World Travel, Beautiful girls etc. I found that since I had the innate intelligence of my father combined with the good nature and kindness and incredible intuitive gifts of my mother that I could move forward at anything I chose with incredible efficiency.
I was always taught not to go through people but to always go my own way and to go around people to get whatever I wanted in life. For example, some people in the fast lane on the freeway drive up behind people and flash their lights and honk for slow drivers to get out of the way. That is a good way to start fight or get shot where I live in California. No. I wait for an opportunity and then pass on the right whenever I can or choose an alternative route. No fights. No deaths and I always am on time ahead of time having outfoxed and out thought 97% of all people to get exactly what I wanted.
If you want to survive the next 10 years on planet earth you might want to consider my survival strategy for success and survival. No fights. No deaths. Complete effeciency and the ongoing survival of yourself and your family. Things look pretty scary for us humans on earth the next 10 years and beyond. Like someone recently said, "It is not the beginning of the end of this financial crisis,it is only the end of the beginning. I'm afraid we are in for something like the Great depression or worse looking at the ignorant way most people view this. If you want to survive this present world financial globalization debacle be sure to educate yourself first and get moving and be extremely pragmatic so you and your family survive the next 10 years!!!
I was always taught not to go through people but to always go my own way and to go around people to get whatever I wanted in life. For example, some people in the fast lane on the freeway drive up behind people and flash their lights and honk for slow drivers to get out of the way. That is a good way to start fight or get shot where I live in California. No. I wait for an opportunity and then pass on the right whenever I can or choose an alternative route. No fights. No deaths and I always am on time ahead of time having outfoxed and out thought 97% of all people to get exactly what I wanted.
If you want to survive the next 10 years on planet earth you might want to consider my survival strategy for success and survival. No fights. No deaths. Complete effeciency and the ongoing survival of yourself and your family. Things look pretty scary for us humans on earth the next 10 years and beyond. Like someone recently said, "It is not the beginning of the end of this financial crisis,it is only the end of the beginning. I'm afraid we are in for something like the Great depression or worse looking at the ignorant way most people view this. If you want to survive this present world financial globalization debacle be sure to educate yourself first and get moving and be extremely pragmatic so you and your family survive the next 10 years!!!
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Some Mood Altering drugs permanently rewire the brain
As a counselor for emotionally disturbed teenagers in California I was required to dispense many prescriptions to these young adults so I decided as a person of conscience that I needed to better understand what the staff psychiatrist was having us give these kids. I was horrified when I started to study the physiological effects of drugs like prosac, haldol, Paxil zoloft etc. I learned that the Prosac family of mood altering drugs permanently rewires the brain of those who take it.
Think for a moment about what I am saying. The effects of this class of drug are permanent. These childrens and adults brains are permanently rewired. This means that these people(adults and children) once having taken these drugs will never process information like those who have never taken these drugs again.
To me, this is far more terrifying than cloning. at least with cloning you get two humans that eventually look the same. With the Prosac effect you get permanently mutated brains that will never process information the same way that humans have for 100,000 years.
What are the long term effects of this. What have we done to these people and their children? Is the suicide factor genetically passed on. Have we just doomed these people genetically? I don't have the answers to any of these questions. I'm just saying all the people that have been put on Prosac and all the other mood altering drugs are millions of guinea pigs and we have no idea what the end result will be for the human race 100, 500 or a 1000 years from now from all this!
Another guinea pig effect is cell phones. Many scientists are comparing cell phones to cigarettes in the way they likely are creating brain cancer. Everyone is addicted to cell phones now. What happens when people start to get sick and die from brain cancer within the next 20 years or so. Most studies on the subject consist of using a cell phone only once a week and these studies are funded by the cell phone makers.
We are a world society of consumers that are being lied to by the drug manufacturers and cell phone makers. It's just like the snake oil salesmen of 150 years ago. Many people died then from the snake oils that were supposed to cure everything. Caveat Emptor. Let the buyer beware!!!
Note: By the way I and another counselor became so upset at kids being drugged to the point where kids were being so heavily drugged in this facility that they would literally sit in a corner with drool coming out of their mouths and be unable to speak. When we complained we were told that they were more easily managed this way. We quit in protest. Many facilities nationwide do not care about children's rights to have normal lives at any point in the future. The children are just so heavily drugged and because of it will never be capable of a normal life at any point.
Think for a moment about what I am saying. The effects of this class of drug are permanent. These childrens and adults brains are permanently rewired. This means that these people(adults and children) once having taken these drugs will never process information like those who have never taken these drugs again.
To me, this is far more terrifying than cloning. at least with cloning you get two humans that eventually look the same. With the Prosac effect you get permanently mutated brains that will never process information the same way that humans have for 100,000 years.
What are the long term effects of this. What have we done to these people and their children? Is the suicide factor genetically passed on. Have we just doomed these people genetically? I don't have the answers to any of these questions. I'm just saying all the people that have been put on Prosac and all the other mood altering drugs are millions of guinea pigs and we have no idea what the end result will be for the human race 100, 500 or a 1000 years from now from all this!
Another guinea pig effect is cell phones. Many scientists are comparing cell phones to cigarettes in the way they likely are creating brain cancer. Everyone is addicted to cell phones now. What happens when people start to get sick and die from brain cancer within the next 20 years or so. Most studies on the subject consist of using a cell phone only once a week and these studies are funded by the cell phone makers.
We are a world society of consumers that are being lied to by the drug manufacturers and cell phone makers. It's just like the snake oil salesmen of 150 years ago. Many people died then from the snake oils that were supposed to cure everything. Caveat Emptor. Let the buyer beware!!!
Note: By the way I and another counselor became so upset at kids being drugged to the point where kids were being so heavily drugged in this facility that they would literally sit in a corner with drool coming out of their mouths and be unable to speak. When we complained we were told that they were more easily managed this way. We quit in protest. Many facilities nationwide do not care about children's rights to have normal lives at any point in the future. The children are just so heavily drugged and because of it will never be capable of a normal life at any point.
Monday, September 29, 2008
Defining the Problem
U.S. Government finances have been in deficit spending since 2002.
The U.S. right now owes 500 billion dollars to China. If they asked for their money
we could not pay it back. They likely won't (at least right now) because we have been their best trading partner on earth.
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have cost 700 Billion so far and likely will reach a trillion dollars. All that is now owed to foreign countries by the U.S.
The net effect: We are financially bankrupt and fighting wars like we actually had the money to do it.
These problems all caught up with us during the subprime debacle.
There is no easy way out.
Ending the wars might save the nation from something like the Great Depression or worse.
Right now, our nation is so financially unrealistic likely it will be worse.
It reminds me of people who once were rich borrowing the money to pretend they are still rich when they actually are bankrupt out of pride.
Without some reality check the United States is over as a nation.
Note: However, I was taken completely by surprise during the 1980s recession and Savings and Loan Crisis. What I learned then much to my amazement is that Nations, Large Corporations and large religious organizations make up a lot of their own rules as they go along and the rest of us individuals are not privy to all this.
Since we are in a war between the free world and muslim terrorism almost anything can happen and anything you hear on the news cannot be completely trusted to be factual. So be aware that there is public knowledge like I shared above the note and the make your own rules to fit the need that all nations, large corporations and religious organizations do depending upon the need. For example, any nation can just print money, change accounting rules or do whatever they want as long as it is applied consistently to everyone within that nation. So, in a sense almost anything is possible in these times! end note.
The U.S. right now owes 500 billion dollars to China. If they asked for their money
we could not pay it back. They likely won't (at least right now) because we have been their best trading partner on earth.
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have cost 700 Billion so far and likely will reach a trillion dollars. All that is now owed to foreign countries by the U.S.
The net effect: We are financially bankrupt and fighting wars like we actually had the money to do it.
These problems all caught up with us during the subprime debacle.
There is no easy way out.
Ending the wars might save the nation from something like the Great Depression or worse.
Right now, our nation is so financially unrealistic likely it will be worse.
It reminds me of people who once were rich borrowing the money to pretend they are still rich when they actually are bankrupt out of pride.
Without some reality check the United States is over as a nation.
Note: However, I was taken completely by surprise during the 1980s recession and Savings and Loan Crisis. What I learned then much to my amazement is that Nations, Large Corporations and large religious organizations make up a lot of their own rules as they go along and the rest of us individuals are not privy to all this.
Since we are in a war between the free world and muslim terrorism almost anything can happen and anything you hear on the news cannot be completely trusted to be factual. So be aware that there is public knowledge like I shared above the note and the make your own rules to fit the need that all nations, large corporations and religious organizations do depending upon the need. For example, any nation can just print money, change accounting rules or do whatever they want as long as it is applied consistently to everyone within that nation. So, in a sense almost anything is possible in these times! end note.
IF Aliens from Space. . . . .
If aliens from space came down and told the President, "Stop the world economy right now because if you don't global warming will render all life on earth extinct" the result would look like what we are experiencing right now.
Gas and oil worldwide will likely drop in consumption by 50%. Up to half of the world's populations likely will be dead from starvation or worse within 10 years.
Even if aliens from space came down to stop the global economy they couldn't have created a more perfect storm than this. And it's not over.
I hope I'm wrong and a solution is found. But as of right now I'm not holding my breath.
Gas and oil worldwide will likely drop in consumption by 50%. Up to half of the world's populations likely will be dead from starvation or worse within 10 years.
Even if aliens from space came down to stop the global economy they couldn't have created a more perfect storm than this. And it's not over.
I hope I'm wrong and a solution is found. But as of right now I'm not holding my breath.
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