Black Hole

“If you really want truth, you need to escape the black hole of power, and allow yourself to waste a lot of time wandering here and there on the periphery.”  Yuval Noah Harari, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century

Destruction begins when ego claims I am in charge 

or when a child watches another die 

for a laugh

this is where energy is pulled into the centre

and the mind looks for the authority

of the past

where I seek compensation for pain suffered 

by giving it a cloak of sovereignty, fed by emotion 

set for revenge, in the memory

that curio cabinet of anger

where a plural pronoun

becomes the new bible

the Book of Us and Them, written as we speak

finding words that stick to the target, not the bully

naming the skin by colour or a person by gender

as though there is no such thing

as our own pain, or sub-conscious

neural substrate

Doctrine is not so much a weapon as armour

remodelled and reshaped to fit the body

to protect the heart from the world

and the world from the heart

the second guess and the tears

a fluid emerging.

(Sleep With Me: Lullaby for an Anxious Planet. Ekstasis 2020)

Gabor Maté - The Roots of Healing

This is one of the most beautiful videos I have seen. Gabor Mate is a prophet for healthier societies.

Power Begins Inside You

It depends on how you express it and the values you have, and knowing what you are willing to die for. It depends on your commitment to life as opposed to how much you invest your ego in things — such as status symbols, trophies, fashions in clothes, hair and accessories.

I have heard many times from people in cities and capitalist nations to look your best. The message is "your body is not just a function of being healthy, it is a statement of your worth". I'm not saying that capitalism or being materialistic is to blame. It's not the bling that makes you — it's your soul.

So the soul can't be located in a physical place and you may think using the word is a cop out. But I believe the soul has no physical body because it's where your character, habits and aspirations live. It's the essence of your life while it breathes. 

I can't replace the material world with my soul because my soul has no authority over the material world, it's a reference point for my aspirations. I aspire to other soft things like love, empathy, art and communication. I am ready to admit this could be wrong, or dangerous even.

What power drives a steam engine before the metal is mined and molded? Is it the imagination, a dream, or physics? What elements am I missing here? The planet, the land, air, the first tardigrade that moved?

I try to imagine the big bang and I have listened to astrophysicists explain how it worked but I can't imagine or explain it. I cannot understand how science works although I respect the people who have learned to understand small details that make up the universal meaning and how each tiny part fits the bigger puzzle. 

I suspect there is a gateway between the truth and the lie. It's the way in which humans have the capacity to use what has become clear to them. Will it make them famous or rich, or will it help us all to live in harmony with the universe?

The power of truth is not for our ego to exploit, it is for the hope that suffering will decrease and our great-grandchildren will come into the world to see how beautiful and how magical their birth is. This doesn't take away suffering, it doesn't guarantee our survival. But it brings meaning into our lives.

Whatever values and sustains life will give you ideas on how to be at peace with your power to imbue the world with moral dignity and gratitude. It will inspire you  to use your power for the greater good.

How can we save the future for our grandchildren

George Monbiot is a writer who inspires me to take on problems that are way above my pay scale and beyond my street. He writes about the power of oligarchs and corporations. A level of our society who have always believed they had the ability to lead us and that it's their duty to do. However leadership often fails under the egos of those who have the wealth, support and power to lead.

The quote "price of freedom being eternal vigilance" has been attributed to a 19th century British politician, Leonard H. Courtney who probably said something a little different and the quote has been attributed to others since. However I have benefitted from the idea since I don't have the money or fame of billionaires, vigilance is all I have until the day I die.

Monbiot who had the private education of aristocratic sons knows the propaganda we are up against. "Opinion writers ... insist they are oppressed by a woke mafia, by the rise of Black Lives Matter and other cultural shifts. From their national newspaper columns and slots on the Today programme, they thunder that they have been silenced. The president of the United States portrays himself as a martyred hero, the victim of oppressive liberalism. This politics of resentment is taken up by the foot soldiers of the nascent far right on both sides of the Atlantic."

Can I be a foot soldier for humanity? How best can I broadcast my vigilance? By writing letters, reading different sources and checking their credibility.

There might be only three or four readers of this blog but they may interpret as they see fit and go on to form their own opinions, and do their own research.

I also write poetry which has influence in its potential longevity.

Power doesn't have to dominate others into submission. In fact the greatest power that England had on me was the quality of their education system after WWII and council housing.  I grew up believing that Great Britain was a great country although I was ignorant about what we were doing to the nations we "colonized" and by the time I read 1984 I had emotionally aspired to civilization through social justice.

It was the local people and their abilities to teach, to heal and to care that allowed me to be empathic after listening to the lives of Canadians.

Now I am convinced that domination is poison to those who are expected to dominate.  That leadership is not about instilling fear. Being human is not having to be right all the time and being wrong is a way to learning how to be better.

Truth is all around me. In the garden. In the pond. In the minds and hearts of my friends.

It's not the right wing or the left wing movements that are to blame for our problems. It's not the oligarchs or the corporations who are evil.

IT'S THE ABUSE OF POWER! 

We can fix that by doing, writing, saying what we can. War is not the answer. Violence is not the answer. Social justice is never guaranteed forever. It is the vigilance of the common people to inform ourselves, acknowledge our habits, our opinions and our actions.

Has the word "Economy" come to mean something else?

Listening to  Michael Enright's final episode of The Sunday Edition (Sunday, June 28/2020)  I heard Adam Gopnik talk about the obsession among damaged rulers as domination or submission. 

I confess I have suspected that leaders of right wing parties now seem to be 'strongmen' whose only concern is how to dominate. Win or lose, control or be castrated. It's not a new thing but it is seen by thoughtful healthy people to be an obstacle to relationship and mental health. I think it's an obstacle to a livable future.

Listening to conversations where people appear to be hostile to ideas of community, justice, living wages and respect — because these ideas get in the way of the economy, which is promoted as the highest priority for today.

It seems the economy is not part of human structure but the god to be worshipped faithfully, not shared with a reverence for life. Greed must worship the economy, we must  bow down to it, to cast out  any other concern. Kindness, compassion, are infidels that get in the way of masturbatory greed breathing heavily in all public spaces.

Umair Haque wrote in 2018 "Americans, it seems to me, don’t treat one another like human beings. Perhaps they don’t even really know how  to. They’re constantly dehumanizing, objectifying, and degrading people — beginning with themselves." The Idea That Changed the World but America Never Learned. Medium.

This is corporate fascism.  Greed for money and status is the destruction of life for the sake of power. In psychiatry it's called 'megalomania', 'psychopathic', 'sociopathic'.

A good and wise friend however, advised that many Americans do not fall under this generalization and grieve for the structural violence created by such capitalist values. 

Any institution that promotes and upholds the supremacy of capitalism, is willing to let all of natural creation die for this 'economy'.

The Commonwealth Sold Out

"The Conservative (in the UK) manifesto made a clear promise. It pledged that in the government’s trade talks, “we will not compromise on our high environmental protection, animal welfare and food standards”. Just six months after the election, the promise has been ditched. Our government is now proposing that chlorine-washed chicken, beef treated with growth hormones, pork from animals injected with ractopamine and scores of other foods produced in the United States by dangerous, cruel and disgusting means will be allowed into this country, as long as higher trade taxes (tariffs) are applied to them." monbiot.com.

Why Black Lives Matter

Civilization has developed language, cities, shelter, and history.

Children are sent to school to learn language, arithmetic and how to socialize. A good thing. Then they are taught to compete for success which encourages suspicion towards others and fear they will not “measure up”.  Not so good a thing.

Today there are people dying of starvation while celebrated men and women live in luxury. If you ask a five year old if this is fair, their answer will depend on their education and their class.

While the richest countries store weapons of mass destruction those on the lower end of the pecking order cannot afford health care, a home or food to eat. Masses are considered disposable if they don’t have money or power. The gap between haves and have-nots widens every decade. Hatred is becoming more brutal.  We might not say it out loud but policies from right wing parties say the poor deserve to die through neglect and emotional abuse. 

Contradictions in ideology — we have a duty to be positive, happy and fulfilled, but deprived of the means to purchase it. Multiple screens parade all the possibilities that promise happiness. Beautiful women, great sex, fame and world recognition. And when it doesn’t come then broken hearts choose performative power—misogyny, racism, bullying, machismo and war.  

This is where we are hit by the realization we are broken and its too late to fix. This is where drugs and alcohol become more than occasional pleasure and on top of everything else, we are controlled by the addiction and the dealers who don’t just persuade but threaten us.

Even education has become corrupt because it's another market and markets sell fantasies on top of knowledge. Fantasies such as—I need another degree to get a job that pays well rather than a social awakening to question why I am not paid well? Getting rich is the only standard that counts in a material world and getting into Ivy League institutions where blonde muscular boys and skinny sexy girls join cults of personality for popularity. They become items. 

In this world of material gloss everything has a price. There is no nuance. Empathy and compassion are unaffordable sensitivities, and when it comes to your own happiness you realize you are alone and the whole world is broken.

The designated scapegoats: marginalized poor, sick, black, Cree, Muslim, Jew or other-gendered — must redesign their world through emotional turmoil to the point of insight. 

This insight enables us to see just how broken, criminal and shallow, the mainstream guardians of power within and above our institutions are.

This is why the real power of community and all its manifestations have been outlawed.

The ruling jailors need us to remain ignorant of our true nature, in order to keep the prisons locked and to keep us hungry, afraid and angry.  And this is why black lives matter.