On Oneness

Now in our culture, we’ve been trained for individual differences to stand out. So you look at each person and immediately see brighter, dumber, older, younger, richer, poorer, and we make all these dimensional distinctions, put them in categories, and treat them that way. And we get so that we only see others as separate from ourselves, and the ways in which they’re separate.

And one of the dramatic characteristics of experience is being with another person and suddenly seeing the ways in which they are like you, not different from you. And experiencing the fact that that which is essence within you and which is essence within me is indeed one. The understanding that there is no other. It is all one.

Richard Alpert

In religion, this concept may be portrayed differently but it is present in every single one. 

Now, now, now let's not get serious on the Vervein's Way.
Vervain makes you casual, carefree and relaxed.

A Night To Remember

A night spent at a local carnival trying all attractions with fellow fitness pals. Among them, my good friend Anu, who was scared enough on the big wheel to start screaming.

Good times are awesome, a bit less when your trainer is among the fitness pals and keeps an eye on what you're eating...Le sigh.

The needs of the Slave Owners

"It is simply a matter of historical fact that the dominant intellectual culture of any particular society reflects the interest of the dominant group in that society. In a slave owning society the beliefs about human beings and human rights and so on will reflect the needs of the slave owners.

In the society, which is based on the power of certain people to control and profit from the lives and work of millions of others, the dominant intellectual culture will reflect the needs of the dominant group. So, if you look across the board, the ideas that pervade psychology, sociology, history, political economy and political science fundamentally reflect certain elite interests.

And the academics who question that too much tend to get shunted to the side or to be seen as sort of ‘radicals’.”

 

Gabor Maté

Close.

Healthy Snacking

India, you're doing so right...How much am I going to miss you...

Hah!

The Monopoly Game

Now, my grandmother was a wonderful person. She taught me how to play the game Monopoly. She understood that the name of the game is to acquire. She would accumulate everything she could and eventually, she became the master of the board. And then she would always say the same thing to me. She would look at me and she would say: “One day, you’ll learn to play the game.”

One summer, I played Monopoly almost every day, all day long. And that summer, I learned to play the game. I came to understand the only way to win is to make a total commitment to acquisition. I came to understand that money and possessions- that’s the way that you keep score. And by the end of that summer, I was more ruthless than my grandmother… I was ready to bend the rules if I had to, to win that game.

And I sat down with her to play that fall. I took everything she had. I watched her give her last dollar and quit in utter defeat. And then she had one more thing to teach me. Then she said: “Now it all goes back in the box. All those houses and hotels. All the railroads and utility companies… All that property and all that wonderful money… Now it all goes back in the box. None of it was really yours.

You got all heated up about it for a while. But it was around a long time before you sat down at the board and it will be here after you’re gone: players come, players go. Houses and cars… Titles and clothes… Even your body.” Because the fact is that everything I clutch and consume and hoard is going to go back in the box and I’m going to lose it all.

So you have to ask yourself when you finally get the ultimate promotion, when you have made the ultimate purchase, when you buy the ultimate home, when you have stored up financial security and climbed the ladder of success to the highest rung you can possibly climb it… and the thrill wears off – and it will wear off – Then what? How far do you have to walk down that road before you see where it leads? Surely you understand it will never be enough.

So you have to ask yourself the question: What matters?

Jordan Maxwell, Zeitgeist: Moving Forward

La Genèse féline

Worst that can happen

Vampire Hunter D novel series

لبكاء وراء الميت غير خسارة

لبكاء وراء الميت غير خسارة

لا تقول راني تعذبت وخدمت بلا اجارة

اللي اكل الطعم فلت واللي بقى شداتو الصنارة

اللي تزرع في الشتاء ينبت و الي في الصيف داق الحرارة

واللي على الحق يسكت اعطاوه الشوك و قال نوارة

و السفينة الى غرقت محال ينجو البحارة

 

حنت ورا الميت لبكاء غير خسارة

On Human Nature

In a society that is predicated on competition and really, very often the ruthless exploitation of one human being by another, the profiteering off of other people's problems for the purpose of profiteering,  the ruling ideology will very often justify that behavior by appeals to some fundamental, unalterable human nature.

So, the myth in our society is that people are competitive, individualistic and selfish by nature. The reality is quite the opposite.

We have certain human needs. The only way that you can talk about human nature concretely is by recognizing that there are certain human needs.

We have a human need for companionship and for close contact, to be loved, to be attached to, to be accepted, to be seen, to be received for who we are.

If those needs are met, we develop into people who are compassionate, cooperative, and who have empathy fir other people.

The opposite that we often see in our society is in fact, a distortion of human nature, precusely because so few people have their needs met.

So yes you can talk about human nature, but only in the sense of basic human needs that lead to certain traits if they are met and a different set of traits if they're denied.

Dr. Gabor Maté