"Does Death Exist?: Life Is Forever, Says Theory!"
Here's something by Robert Lanza, M.D. worth pondering this morning.
THE BUS ALWAYS COMES FOR THOSE WHO WAIT!
“We have a saying in Puerto Rico: 'The bus — la guagua — always comes for those who wait.”
Tony Bechara, painter, on the occasion of honoring his friend and fellow painter, Carmen Herrera, 94, who sold her first painting five years ago, at 89. Now, at a small ceremony in her honor, she was basking in the realization that her career had finally, undeniably, taken off!
Since that first sale in 2004, collectors have avidly pursued Ms. Herrera, and her radiantly ascetic paintings have entered the permanent collections of institutions like the Museum of Modern Art, the Hirshhorn Museum and the Tate Modern. Last year, MoMA included her in a pantheon of Latin American artists on exhibition. And this summer, during a retrospective show in England, The Observer of London called Ms. Herrera the discovery of the decade, asking, “How can we have missed these beautiful compositions?”
In a word, Ms. Herrera, a nonagenarian homebound painter with arthritis, is hot!
Tony Bechara, painter, on the occasion of honoring his friend and fellow painter, Carmen Herrera, 94, who sold her first painting five years ago, at 89. Now, at a small ceremony in her honor, she was basking in the realization that her career had finally, undeniably, taken off!
Since that first sale in 2004, collectors have avidly pursued Ms. Herrera, and her radiantly ascetic paintings have entered the permanent collections of institutions like the Museum of Modern Art, the Hirshhorn Museum and the Tate Modern. Last year, MoMA included her in a pantheon of Latin American artists on exhibition. And this summer, during a retrospective show in England, The Observer of London called Ms. Herrera the discovery of the decade, asking, “How can we have missed these beautiful compositions?”
In a word, Ms. Herrera, a nonagenarian homebound painter with arthritis, is hot!
WHAT IS ATTRACTIVE? PART ONE!
Believe it or not - and why wouldn't you believe it? - this is one of the frequent questions I deal with as a therapist. Almost everyone who comes to therapy is struggling with this issue in one way or another. Whether its conflictual expression takes the form of self-deprecation - "I'm not smart enough, thin enough, young enough, rich enough..." - or as a desperate search for the "perfect" love object who is enough and more, one thing is certain: pursuing gratification in love based on external or superficial notions of "attractiveness" is a losing proposition. In 30 years of practicing therapy, and 50+ years of living, I have yet to meet even one person who found happiness in a relationship by trying to have the criteria of their "checklist" met or lived up to, either by themselves or another. Not even one exception.
Why not?
Well, it's complicated, but let me try to uncomplicate it.
It starts with the problem of "unconditional love."
Most people have heard about the concept of unconditional love, and most people have some personal notion of what it means. And most people are wrong. You see, unconditional love is the only kind of love there is, so to make it as if it's a special kind of love is erroneous to start with. Love for another, love of any kind - romantic, parental, between friends or family members or pets - is not based on the attributes of the beloved. Love is a soul force coming through the one who is loving, and received, or not, by the one being loved. One doesn't decide to love another based on anything external or superficial, in spite of ego notions to the contrary. You don't love someone because they're handsome or smart or rich. You love someone because you do.
Now, one can actively interfere with the expression or reception of love, which is a function of defenses and character structure issues. A narcissistic person, for example, once put it perfectly in a session when he said this: "I want to be the special person of a special person." Problem is as soon as said "special person" chooses that guy who wants to be chosen, the special person isn't special anymore. So the torturous loop must go on, with the idealized, fantasy love object always remaining just out of reach.
The point is when you're imagining that the unconditional love you want, which is really just love, is based on superficial aspects, then you can become desperately hooked on images of what "attractive" is.
So, then, what is attractiveness really? Chemistry? Destiny? Compatibility? And is anyone inherently attractive?
Hmm... yes, yes, yes, and... yes! But here's the thing - you can be attracted to someone because of the ways in which the desired person will provoke you into feeling something you've been suppressing, like sadness or anger. You can be attracted to someone in order to be moved to a new place in any given lifetime through conflict and loss or ego deflation. Or you can be attracted to someone because they're your soul mate and you're ready for the big orgasm!
It all depends, in other words, on your level of personal development. The more open and connected you are to your deepest, highest self, the more you will see the totality of another person - mind, body, spirit - and the more attraction will be based on the dictates and vision of the soul. And likewise, "beauty" will be seen as a measure of openness and connectedness in another, not as some arbitrary arrangements of body parts or bank accounts.
It's in the eyes, folks, where the soul can shine through, in the suppleness of facial self-expressions without a mask, in the centeredness of one's heart and in the positively charged-up genitals. That's a perfect ten! The very notion of shrinking down a nose, pumping up breasts or tightening up abs as a road to finding the love that you're internally resisting is as ludicrous as putting an expensive rug over a floor being devoured by termites.
Why not?
Well, it's complicated, but let me try to uncomplicate it.
It starts with the problem of "unconditional love."
Most people have heard about the concept of unconditional love, and most people have some personal notion of what it means. And most people are wrong. You see, unconditional love is the only kind of love there is, so to make it as if it's a special kind of love is erroneous to start with. Love for another, love of any kind - romantic, parental, between friends or family members or pets - is not based on the attributes of the beloved. Love is a soul force coming through the one who is loving, and received, or not, by the one being loved. One doesn't decide to love another based on anything external or superficial, in spite of ego notions to the contrary. You don't love someone because they're handsome or smart or rich. You love someone because you do.
Now, one can actively interfere with the expression or reception of love, which is a function of defenses and character structure issues. A narcissistic person, for example, once put it perfectly in a session when he said this: "I want to be the special person of a special person." Problem is as soon as said "special person" chooses that guy who wants to be chosen, the special person isn't special anymore. So the torturous loop must go on, with the idealized, fantasy love object always remaining just out of reach.
The point is when you're imagining that the unconditional love you want, which is really just love, is based on superficial aspects, then you can become desperately hooked on images of what "attractive" is.
So, then, what is attractiveness really? Chemistry? Destiny? Compatibility? And is anyone inherently attractive?
Hmm... yes, yes, yes, and... yes! But here's the thing - you can be attracted to someone because of the ways in which the desired person will provoke you into feeling something you've been suppressing, like sadness or anger. You can be attracted to someone in order to be moved to a new place in any given lifetime through conflict and loss or ego deflation. Or you can be attracted to someone because they're your soul mate and you're ready for the big orgasm!
It all depends, in other words, on your level of personal development. The more open and connected you are to your deepest, highest self, the more you will see the totality of another person - mind, body, spirit - and the more attraction will be based on the dictates and vision of the soul. And likewise, "beauty" will be seen as a measure of openness and connectedness in another, not as some arbitrary arrangements of body parts or bank accounts.
It's in the eyes, folks, where the soul can shine through, in the suppleness of facial self-expressions without a mask, in the centeredness of one's heart and in the positively charged-up genitals. That's a perfect ten! The very notion of shrinking down a nose, pumping up breasts or tightening up abs as a road to finding the love that you're internally resisting is as ludicrous as putting an expensive rug over a floor being devoured by termites.
THIS MUST BE OBAMA'S FAULT... SOMEHOW?!
THIS MORNING'S WASHINGTON POST HEADLINE: "ZERO PERCENT JOB GROWTH IN THE 00'S!"
"For most of the past 70 years, the U.S. economy has grown at a steady clip, generating perpetually higher incomes and wealth for American households. But since 2000, the story is starkly different. The past decade was the WORST for the U.S. economy in modern times. It was, according to a wide range of data, a lost decade for American workers. The decade began in a moment of triumphalism -- there was a current of thought among economists in 1999 that recessions were a thing of the past. By the end, there were two, bookends to a debt-driven expansion that was neither robust nor sustainable. There has been ZERO NET JOB CREATION since December 1999. No previous decade going back to the 1940s had job growth of less than 20 percent. Economic output rose at its slowest rate of any decade since the 1930s as well. Middle-income households made less in 2008, when adjusted for inflation, than they did in 1999 -- and the number is sure to have declined further during a difficult 2009. The Aughts were the first decade of falling median incomes since figures were first compiled in the 1960s.."
I GUESS OBAMA MUST HAVE TIME-TRAVELED BACK TO 2000 AND SECRETLY DESTROYED THE ECONOMY WHILE W AND DARTH CHENEY WERE SHOOTING EVERYONE IN THE FACE! OH NO, WAIT! I KNOW - IT WAS BILL CLINTON'S FAULT! OH WAIT ! WAIT! UHH... ANYWAY, OBAMA'S BLACK AND THIN AND HIS WIFE IS HOT FOR HIM AND HE MUST BE A MUSLIM SOCIALIST FASCIST WHO CAN HIT A THREE-POINT SHOT LIKE IT WAS NOTHING AND... UHH... I'M NOT A REPUBLICAN ANYMORE ANYWAY. YEAH, THAT'S RIGHT... I'M A... A... A... A LIBERTARIAN! YEAH, THAT'S THE TICKET!!
"For most of the past 70 years, the U.S. economy has grown at a steady clip, generating perpetually higher incomes and wealth for American households. But since 2000, the story is starkly different. The past decade was the WORST for the U.S. economy in modern times. It was, according to a wide range of data, a lost decade for American workers. The decade began in a moment of triumphalism -- there was a current of thought among economists in 1999 that recessions were a thing of the past. By the end, there were two, bookends to a debt-driven expansion that was neither robust nor sustainable. There has been ZERO NET JOB CREATION since December 1999. No previous decade going back to the 1940s had job growth of less than 20 percent. Economic output rose at its slowest rate of any decade since the 1930s as well. Middle-income households made less in 2008, when adjusted for inflation, than they did in 1999 -- and the number is sure to have declined further during a difficult 2009. The Aughts were the first decade of falling median incomes since figures were first compiled in the 1960s.."
I GUESS OBAMA MUST HAVE TIME-TRAVELED BACK TO 2000 AND SECRETLY DESTROYED THE ECONOMY WHILE W AND DARTH CHENEY WERE SHOOTING EVERYONE IN THE FACE! OH NO, WAIT! I KNOW - IT WAS BILL CLINTON'S FAULT! OH WAIT ! WAIT! UHH... ANYWAY, OBAMA'S BLACK AND THIN AND HIS WIFE IS HOT FOR HIM AND HE MUST BE A MUSLIM SOCIALIST FASCIST WHO CAN HIT A THREE-POINT SHOT LIKE IT WAS NOTHING AND... UHH... I'M NOT A REPUBLICAN ANYMORE ANYWAY. YEAH, THAT'S RIGHT... I'M A... A... A... A LIBERTARIAN! YEAH, THAT'S THE TICKET!!
DO YOU HAVE "RESTLESS LEG SYNDROME?!"
Check out psychologist Ellen Langer's piece entitled: "The Medicalization Of Mundane Experience: The 'Syndrome' Syndrome."
TODAY'S QUOTE!
"I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference."
Robert Frost
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference."
Robert Frost
AND THE WINNER OF THE "HOW STUPID WERE WE?" AWARD FOR THE 00'S IS...
No, not Sarah Palin, Orly Taitz or W. Not Limbaugh, Beck or Joe Wilson. Not even Joe The Plumber (and that's some real stupid there!)
Nope. The winner is... the right wing bloggers on the POLITICS FORUM on CRAIGSLIST!
Surprised? Well, let me explain.
Here's a place where uncensored discourse can take place on any subject related to politics, where whatever anyone wants to express is posted for all to see, without filtering or screening, free of charge, and yet, this spot in cyber space has become a repository, a veritable dumpster for the screeds of the most inane, ignorant and inarticulate of the English-speaking (barely) population. The brain-addled vitriol that is spewed on a daily basis on CL POLITICS is not just racist, sexist, xenophobic, homophobic, and paranoid... that kind of material could easily be found on many sites, or even on FOX News. No, the stuff I'm talking about is downright, low-down, not-even-trying stupid! Facts are either made up or considered non-essential to those making their mostly unintelligible "arguments" here, and the level of writing and schoolyard name-calling is such that my 3rd-grade daughter would be embarrassed by it.
Stupidity is not just a function of education, folks. One can be formerly uneducated, yet still be smart, still be coherent, still be able to discern fact from fiction and able to express themselves in a fashion that is worthy of being called a human being. No, stupidity is in many ways a choice. A choice to close off one's mind and emotional connection, a choice to rely on superstition, dogma and base impulses, a choice to act for all intents and purposes - soulless.
So, congratulations to CL POLITICS! In a decade of major bar-lowering in so many areas of civilization, you have set a new, low standard.
Nope. The winner is... the right wing bloggers on the POLITICS FORUM on CRAIGSLIST!
Surprised? Well, let me explain.
Here's a place where uncensored discourse can take place on any subject related to politics, where whatever anyone wants to express is posted for all to see, without filtering or screening, free of charge, and yet, this spot in cyber space has become a repository, a veritable dumpster for the screeds of the most inane, ignorant and inarticulate of the English-speaking (barely) population. The brain-addled vitriol that is spewed on a daily basis on CL POLITICS is not just racist, sexist, xenophobic, homophobic, and paranoid... that kind of material could easily be found on many sites, or even on FOX News. No, the stuff I'm talking about is downright, low-down, not-even-trying stupid! Facts are either made up or considered non-essential to those making their mostly unintelligible "arguments" here, and the level of writing and schoolyard name-calling is such that my 3rd-grade daughter would be embarrassed by it.
Stupidity is not just a function of education, folks. One can be formerly uneducated, yet still be smart, still be coherent, still be able to discern fact from fiction and able to express themselves in a fashion that is worthy of being called a human being. No, stupidity is in many ways a choice. A choice to close off one's mind and emotional connection, a choice to rely on superstition, dogma and base impulses, a choice to act for all intents and purposes - soulless.
So, congratulations to CL POLITICS! In a decade of major bar-lowering in so many areas of civilization, you have set a new, low standard.
THIS IS SO CATHARTIC, I'M REPRINTING THE WHOLE THING!!!
This is from April 2009, just a beauty and one of my favorites from the year coming to an end.
"G.O.P.: R.I.P"
By STEVEN WEBER
"So there it stands: a naked, pigeon-chested old man, random strands of white hair on its boney shoulders; its swollen-knuckled hands clasped over its dead genitals, looking at once forlorn and menacing, shivering with self-loathing and xenophobia, raging pathetically at its timely and appropriate defeat at the hands of Reason.
Ladies and gentlemen: The Republican Party.
With every passing day, the people who stubbornly, maddeningly cling to an obsolete ideal and who stand in the way of the cultural advancement of this country, this America, spew the base reality of their caustic ideology into the air.
The Republican Party is like a dying tyrant, mad with syphilis, ironically like that very Stalin they would accuse their enemies of associating with. How else to account for their desperation to resurrect the wraith of Joseph McCarthy; the hammy and baffling utterances from high level party officials like Boehner and McConnell; the blatant desire on their part to let the country fail out of sheer resentment; the wanton sedition of Conservative shit-stirrers ranging from the quasi Madame Defarge Michele Bachmann to the porcine, pill-popping porcine propagandist Rush Limbaugh?
It is an all out assault on reason, on progress, on truth. What is the difference between the Republican Party and, say, the Taliban? A rogue by any other name would smell as rank. Their frantic accusations all churned out in a futile effort to explain their current pariah status is as pathetic and draconian as stoning a woman in the street.
I feel I must apologize for my own particularly febrile anger. It's unseemly and ugly. But finally, the enemy is clearly outlined. We can see it for what it is and what it always has been. It exists not in myth but in a reality which has plagued humanity for millennia: utter, hateful ignorance born from a fear of truth, indeed a fear of life itself; a mad and impotent pursuit of some long-forgotten ecstasy having spawned generations of paranoid power addicts who chase the past at the expense of the future, cloaking their real intentions in perfumed patriotism and the seductive swoon of religion.
It's so fitting that we are living in an age where beheadings, torture, piracy and now unbridled power mongering are all common place. Perhaps that element of humanity is going back into hibernation and is snapping at any and everything before its eyes finally close. In our lifetime the choice has never been so stark.
Don't be intimidated by that naked, pigeon-chested old man. His party's over."
"G.O.P.: R.I.P"
By STEVEN WEBER
"So there it stands: a naked, pigeon-chested old man, random strands of white hair on its boney shoulders; its swollen-knuckled hands clasped over its dead genitals, looking at once forlorn and menacing, shivering with self-loathing and xenophobia, raging pathetically at its timely and appropriate defeat at the hands of Reason.
Ladies and gentlemen: The Republican Party.
With every passing day, the people who stubbornly, maddeningly cling to an obsolete ideal and who stand in the way of the cultural advancement of this country, this America, spew the base reality of their caustic ideology into the air.
The Republican Party is like a dying tyrant, mad with syphilis, ironically like that very Stalin they would accuse their enemies of associating with. How else to account for their desperation to resurrect the wraith of Joseph McCarthy; the hammy and baffling utterances from high level party officials like Boehner and McConnell; the blatant desire on their part to let the country fail out of sheer resentment; the wanton sedition of Conservative shit-stirrers ranging from the quasi Madame Defarge Michele Bachmann to the porcine, pill-popping porcine propagandist Rush Limbaugh?
It is an all out assault on reason, on progress, on truth. What is the difference between the Republican Party and, say, the Taliban? A rogue by any other name would smell as rank. Their frantic accusations all churned out in a futile effort to explain their current pariah status is as pathetic and draconian as stoning a woman in the street.
I feel I must apologize for my own particularly febrile anger. It's unseemly and ugly. But finally, the enemy is clearly outlined. We can see it for what it is and what it always has been. It exists not in myth but in a reality which has plagued humanity for millennia: utter, hateful ignorance born from a fear of truth, indeed a fear of life itself; a mad and impotent pursuit of some long-forgotten ecstasy having spawned generations of paranoid power addicts who chase the past at the expense of the future, cloaking their real intentions in perfumed patriotism and the seductive swoon of religion.
It's so fitting that we are living in an age where beheadings, torture, piracy and now unbridled power mongering are all common place. Perhaps that element of humanity is going back into hibernation and is snapping at any and everything before its eyes finally close. In our lifetime the choice has never been so stark.
Don't be intimidated by that naked, pigeon-chested old man. His party's over."
HOW STUPID WERE WE?!
Working on some selections for the stupidest primates of the 00 decade.
Here's a few to start with:
WHEW!
Here's a few to start with:
WHEW!
MORE ON THE DECADE FROM HELL!
Perhaps more than anything else, this says it all:
In 2009... FOX NEWS HAD ITS BEST YEAR EVER!!
Just take a minute and think about that.
WHEW! That is a year to top off a decade from hell!!
In 2009... FOX NEWS HAD ITS BEST YEAR EVER!!
Just take a minute and think about that.
WHEW! That is a year to top off a decade from hell!!
SEXUAL REPRESSION STILL KILLS, AND WE STILL DON'T GET IT!
I have written many posts on this blog and posted many articles by others here as well on the very serious damage that sexual repression does, individually and to our societies. And you know what? Most people don't get it. Most people still think that a vibrant sex life is a luxury, like playing tennis or watching a football game on Sunday. But it isn't. Our sexual energy is one of the most powerful forces within all of us, and when that energy is distorted or blocked as it is in so many individuals, the results are disastrous, whether in the causation of personal disease or social ills.
HERE is yet another headline about somebody who was sexually repressed trying to blow people up:
Terror Suspect's Web Posts Reveal Desire For 'Great Jihad,' Shame About Sex.
"The Nigerian, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, accused in the Christmas day attack on a U.S. airliner, reflects on a blog about a growing alienation from his family, his shame over sexual urges and his hopes that a "great jihad" will take place across the world."
Come on, folks! This problem isn't going to go away. Violence, fanaticism, paranoia, maniacal repression of others, Republicans, these illnesses won't be contained by anyone's military or police force, or by any protest movements, anymore than an adolescent's sexual feelings can be successfully contained by threatening or inane pseudo-religious dogma or preposterous, Flintstonian policies like "abstinence only."
Work on yourself, people! Help your children free themselves. This is only going to change one person at a time. If you have been ignoring or neglecting or minimizing your sex life, do the world and yourself and your children a favor and get on it! Make a New Year's resolution that will really mean something.
HERE is yet another headline about somebody who was sexually repressed trying to blow people up:
Terror Suspect's Web Posts Reveal Desire For 'Great Jihad,' Shame About Sex.
"The Nigerian, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, accused in the Christmas day attack on a U.S. airliner, reflects on a blog about a growing alienation from his family, his shame over sexual urges and his hopes that a "great jihad" will take place across the world."
Come on, folks! This problem isn't going to go away. Violence, fanaticism, paranoia, maniacal repression of others, Republicans, these illnesses won't be contained by anyone's military or police force, or by any protest movements, anymore than an adolescent's sexual feelings can be successfully contained by threatening or inane pseudo-religious dogma or preposterous, Flintstonian policies like "abstinence only."
Work on yourself, people! Help your children free themselves. This is only going to change one person at a time. If you have been ignoring or neglecting or minimizing your sex life, do the world and yourself and your children a favor and get on it! Make a New Year's resolution that will really mean something.
MORE ON HOW SEXUAL REPRESSION KILLS! "TEACHERS: LEAVE THOSE ('SEXTING') KIDS ALONE!!"
I've of course written before on the rampant damage that sexual repression causes. Here's another example from this week's news...
In a piece on The Daily Beast last week, entitled "Leave 'Sexters' Alone!" Conor Friedersdorf writes that "stories that begin with 'sexting' become tragic all too frequently only when principals, police officers, or district attorneys get involved. In most cases, teens who conceal their sexting from authority figures suffer negligible adverse consequences; they're hardly the first generation to play 'I'll show you mine,' and even Verizon's 3G network cannot yet transmit sexually transmitted diseases or pregnancy."
Exactly! How sadly often is it that suppressed, repressed and oppressive adults inflict their own festered ire from a sex-life gone dead on their kids who might actually think their sexuality is a cause for exploration and celebration.
Here's more from Conor's article:
"The two known suicides attributed to 'sexting' actually resulted from adults who exacerbated, rather than stopped, the abhorrent 'slut-shaming' that peers callously directed at girls whose naked photos were spread around school; and authority figures in at least six states charge less troubled teens who send naked pictures of themselves with distributing child pornography! Yes, it is possible to be charged with distribution of child pornography for sending out a photograph of yourself—and to be charged with possessing it when a naked photo sent by your high-school girlfriend is stored on your cellphone. Should technology ever permit humans to download our brains' mental images to a hard drive, every last teenager in America will wind up prohibited from living within 10,000 feet of themselves!"
In a piece on The Daily Beast last week, entitled "Leave 'Sexters' Alone!" Conor Friedersdorf writes that "stories that begin with 'sexting' become tragic all too frequently only when principals, police officers, or district attorneys get involved. In most cases, teens who conceal their sexting from authority figures suffer negligible adverse consequences; they're hardly the first generation to play 'I'll show you mine,' and even Verizon's 3G network cannot yet transmit sexually transmitted diseases or pregnancy."
Exactly! How sadly often is it that suppressed, repressed and oppressive adults inflict their own festered ire from a sex-life gone dead on their kids who might actually think their sexuality is a cause for exploration and celebration.
Here's more from Conor's article:
"The two known suicides attributed to 'sexting' actually resulted from adults who exacerbated, rather than stopped, the abhorrent 'slut-shaming' that peers callously directed at girls whose naked photos were spread around school; and authority figures in at least six states charge less troubled teens who send naked pictures of themselves with distributing child pornography! Yes, it is possible to be charged with distribution of child pornography for sending out a photograph of yourself—and to be charged with possessing it when a naked photo sent by your high-school girlfriend is stored on your cellphone. Should technology ever permit humans to download our brains' mental images to a hard drive, every last teenager in America will wind up prohibited from living within 10,000 feet of themselves!"
TODAY'S QUOTE: PAUL KRUGMAN JOINS IN W/PL ON "THE DECADE FROM HELL!"
Here's Krugman:
"What was truly impressive about the decade past, however, was our unwillingness, as a nation, to learn from our mistakes. So let’s bid a not at all fond farewell to the Big Zero — the decade in which we achieved nothing and learned nothing. Will the next decade be better? Stay tuned. Oh, and happy New Year."
Read the whole essay HERE.
"What was truly impressive about the decade past, however, was our unwillingness, as a nation, to learn from our mistakes. So let’s bid a not at all fond farewell to the Big Zero — the decade in which we achieved nothing and learned nothing. Will the next decade be better? Stay tuned. Oh, and happy New Year."
Read the whole essay HERE.
THE WORST OF TIMES OR THE BEST OF TIMES: WHO'S DECADE FROM HELL WAS IT?!
What kind of decade is coming to an end this week?
Some, including TIME Magazine, have called this "The Decade From Hell!"
Well, indeed, it was certainly pretty bad from a collective perspective, that's for sure. Unless you were a hedge-fund manipulator, or a banking, insurance, or pharmaceutical crook, or a politician on the take from same, the decade just ending, the one dominated by maggot-eating, obeise-berating reality TV and eight years of surreal, sexless saber-rattling and pseudo-religious posturing by the worst leaders in American history, you were pretty much screwed at every level in the 00's.
If you were in the 98% of the population not worth $50 million or more, you worked harder and longer this past decade and got less compensation in current dollars for your efforts. You were told that the schools your kids had to go to, the roads you had to travel on, and the levy's built to hold back hurricane flood waters from your city were all in fine shape, even though your reality said otherwise, often tragically. You were convinced that global warming wasn't real, but Saddam's weapons of mass destruction were, and in spite of the evidence, you were told that just telling teens not to have sex was the best way to prevent them from doing it, even as teen pregnancy rose and rose. But the good news was that you were systematically prescribed drugs to help you get it up, lower your blood pressure, emotionally numb you and basically keep you from complaining too much while you were being raped and robbed blind.
Here's a bit from the TIME piece:
"Bookended by 9/11 at the start and a financial wipeout at the end, the first 10 years of this century will very likely go down as the most dispiriting and disillusioning decade Americans have lived through in the post–World War II era. Call it the Decade from Hell, or the Reckoning, or the Decade of Broken Dreams, or the Lost Decade. Call it whatever you want — just give thanks that it is nearly over."
And let's not even talk about the levels of inanity and stupidity diving ever-downward with the likes of Sarah "Wilma Flintstone" Palin, Joe The [not really a plumber] Plumber, Glenn Beck, Orly Taitz and the birthers, tea-baggers, end-timers and assorted other overmedicated Barney Rubbles.
But... was it truly "the decade from hell?" The interesting thing is that the answer to that question depends on from where you answer it. We are always creating our reality at two levels - individually and en mass. In spite of it all, I know people who fell truly, deeply in love during the 00's for the first time, or who created a masterpiece in their chosen art form, or found abundance without cheating or stealing from anybody else, or who healed their minds-bodies-and-spirits in miraculous ways without the slash-and-burn mideaval methods of mainstream medicine. Yes, a lot of good most definitely happened to many individuals, all within the larger context of debacle after debacle at the public levels of reality.
So, can the best decade, personally, simultaneously exist within the worst decade collectively? Of course. As long as you're not thinking and living your life from a strictly dualistic place.
A concomitant question that arises is: Can we be evolving collectively as a species if as a species we are collectively doing so poorly? Well, I suppose that's like asking if an alcoholic is evolving when he's in the process of hitting bottom. The answer is to some degree unknown because it all depends on what is done at the bottom, what choices are made there, and then, what the follow-up is. As a country, we may certainly be at our bottom, although just when it seems that our degree of denial has brought us as low as we can go, Joe Leiberman and John McCain raise a toast and take another swig of single malt bullshit!
Nonetheless, folks, you create your own personal reality from the inside out, and our collective reality, just like the weather, is a manifestation of all of our personal realities combined. So, as we approach a new decade, my advice is to continue to be as conscious and loving and connected as possible in your life, and perhaps you will be the Hundredth Monkey.
[Read about the HUNDREDTH MONKEY here.]
Some, including TIME Magazine, have called this "The Decade From Hell!"
Well, indeed, it was certainly pretty bad from a collective perspective, that's for sure. Unless you were a hedge-fund manipulator, or a banking, insurance, or pharmaceutical crook, or a politician on the take from same, the decade just ending, the one dominated by maggot-eating, obeise-berating reality TV and eight years of surreal, sexless saber-rattling and pseudo-religious posturing by the worst leaders in American history, you were pretty much screwed at every level in the 00's.
If you were in the 98% of the population not worth $50 million or more, you worked harder and longer this past decade and got less compensation in current dollars for your efforts. You were told that the schools your kids had to go to, the roads you had to travel on, and the levy's built to hold back hurricane flood waters from your city were all in fine shape, even though your reality said otherwise, often tragically. You were convinced that global warming wasn't real, but Saddam's weapons of mass destruction were, and in spite of the evidence, you were told that just telling teens not to have sex was the best way to prevent them from doing it, even as teen pregnancy rose and rose. But the good news was that you were systematically prescribed drugs to help you get it up, lower your blood pressure, emotionally numb you and basically keep you from complaining too much while you were being raped and robbed blind.
Here's a bit from the TIME piece:
"Bookended by 9/11 at the start and a financial wipeout at the end, the first 10 years of this century will very likely go down as the most dispiriting and disillusioning decade Americans have lived through in the post–World War II era. Call it the Decade from Hell, or the Reckoning, or the Decade of Broken Dreams, or the Lost Decade. Call it whatever you want — just give thanks that it is nearly over."
And let's not even talk about the levels of inanity and stupidity diving ever-downward with the likes of Sarah "Wilma Flintstone" Palin, Joe The [not really a plumber] Plumber, Glenn Beck, Orly Taitz and the birthers, tea-baggers, end-timers and assorted other overmedicated Barney Rubbles.
But... was it truly "the decade from hell?" The interesting thing is that the answer to that question depends on from where you answer it. We are always creating our reality at two levels - individually and en mass. In spite of it all, I know people who fell truly, deeply in love during the 00's for the first time, or who created a masterpiece in their chosen art form, or found abundance without cheating or stealing from anybody else, or who healed their minds-bodies-and-spirits in miraculous ways without the slash-and-burn mideaval methods of mainstream medicine. Yes, a lot of good most definitely happened to many individuals, all within the larger context of debacle after debacle at the public levels of reality.
So, can the best decade, personally, simultaneously exist within the worst decade collectively? Of course. As long as you're not thinking and living your life from a strictly dualistic place.
A concomitant question that arises is: Can we be evolving collectively as a species if as a species we are collectively doing so poorly? Well, I suppose that's like asking if an alcoholic is evolving when he's in the process of hitting bottom. The answer is to some degree unknown because it all depends on what is done at the bottom, what choices are made there, and then, what the follow-up is. As a country, we may certainly be at our bottom, although just when it seems that our degree of denial has brought us as low as we can go, Joe Leiberman and John McCain raise a toast and take another swig of single malt bullshit!
Nonetheless, folks, you create your own personal reality from the inside out, and our collective reality, just like the weather, is a manifestation of all of our personal realities combined. So, as we approach a new decade, my advice is to continue to be as conscious and loving and connected as possible in your life, and perhaps you will be the Hundredth Monkey.
[Read about the HUNDREDTH MONKEY here.]
GET RICH OR GET OUT!
Two years ago, I posted a long piece entitled "THE END OF THE JOB!" It was about many things related to our changing work-life consciousness, and worth reading if you have a bit of time over the holidays. The title itself came from the September 19, 1994 cover story of Fortune Magazine, of all places. Again, worth reading if you have the time. In short, what the Fortune article made clear was something I had already come to realize - that working by the hour at a traditional "job" was not going to cut it any more in terms of providing financial well-being or stability down the road, unless, of course, you were either willing to live a minimalist subsistence lifestyle through old age, or work full-time well into your 70's and beyond.
In 1994, when that article came out, I had just turned forty. I didn't have any fears about getting older. I still don't. In fact, I always have and still do look forward to getting on in years. But what I did realize at that time, as I began my approach to mid-life, was that the country I grew up in economically was gone, a country in which my working-class parents could buy a 4-bedroom house on a quarter of an acre of land, half-an-hour from New York City, for substantially less that I just paid for a 4-cylinder car in 2008! Yep. You heard that right. And furthermore, in my childhood, all of my friends - the sons and daughters of house painters, carpenters, plumbers, garbage collectors, school teachers, deli-owners - all lived in comfortable private houses, as well, and like my dad, the fathers were the only wage-earners in the families. Get it? One working-class level income got you a roomy house, at least one car, a yearly summer vacation and a college education for the kids, if they wanted one. Today? Well, you know the story. Two, three, even four incomes per household barely gets you a living, and only at that if you go into substantial debt to boot.
I took up a mission in the mid-nineties. I began telling everyone, including the people that I advised as a therapist, that they needed to understand not just the realities of their own financial situations, but even moreso that they needed to understand that the infection of deregulated greed and corruption ravaging the body of America's economy wasn't going away anytime soon. Working for a living just wasn't going to cut it anymore, if you wanted to finish out the last rounds of your life at any level of comfort and quality. Nor were you going to be able to live on what, if anything you'd put away for the future. Most working or middle-class people didn't have any kind of significant savings or pensions they could rely on, and even if they did for a while, the debacles caused by the nefarious bank and hedge fund managers and other market manipulators eliminated those modest nest eggs for 95% of the population.
So, what was/is one to do in the face of these harsh realities?
"Invest in yourself" became my mantra.
In a piece I wrote earlier this year, entitled "YOU ARE THE ONLY GAME THAT ISN'T RIGGED," spinning of a brilliant piece of journalism by Matt Taibbi, that's what I advised. If you have a gift, a talent or a passion, then explore it, develop it, express it in the world somehow, especially if it's something that doesn't require working for a wage by the hour. And if you find yourself blocked in that area, then, for your sake, do the self-work necessary to unblock yourself, whatever it takes.
That's how I started on my own track to become a writer 8 years ago. As much as my work as a psychotherapist was a true calling for me, it was nonetheless a by-the-hour proposition, and therefore had a ceiling in terms of its capacity to produce wealth for me. So, in 2001, I began what I now call my "GET RICH OR GET OUT" journey. Simply put, I set myself on a course that would inevitably end with me becoming financially independent, either because I'd become wealthy enough to enjoy the material benefits of western society without having to "work for a living" until old age, or because I had dropped out of mainstream culture altogether and gone off the grid.
I still can't say yet which of the two alternatives will play out for my future. Last week, with the help of the wonderful director/actor/author, Paul Michael Glaser, I held a staged reading of the pilot episode of a television show I created. Last month, a screenplay I co-wrote with someone won Best Action Adventure Screenplay at the Gotham Film Festival. Clearly, I haven't given up on writing as a potential road to abundance for myself and my family. However, last night, I found myself talking with the love of my life about the possibility of moving to Canada sometime in the future to escape the crooks and liars that are gutting this country and make a fresh start in a healthier land.
I'll keep you posted.
In 1994, when that article came out, I had just turned forty. I didn't have any fears about getting older. I still don't. In fact, I always have and still do look forward to getting on in years. But what I did realize at that time, as I began my approach to mid-life, was that the country I grew up in economically was gone, a country in which my working-class parents could buy a 4-bedroom house on a quarter of an acre of land, half-an-hour from New York City, for substantially less that I just paid for a 4-cylinder car in 2008! Yep. You heard that right. And furthermore, in my childhood, all of my friends - the sons and daughters of house painters, carpenters, plumbers, garbage collectors, school teachers, deli-owners - all lived in comfortable private houses, as well, and like my dad, the fathers were the only wage-earners in the families. Get it? One working-class level income got you a roomy house, at least one car, a yearly summer vacation and a college education for the kids, if they wanted one. Today? Well, you know the story. Two, three, even four incomes per household barely gets you a living, and only at that if you go into substantial debt to boot.
I took up a mission in the mid-nineties. I began telling everyone, including the people that I advised as a therapist, that they needed to understand not just the realities of their own financial situations, but even moreso that they needed to understand that the infection of deregulated greed and corruption ravaging the body of America's economy wasn't going away anytime soon. Working for a living just wasn't going to cut it anymore, if you wanted to finish out the last rounds of your life at any level of comfort and quality. Nor were you going to be able to live on what, if anything you'd put away for the future. Most working or middle-class people didn't have any kind of significant savings or pensions they could rely on, and even if they did for a while, the debacles caused by the nefarious bank and hedge fund managers and other market manipulators eliminated those modest nest eggs for 95% of the population.
So, what was/is one to do in the face of these harsh realities?
"Invest in yourself" became my mantra.
In a piece I wrote earlier this year, entitled "YOU ARE THE ONLY GAME THAT ISN'T RIGGED," spinning of a brilliant piece of journalism by Matt Taibbi, that's what I advised. If you have a gift, a talent or a passion, then explore it, develop it, express it in the world somehow, especially if it's something that doesn't require working for a wage by the hour. And if you find yourself blocked in that area, then, for your sake, do the self-work necessary to unblock yourself, whatever it takes.
That's how I started on my own track to become a writer 8 years ago. As much as my work as a psychotherapist was a true calling for me, it was nonetheless a by-the-hour proposition, and therefore had a ceiling in terms of its capacity to produce wealth for me. So, in 2001, I began what I now call my "GET RICH OR GET OUT" journey. Simply put, I set myself on a course that would inevitably end with me becoming financially independent, either because I'd become wealthy enough to enjoy the material benefits of western society without having to "work for a living" until old age, or because I had dropped out of mainstream culture altogether and gone off the grid.
I still can't say yet which of the two alternatives will play out for my future. Last week, with the help of the wonderful director/actor/author, Paul Michael Glaser, I held a staged reading of the pilot episode of a television show I created. Last month, a screenplay I co-wrote with someone won Best Action Adventure Screenplay at the Gotham Film Festival. Clearly, I haven't given up on writing as a potential road to abundance for myself and my family. However, last night, I found myself talking with the love of my life about the possibility of moving to Canada sometime in the future to escape the crooks and liars that are gutting this country and make a fresh start in a healthier land.
I'll keep you posted.
YES!! DINOSAURS AND ABSTINENCE ONLY PROGRAMS ARE NOW EXTINCT!!!
During President George W. Bush's administration, abstinence programs received more than $100 million a year directly in federal funding and about $50 million in federal money funneled through the states. But the effort came under mounting criticism when studies concluded that the approach was ineffective and signs emerged that the long decline in teen pregnancies was faltering under abstinence only
As part of President Obama's first budget, Congress approved a request for more than $110 million for a new "teenage pregnancy prevention" initiative that would only fund programs that have been "proven effective through rigorous evaluation," which would effectively eliminate abstinence programs. James Wagoner, president of Advocates for Youth, a Washington-based advocacy group said: "This is the end of the failed abstinence-only model that research has shown is ineffective."
As part of President Obama's first budget, Congress approved a request for more than $110 million for a new "teenage pregnancy prevention" initiative that would only fund programs that have been "proven effective through rigorous evaluation," which would effectively eliminate abstinence programs. James Wagoner, president of Advocates for Youth, a Washington-based advocacy group said: "This is the end of the failed abstinence-only model that research has shown is ineffective."
3 RESPONSES TO PL'S "GET RICH OR GET OUT!" PL RESPONDS!
anonymous said...
Great picture of you and Mr. Glaser.
I sure wish I could join you in Canada. Definitely agree about what is happening to this country.
caseydancer said...
Wow, congratulations on the Gotham award and thanks so much for this article.
It almost brought tears to my eyes because it is this exact concept I cling to when the fears about my future creep in. That my gift, my passion and my joy is writing, and so writing must be the path I'm meant to follow to lead me out of this dark, suffocating, dead-end, hand-to-mouth-til-the-day-I-die life.
You're inspiring.
Two anonymouses said...
We need you Peter; don't go to Canada!!! I & F
PL says:
Hang in there, everyone. It ain't over 'till... And remember, sometimes you just have to be willing to do something in order not to have to do it!
Great picture of you and Mr. Glaser.
I sure wish I could join you in Canada. Definitely agree about what is happening to this country.
caseydancer said...
Wow, congratulations on the Gotham award and thanks so much for this article.
It almost brought tears to my eyes because it is this exact concept I cling to when the fears about my future creep in. That my gift, my passion and my joy is writing, and so writing must be the path I'm meant to follow to lead me out of this dark, suffocating, dead-end, hand-to-mouth-til-the-day-I-die life.
You're inspiring.
Two anonymouses said...
We need you Peter; don't go to Canada!!! I & F
PL says:
Hang in there, everyone. It ain't over 'till... And remember, sometimes you just have to be willing to do something in order not to have to do it!
TONIGHT'S QUOTE!
“It is wrong to think that love comes from long companionship and persevering courtship. Love is the offspring of spiritual affinity and unless that affinity is created in a moment, it will not be created for years or even generations.”
Kahlil Gibran
Kahlil Gibran
THERE ARE NO "NATURAL CAUSES" OF DEATH FOR A 32-YEAR OLD!!
Of course, now we know about the slew of prescription drugs found in Brittany Murphy's bathroom.
"A check of the nightstands revealed large amounts of prescription medication in the decedent's name. Also noted were numerous empty prescription medication bottles in the decedent's husband's name, the decedent's mother's name and unidentified third party names."
The medications included Topamax (anti-seizure), Methylprednisolone (anti-inflammatory), Fluoxetine (anti-depression), Klonopin (anti-anxiety), Carbamazepine ( a bipolar med), Ativan (another anti-anxiety), Vicoprofen (pain killer), Propranolol (for hypertension, used to prevent heart attacks), Biaxin (antibiotic), Hydrocodone (pain killer) and, oh... miscellaneous vitamins! It was noted that no illegal drugs were discovered.
I have been saying for 30 years that history is going to look back upon the medical-pharmaceutical-insurance complex of the late 20th Century/early 21st Century as a heinous perpetrator of crimes of the worst order. Dealing not just in staggering amounts of theft and deception, but in death, literally mass murder, these criminals in suits and white coats have engaged in an appalling, scandalous and barbaric war against a dependent, naïve and ignorant population.
This is beyond political or economic philosophy, folks. You can’t blame capitalism or partisanship for what’s happened to millions of people who’ve lost lives and limb, or beloved friends and families, or their financial solvency because of the lies and nefarious acts of these assassins and drug dealers. This is rampant sociopathy, pure and simple, beyond the typical brand of psychopathic disorder so prevalent in our society, beyond even greed or hate. This isn’t about money or power, either. These serial killers have no empathy. Their victims are not human to them, but merely a source of supply for the insatiable needs of their egos from hell. They have no more conscience or compassion than an army of red ants does while eating its helpless prey alive.
Like the worst nightmare or horror movie, where the killer first numbs or paralyses, then rapes, robs, tortures and dismembers his victims before finally ending their misery, the doctors, pharmacists and CEO’s in this criminal conglomerate keep you terrified with diagnostic proclamations of doom, and drugged and anesthetized with toxic prescriptions, while you are slashed and burned beyond recognition until you finally die... or run out of money.
Brittany Murphy, Michael Jackson and Anna Nicole Smith are not even the tip of this iceberg. The number of people slaughtered at the hands of these sociopaths amounts to a genocide, an extermination of human beings over not just years, but generations.
Now, let me be clear about one more important point before concluding. No one is innocent here, except our children. If you are an adult and you surrender your mind and will over to a doctor because you want to believe in a fairy godfather, or if you pay huge insurance premiums and then don’t hold your company’s feet to the fire when they refuse to pay your claims because you reflexively defer to “authorities,” or if you blindly take drugs or give drugs to your children to solve problems that a knowledge of nature’s wisdom and a determined amount of personal research can resolve, then you are no victim. You are a colluder, an enabler, and most certainly stuck in an oral-masochist character structure! You are, in other words, lunch for the psychopaths and sociopaths of the world.
So, as always, I end with the same dictate – if you want to get out from under the control that the manipulators and mind-fuckers have over you, get serious about your self-work!
That is the only true vaccine there is against whatever ails you.
Happy trails, Brittany!
P.S. To my readers who will remind me that they personally know of good doctors who strive to be true healers, just as they know of good cops who aren’t on power trips but want to be of service to their community, I will answer in advance that yes, I know there are, just as there were Nazi party members and sympathizers who didn’t actively participate in the slaughter of millions of Jews, and some who even helped them escape. I honor those individuals, like myself, who work out of the box in an otherwise dysfunctional profession. But just as one bad apple doesn’t spoil the whole bunch, one good apple doesn’t exonerate the rotten bunch.
"A check of the nightstands revealed large amounts of prescription medication in the decedent's name. Also noted were numerous empty prescription medication bottles in the decedent's husband's name, the decedent's mother's name and unidentified third party names."
The medications included Topamax (anti-seizure), Methylprednisolone (anti-inflammatory), Fluoxetine (anti-depression), Klonopin (anti-anxiety), Carbamazepine ( a bipolar med), Ativan (another anti-anxiety), Vicoprofen (pain killer), Propranolol (for hypertension, used to prevent heart attacks), Biaxin (antibiotic), Hydrocodone (pain killer) and, oh... miscellaneous vitamins! It was noted that no illegal drugs were discovered.
I have been saying for 30 years that history is going to look back upon the medical-pharmaceutical-insurance complex of the late 20th Century/early 21st Century as a heinous perpetrator of crimes of the worst order. Dealing not just in staggering amounts of theft and deception, but in death, literally mass murder, these criminals in suits and white coats have engaged in an appalling, scandalous and barbaric war against a dependent, naïve and ignorant population.
This is beyond political or economic philosophy, folks. You can’t blame capitalism or partisanship for what’s happened to millions of people who’ve lost lives and limb, or beloved friends and families, or their financial solvency because of the lies and nefarious acts of these assassins and drug dealers. This is rampant sociopathy, pure and simple, beyond the typical brand of psychopathic disorder so prevalent in our society, beyond even greed or hate. This isn’t about money or power, either. These serial killers have no empathy. Their victims are not human to them, but merely a source of supply for the insatiable needs of their egos from hell. They have no more conscience or compassion than an army of red ants does while eating its helpless prey alive.
Like the worst nightmare or horror movie, where the killer first numbs or paralyses, then rapes, robs, tortures and dismembers his victims before finally ending their misery, the doctors, pharmacists and CEO’s in this criminal conglomerate keep you terrified with diagnostic proclamations of doom, and drugged and anesthetized with toxic prescriptions, while you are slashed and burned beyond recognition until you finally die... or run out of money.
Brittany Murphy, Michael Jackson and Anna Nicole Smith are not even the tip of this iceberg. The number of people slaughtered at the hands of these sociopaths amounts to a genocide, an extermination of human beings over not just years, but generations.
Now, let me be clear about one more important point before concluding. No one is innocent here, except our children. If you are an adult and you surrender your mind and will over to a doctor because you want to believe in a fairy godfather, or if you pay huge insurance premiums and then don’t hold your company’s feet to the fire when they refuse to pay your claims because you reflexively defer to “authorities,” or if you blindly take drugs or give drugs to your children to solve problems that a knowledge of nature’s wisdom and a determined amount of personal research can resolve, then you are no victim. You are a colluder, an enabler, and most certainly stuck in an oral-masochist character structure! You are, in other words, lunch for the psychopaths and sociopaths of the world.
So, as always, I end with the same dictate – if you want to get out from under the control that the manipulators and mind-fuckers have over you, get serious about your self-work!
That is the only true vaccine there is against whatever ails you.
Happy trails, Brittany!
P.S. To my readers who will remind me that they personally know of good doctors who strive to be true healers, just as they know of good cops who aren’t on power trips but want to be of service to their community, I will answer in advance that yes, I know there are, just as there were Nazi party members and sympathizers who didn’t actively participate in the slaughter of millions of Jews, and some who even helped them escape. I honor those individuals, like myself, who work out of the box in an otherwise dysfunctional profession. But just as one bad apple doesn’t spoil the whole bunch, one good apple doesn’t exonerate the rotten bunch.
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