Reflecting on the Choices we make
I have just come to the insight that when I am old and perhaps sitting in my rocking chair on my verandah … reflecting on my my life to that point … I will look at the life that my choices have created and I will be content that I have given everything I had … I will understand that I did the best I could have done given the beliefs and expectations I had at the time.
There is nothing creative that can come from regrets … they are only good for wallowing in … take the learning of those experiences, integrate them with your life, and move forward, allow those lessons to change the future.
Don’t get me wrong … I have screwed up sometimes publicly, many times personally with my loved ones and family … but at the time I led with my feelings, sometimes they were fraught and scattered .. too often they were about me and my needs … and not what they should have been … but like all of us … life is an inside job … we create the life we believe in … the one we should have, at any moment in our lives – this changes in every moment as we evolve.
That is why our past does not determine who we are now, or in anyway it has a relation to who we will become … give yourself a break … the future is yours to create in this moment … for me I don’t have goals as such (other than to help who I can) … I believe in a living my life, based on a few basic truths and with my values … they will get me where I need to be.
What each of is focus on may be different for each of us .. that is your personal preference, each one is valid for you 
For me these are my focus:
(1) each morning I get out of bed, looking forward to the day ahead and what it will bring to me .. what I will learn.
(2) I know there is much I cannot do, but I can live my life in the best way for me … as well what I can do within my sphere of influence is to help who I can … who hopefully will pass that feeling onwards to others … I also know that looking at the enormity of what does need doing to make this a more loving world .. I can only help who I can … even if that is just one person, who hopefully will help others.
(3) Now, I think before I speak … knowing that what I say affects others .. trying to make everything I say improve on the silence .. because silence itself can be incredibly powerful.
(4) I seek to understand .. be curious all the time at everything and anything
(5) I like to walk, to exercise, I suppose it is part of my meditation .. the pure zen of it, the one step in front of the other …
(6) I like to nurture … to create .. to me that manifests in my life in the building and investing in relationships … most times these are not deep .. but some can be … whether they end up being sustainable … is not really what is important … what is, is that every experience and every person that comes into your life, teaches you something about you … and what you need to understand and let your self push beyond your own boundaries .. to grow and evolve.
Love everyone … for they are part of us … all life is … my parting gift would be forgive yourself and look to, and trust your feelings for you know how you want to live your life … trust absolutely few people in your life … for trust is the ultimate gift one gives to another … it is the foundation of all real, long term “life” relationships. For me in that regard … I have been very fortunate.
Comments would be welcome … what aspects of life are important to you ?
xxxx
Content vs Technology
Whilst it is true in some aspects, we have come a long way from the original books of my school days … but I am wondering if our focus is on what really is of value, at the end of the day … the internet, all devices whether they be notebooks, tablets or Smart phones are a tool, a portal … a doorway only … these devices are not what should be valued … for in the case of education they just facilitate the access to what is really can be of value … the content… and of course there is much discussion as to what is the right content … Chomsky comments; The Purpose of Education – Is it creative or an Indoctrination (political, ideological ) a You Tube discussion is available here
… For me I feel it is an effort to produce cogs in a wheel with little thought given outside the strict guidelines of the chosen career path … for who they are as a person … those that do think outside the box are incredibly rare … and we find men and women in their 40’s … choosing a different life .. or perhaps the essence here is a different way of living life.
Teaching is a huge responsibility, and the actual pressures of teaching whilst at the same time being pressured for many sides concerning productivity … budgets – it is so clear that teaching is not what it used to be – so far as the huge amount and the breath of content there is to teach, is I am sure is part of the problem .. when I started with an Classical Arts education which talked about Art, History and the inherent transfer of values, principles and ethics, (before we decided on our career paths) admittedly it was a different world, however in the formative years of a child’s education I wonder if the intense focus on learning business or career applicable skills is the right course of action …. for things like true ethical behaviour cannot be taught in a classroom – it is something that is integrated into your personality over time from your primary caretakers … such values and principles must be part of the person themselves … my view is that on-going education just educates us in how to learn to prepare for the work force … unfortunately too many of the graduates I have employed are too focused on theory and have little or no ability to understand the human cost of their decisions …. there is little or no empathy for the people and the lives they live (away from work) and the responsibilities that necessarily come with it … so we have huge numbers of people who just fall through the cracks .. with little or no safety net … this goes further as Lewis Carroll might have said, down the rabbit hole … into another discussion all together, outside the scope of this post.
I am not a teacher … but my observation would be is I wonder if the focus is going away from the content we are teaching the next generation … to focus on the technology that delivers the content … it like focusing on making a book, rather than the content it delivers … we could go deep into this (perhaps I will on one of my blogs) – the philosophy of the internet … however my view is that we need to focus on the content, and more face to face collaboration, although in an Online Teaching Environment that may not be easy, but there are ways of fostering such a circumstance … otherwise we will end up with a generation, essentially of loners … whose world is the internet … and the fantasy world it represents … and hence have no interest or ability to interface with fellow members of humanity – what kind of society that creates can’t be sustainable.
If we want to positively change the future of humanity away from the senseless pursuit of more, we need to start by changing that which our children are taught to value … if they learn to value technology over people and the content itself, that is like having the cart before the horse … would it not be preferable to foster a collaborative and creative culture, perhaps we need to start by really engaging and communicating with each other, rather than talking at each other – after the essence of the internet is supposed to be social, and interactive, therefore engagement is a pre-requisite for a relationship .. we are no longer in the passive media days of Mass media … we should look at this further I feel. To me we seem to be without thought, running full speed into a abyss, just because everyone else is.
There are Four types of men:
Not to be sexist, insert either sex where applicable
There are four types of men:
1. One who knows and knows that he knows… His horse of wisdom will reach the skies.
2. One who knows, but doesn’t know that he knows… He is fast asleep, so you should wake him up!
3. One who doesn’t know, but knows that he doesn’t know… His limping mule will eventually get him home.
4. One who doesn’t know and doesn’t know that he doesn’t know… He will be eternally lost in his hopeless oblivion!”
Ibn Yami, 13th-century Persian-Tajik poet (Born 1286 in Faryumad, near Sebzevar; died 1368)
There is a another version as below by Solomon Ibn Gabriol (He was born in Malaga about 1021; died about 1058 in Valencia)
There are four types of men in this world:
1. The man who knows, and knows that he knows; he is wise, so consult him.
2. The man who knows, but doesn’t know that he knows; help him not forget what he knows.
3. The man who knows not, and knows that he knows not; teach him.
4. Finally, there is the man who knows not but pretends that he knows; he is a fool, so avoid him.”
Take what you will from either .. you get the idea …
My only comment would be that nothing seems to have changed
The future is for us, to create together
Recently I commented on a blog … it was truly a refreshing wind blowing through the normally .. Sclerotic thought processes of the status quo … I liked the post, I think we can learn from it … I would like as many as possible to read it …
A comment I made on the post … I feel acts as a good introduction
I read many blogs each day, the majority offer criticism of what is .. with no developed alternative to suggest … here we see a way that normal people can break the current business as usual model … and create a real way forward at grass roots level, the writer of this blog post sees the problem clearly, for surely the essence of the failure of the current system is, Yes, competition is a good thing … but this focus of “killing” the competition leads to less competition, not more … and the Capitalist system only works when there is a lot of competition.
Instead, now we have ended up where power and control is increasingly being consolidated in few hands… and as history clearly shows consolidated power crushes liberty … there is no way for them to co-exist, and so democracy and freedoms are becoming a memory.
These same organizations where power is being consolidated have been driving us to “buy to consume” … Why ? … because they need us to, so they continue to exist … there is great wisdom and freedom in being free of debt … for when you are in debt, you are not only paying the debt with money, but also with your freedom.
Other aspects of this strategy, is that it supports like minded people and organisations. Also in the wider market, it gives Value driven support for small business, which allows them to grow and hence increase competition, and with the support of like minded organisations that are not driven just on price but on equity, relevancy and impact … it will succeed, this enhances choice.
At a community level, the exchange of produce to help each other is a great point to start with and perhaps over time, this may grow into community driven projects such as growing food, or (?), the great upside is that it gives purpose, and brings everyone together to help themselves and each other … this develops everyone involved, promotes community cohesion and purpose and lessens the likely hood that people will fall through the cracks.
This post makes sense as it is something that everyone can do today … to challenge and change the what is, to what it can be, for at the end of the day, if we all don’t do this who else will ?
The post is here … it offers a critical point … the need by business to kill the competition is flawed … the trouble with that it destroys not only the competition, but also competition itself and the capitalist model … think about it …
Here my friends the future really is in our hands … we must create our own way … governments have shown themselves incompetent and incapable … so lets do it ourselves … ???
Any thoughts or comments are welcome …. or perhaps some thoughts at other topics to look at further ….
Moving Forward ..
For some considerable time we have witnessed the destruction of our culture, to the point now that almost anything that does not involve consumption or the worship of money seems to be very much in second place … almost as a curiosity of “what is that” ?? … one only needs to look at the very young that know that milk comes from packets and are somewhat perplexed where meat comes from … the connection with where we came from in breaking .. breaking ….
Politicians talk, but do nothing … for their only priority is themselves, and being re-elected, after all we all know for most they can do little, after all they have one master already, so there is no place in their lives to represent the people they are supposed to work for.
How do we move forward as a culture … without involving the so called leadership … I saw a very good post today on a blog … here .. is the link …
I would suggest you go and read it … I put some comments there that some may find interesting … but basically if we want to change the future … we have to do it ourselves …. we have the power … we just start at home at the grass roots level, in the neighbourhoods, the local communities …
Perhaps Time will be the equaliser ?
Time is like a blind drawn on the past, shrouding what was … I sometimes wonder how many times Gaia has been through this same scenario … where civilizations have reached their use by date as ours has … with the passage of time, nothing left to remind us of what was …. perhaps Atlantis was one …. will what we have now, also become the stuff of fable and legends … perhaps … Gaia has been patient with this experiment called humanity … but now we have the capacity to do her irrevocable harm .. her patience is at an end … For even Manhattan was farmland once, and it will be again …I once worked out how long it would take for concrete and steel to be blowing in the wind … with little left to reveal what was … perhaps as little as 200-300 years, certainly less than a 1000 … for Gaia, but a blink in the eye …
Perhaps in the future .. the archaeologists of the time will look at the rubble and wonder what was this place ? … what were these giant penile structures to the sky, perhaps a religious center? In a way they will be right … for it is worshipping money … an idol of our own creation ….. to which everything that is spiritual and right had been sacrificed.
