Virility
What a shame it's wasted on the youth. By the time we know what to do and how to make best use of it, it's gone like an April shower.
Young people have so much of it that they go around and twitch all day to get some action and when they do get it is over in such a short time, they hardly notice it has begun.
Old folks on the other hand, when they start the game their interest and that of their partner has faded into other areas like remembering that the stove is still cooking all that is left of an unfortunate casserole which was meant to be a dinner surprise.
And it started so well. The champagne is still in the bucket but the ice is gone and the water would make the bunch of roses happy. Gone is the memory of the sweet words and the special attention to details in her dress and forgotten what was on the plan for the evening. And when we start the game again, a kind of silliness takes hold and we make good fools of ourselves. Mushrooms are better when fresh as when they are re-heated.
We know how to flirt, in fact, we become perfect with age and our charm and honesty are our best sides, there are no problems, but when the flirting catches fire, we are in hell's kitchen. And there is the issue with age. Most of us man love young women, when they are in full bloom and when we are lucky and have gotten a positive response to our advances, we drop twenty years in age, gone the lacklustre eyes and the tired gait and who was that man who had arthritis just yesterday?
I'm reminded how it's been said: Man has good sex for twenty years and then thinks being a stud horsing around for another five, followed by five more monkey-ing and finally making a jackass of himself till he dies. Talk about metamorphosis.
Yet our lady friend is glowing with our compliments. Having the attention of an older, distinguished gentleman is a special honour because it makes them feel more mature and the prospect to be treated like a lady is better than with young men who only have one thing on their mind. But make no mistake, older men have also only one thing on their mind but we know how to cover it up with finesse. And ladies have the same thing on their minds but they want to make others believe they don't. Why else do they display their goods and go out with a man who issues an invitation? In the end all roads lead to Rome.
And there is nothing wrong with it. After all, we are sexual beings and our biological function is not like many animals only during certain times of the year at peak. So forget political and religious reasoning and artificial moral codes and embrace your human nature without pretensions. The sad situation is when we treat and deal with our desires like it was something for sale or a bargaining object. Is it not degrading when we pay money for women to share her affections with us? A women accepting money for sex must feel like a victim; that she does us a favour and sacrifices herself and her body for money. Can we not get it because we are that ugly that we need to pay for it? Where is our self’s-worth? Can we not imagine that women enjoy our affections too and if we are really good, are we not worth to be paid too or at least call it even?
Let's face it, we both want love, so let's have it. Strange how man think they can go around and feel like "real" man when having "scored" with a number of women but women are labelled anything else when doing the same thing. Why not labels like "real women"? Sex is not bad but what we make it is. We don't see it as an expression of affection or love but as bond that imprisons the other and now they are our property and we think we have rights instead of privileges. It is an honour when we are intimate with another because we share affection with that person. It does not make that person our property. The experience is ours and nobody can take that from us but the person is free to go whenever they decide. Love is an experience, not a thing that can be had. It changes like day to night and like breathing is not only taking a breath in. It must also go out or it would not be complete.
Hanging on to another will make them want to leave. Nobody want to live in a cage unless they are afraid to be free and the fear of freedom is lack of self-confidence, being afraid what others will think of us, so we live by other peoples expectations of us and thus are powerless slaves.
A free person is not afraid but when fear comes into our life's we begin to conform and loose our dreams, our love and our joy of life.
Young people have been deceived with ideas that when they had sex with someone, they also have rights and responsibility along with it and out of duty, guilt or obligation enter into a commitment that often ends in a bad relationship. Then they look for ways to get what they want outside of the relationship, which in turn creates more guilt, lies, deception and a falseness of being. When we get older, we understand that we are not doing the honest thing but are in a rut and it is difficult to get out of one. And then there are the friends, perhaps children, parents, Mother and father in law to consider, so pretend all is well and continue living a lie. No big deal folks, the majority of the human population does. Why would you want to be different? You would just make yourself being a target of ridicule and become an outcast at best. Or they will hate you for lecturing them or because you want to be special, better than them. We will not be invited to parties, even friends start to avoid us and our reputation will be one of a strange guy and no fun to have around. The price we pay for wanting to be honest and bettering ourselves is indeed very high. We prefer being lied to and not to hear inconvenient truth.
At least young folks are not interested in all this heavy stuff and sow their seeds without much thought and it would be all well if they did not have those stupid ideas planted into their heads already and when the surge of the hormones subsides, they remember the ideologies again and then slogans like "do as I tell you, not as I do" get created.
Too bad, wisdom comes with age when it would be better having it while young. There are too many of us old folks who are giving good advise because we cannot give any more bad examples no matter how hard we try. I still remember when I thought it was desirable to have been able to perform five times in one day, now I’m glad when I perform once a year but at least I’m remembered for five years. At least I want to believe that. It takes the sting out of advancing in age when others mistakenly think we loosing hair when in reality it is gaining face. We can excuse our failures with our age but what have the young folks for an excuse? Business pressures? Performance anxiety? Sorry, I’m gay?
Women can always claim the famous headaches but what about man? We need to invent something to be pardoned because the "I'm tired and exhausted" only wimps will use and there will be a snowball fight in hell before we would admit to be a wimp. But age will be accepted and even seen by some ladies as a challenge to make it all better and to prove they have magical powers. And they do. It was amazing how a knockout blow with the boom was shaken of by an elderly gentleman with his much, much younger companion he claimed to have been his niece. A ram would have gone to his knees but this old goat just said: "Oops, gotta watch that" and continued telling her how he shopped single handed in Bangkok and stopped four potential cut-throats by handing over his wallet with $1000,- in it. The wide-eyed, open-mouthed admiration of his niece was magical. He was her hero and the six-course dinner was paid for without a blink and his impressive swelling of his head must have impressed her immensely and through the evening until I split, she hung on his lips like a leech. Some nieces are more magical then others.
Ever now and then I experience miracles that can only be explained with the presence of the fairer sex. It surprises me how often man who often are rude and boisterous turn into gentleman when a lady is present and are courteous and lay off with four-letter conversations. Others turn timid and display an attitude of helplessness and again others become show-offs. And all that is done to impress and attract the chosen object of their potential; hormones in action.
Since I am a man, I cannot imagine how women feel about all that display of mating ritual but I would love to hear some comments from the female population. How do they react to male advances and what do they consider to be effective? I often hear that they like when man are real but I still need to see man being real in the presence of a women. We man seem to carry so many role options with us that it would take an onion thousands of years to grow that many layers.
And what about women? What do they do to attract men? To me it seems that the first thing is their looks that they are concerned about. The inner beauty is of secondary or even third on their list of concerns. They know man well enough to realize what man looking at first. Bust, waist, butt, legs, then face and hair, not necessary in this order but not far off are the first things that man will notice. Looks are important to women and they know. Man seldom ask for intelligence in women and often find it intimidating because it dimmers their imagined intelligence. Why would she need a man if she were intelligent? A fair question. So women do not display theirs until the man is caught in the Venus trap. Now, that is using intelligence. And men are so easily lured. All that is needed is to display some of the goods; an encouraging smile and men are following women almost anywhere and do almost anything to convince them of their worthiness. They fly to Mars to astonish the world, but particularly the females of their prowess. As they say: behind a successful man is always a woman.
So we can see that nature has provided us with this sexual incentive to accomplish things that we normally would not do. So let's acknowledge this power and not put it into a political straight jacket. A thing I learned in the southern latitudes is that when you look at a woman appraisingly, they actually smile at you for noticing them as woman while in our northern parts they sue you for sexual harassment. Face it folks; sex is a reality that will not go away by political correctness; it will only pervert it. In fact, if it weren’t for sex we would have gone the path of the dinosaurs long ago. I love looking at woman and will not avert my gaze when I notice a good-looking girl or woman like many man do when meeting her eye. It is part of the ritual to look and notice.
A woman dressed in a very masculine way, including a tie, of looking at her ample bosom, once harangued me for sexual molestation although I did not even say a word or made an offensive gesture. If she hated man, why was she dressing like one? From suppression springs perversion, has that not yet rung a bell? Heaven knows we had a lot of examples. Let's go with the flow, shall we?
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Sailor's blues
Love, a four-letter word as some may say, others feel a deep reverence for it, many exploit it, some run from it as others run toward and then fall for it. Running too fast into it is like colliding with a train. It hurts. But then there are those who are masochist and have a tremendous pleasure from it. Again others pussy-footing around it, playing with and in it and having a blast, one might say literally, but there is something about it that attracts living beings, namely humans or those who think they are, like flies to the sweet smell of rotting fruit.
Now, we are not talking about the love that is heavenly or talked about in some sacred books and scriptures, no, we are talking about down to earth, every day just-for-the-fun-because- there-is-nothing-else-to-do rutting.
We sailors are not exempt from this love effect; in fact, we are the real suckers for it. Could it be because we spend a lot of time tinkering with our real love, the boat, and when we take a break we realize that we’ve been missing something, for example, the returning of love, or the equivalent of that?
So what are we going to do? We go to the local watering hole, be it a bar, a coffee shop or a restaurant and begin timidly or boldly looking around for a sympathetic smile, someone who may be looking also for some diversion. Looks, of course, are important but willingness is a must. Forget intelligence because if they have it, they never get involved without a thorough getting to know the other. But then again, if they get to know the other they would never have a chance.
Conversations are about the boat, at least from my part, the work with them, the pleasures of sailing, how much fun they can give and how much aggravations they can cause. The chosen subject listens with half an ear because they may not even grasp half of the meaning of the talk but are mesmerized by the torrent of words that spill from the others mouth.
When we become alert to their state of mind, we then give an account of our adventures that made us look like heroes. Now we are getting somewhere. Here is a chance to shine and show our romantic and adventurous side. The waves were sky high and we stood watch over the vessel and our crew, climbed the mast in a wild, raging storm and bested the elements to emerge in one piece and just a tad exhausted.
Not much to brag about calm seas, a sunset or sunrise, a day-in day-out sitting at the helm with nothing else to do than watching the swells slowly lifting and lowering the vessel in a never-ending rhythm.
It astonishes how our stories affect the others. They invite us for lunch or pay for our coffee or beer or when we have managed to impress them sufficiently we may even get a chance to spend a night with them but mostly one at a time.
And here comes the part that creates the problems. In our deluded ways of thinking we believe that the other loves us. They may even think themselves being in love but far from it. They have been just as lonely for company as we were and we just entertained them sufficiently and created in them an illusion as of who we are for them and to make them think we are full of more entertaining stories but when we ran out of our stories and go out to create some more, they will not want to become a subject in the stories. When the real story begins, they prefer to hear about them but not be part of them. It is much safer to watch “The perfect Storm” from an armchair with real surround sound munching on something from the fixed, solid fridge and sipping a beverage without necessarily wearing it. The chance to drown on the drink is minimal and walking to the fridge for another one is not a dangerous trip.
In addition, the daily chores on boats are overwhelming. Filling tanks with water or fuel means either to use the dinghy, fill up the containers, return to the vessel, heave the load aboard and fill up the tanks or go to the fuel dock, pay an arm and a leg for the stuff and then pay docking fee. I take the cheaper alternative and what the hell, its good exercise walking two miles in a scorching heat three times with two jerry cans 5 gallons each. We could touch our toes without bending and that also explains the dirty fingernails. People with weight problems would benefit from this. It does not sound like much but it takes at least a few hours and often several trips. Imagine you do laundry.
Telling the story is great because of the effect it has on our audience and the embellishments that we use like a five star hotel gourmet cook the larder make for a cheap night for us and costly for the others but you should expect to pay for being entertained.
Asking your mate to assist you with those chores is like asking for a mutiny so it is up to the captain to do all the heavy work and that makes it difficult to throw yourself overboard.
Then there is the ongoing F.o.r.d. work. Fix or repair daily. Hanging upside-down in a hot, cramped, dirty and inaccessible engine room or a cabin that is so small you have to step outside if you want to change your mind is the best breeding ground for some really interesting combinations of four letter words that is limited only by the lack of imagination.
Other things that supply variety to our blues are the aspects of necessary repairs and the associated down time. That is a chapter we all have our own versions and plenty of them. If we happen to have lured someone during that time onto our boat, they need to be very much in love with us if we want them to stay with us. A lot of extracurricular romantic activity is advisable and even that is no guarantee for a happy after. It is amazing how boats can accelerate the natural process of relationship difficulties at least a hundred times. Something that may not have surfaced for fifty years can pop up in just a few month even with the benefit to have shore leave more frequently then on the high seas.
Who do we think want to live a lifestyle like that? So our Honey is soon getting the cabin fewer syndrome and comes up with stories of her own to escape this environment. It could be that they need to take care of family members who are in need of a third eye transplant, a second liver or a new growth of hair on their chest. Others find it necessary to find a job in a Far, far away Kingdom to earn money and promises to return when things are better. They of course want to remain friends because one never knows.
So here we are, the poor drags of a barrel of wine turned vinegar with a long face that could be mistaken for a cowboy’s old horse wondering what happened to the love forever and soul mates since time immemorial.
Sailors are suckers for romantic movies, stories and songs because they recognize their own life in them. It’s a blues that most of us could sing but I would be hard pressed to find any other species other than sailors susceptible to as much disillusions as they go through.
In all harbours I met sailors, males and females who had stories that would make a stone cry and it still did not make them calloused for romance and their eyes still had that sparkle that make them attractive and look-alive. There must be something in this lifestyle that is keeping them young and curious and interesting and that maybe the reason why they are wanted for a while until the hardships of this kind of life is getting too much for the average person and they look for an easier life and less demanding on them.
When they move on, they leave behind a confused sailor who would like to understand what the hell this people do not like about a life on the sea that gives them skills, knowledge, self-confidence, freedom, a deeper understanding of all that is and a sense of awe about human potential.
We want to share this opportunity with those less fortunate land-dwellers, after all, they got used living on the land for such a long time they forgot that they came from the sea, and feel rejected when they do not want to or are afraid to go and find themselves on the oceans as many others did. It is only a matter of getting used to it and not a disability to do it.
Maybe there is somewhere a silver lining in the clouds once we reach the horizon but for me the end of the water is just out of reach.
Now, we are not talking about the love that is heavenly or talked about in some sacred books and scriptures, no, we are talking about down to earth, every day just-for-the-fun-because- there-is-nothing-else-to-do rutting.
We sailors are not exempt from this love effect; in fact, we are the real suckers for it. Could it be because we spend a lot of time tinkering with our real love, the boat, and when we take a break we realize that we’ve been missing something, for example, the returning of love, or the equivalent of that?
So what are we going to do? We go to the local watering hole, be it a bar, a coffee shop or a restaurant and begin timidly or boldly looking around for a sympathetic smile, someone who may be looking also for some diversion. Looks, of course, are important but willingness is a must. Forget intelligence because if they have it, they never get involved without a thorough getting to know the other. But then again, if they get to know the other they would never have a chance.
Conversations are about the boat, at least from my part, the work with them, the pleasures of sailing, how much fun they can give and how much aggravations they can cause. The chosen subject listens with half an ear because they may not even grasp half of the meaning of the talk but are mesmerized by the torrent of words that spill from the others mouth.
When we become alert to their state of mind, we then give an account of our adventures that made us look like heroes. Now we are getting somewhere. Here is a chance to shine and show our romantic and adventurous side. The waves were sky high and we stood watch over the vessel and our crew, climbed the mast in a wild, raging storm and bested the elements to emerge in one piece and just a tad exhausted.
Not much to brag about calm seas, a sunset or sunrise, a day-in day-out sitting at the helm with nothing else to do than watching the swells slowly lifting and lowering the vessel in a never-ending rhythm.
It astonishes how our stories affect the others. They invite us for lunch or pay for our coffee or beer or when we have managed to impress them sufficiently we may even get a chance to spend a night with them but mostly one at a time.
And here comes the part that creates the problems. In our deluded ways of thinking we believe that the other loves us. They may even think themselves being in love but far from it. They have been just as lonely for company as we were and we just entertained them sufficiently and created in them an illusion as of who we are for them and to make them think we are full of more entertaining stories but when we ran out of our stories and go out to create some more, they will not want to become a subject in the stories. When the real story begins, they prefer to hear about them but not be part of them. It is much safer to watch “The perfect Storm” from an armchair with real surround sound munching on something from the fixed, solid fridge and sipping a beverage without necessarily wearing it. The chance to drown on the drink is minimal and walking to the fridge for another one is not a dangerous trip.
In addition, the daily chores on boats are overwhelming. Filling tanks with water or fuel means either to use the dinghy, fill up the containers, return to the vessel, heave the load aboard and fill up the tanks or go to the fuel dock, pay an arm and a leg for the stuff and then pay docking fee. I take the cheaper alternative and what the hell, its good exercise walking two miles in a scorching heat three times with two jerry cans 5 gallons each. We could touch our toes without bending and that also explains the dirty fingernails. People with weight problems would benefit from this. It does not sound like much but it takes at least a few hours and often several trips. Imagine you do laundry.
Telling the story is great because of the effect it has on our audience and the embellishments that we use like a five star hotel gourmet cook the larder make for a cheap night for us and costly for the others but you should expect to pay for being entertained.
Asking your mate to assist you with those chores is like asking for a mutiny so it is up to the captain to do all the heavy work and that makes it difficult to throw yourself overboard.
Then there is the ongoing F.o.r.d. work. Fix or repair daily. Hanging upside-down in a hot, cramped, dirty and inaccessible engine room or a cabin that is so small you have to step outside if you want to change your mind is the best breeding ground for some really interesting combinations of four letter words that is limited only by the lack of imagination.
Other things that supply variety to our blues are the aspects of necessary repairs and the associated down time. That is a chapter we all have our own versions and plenty of them. If we happen to have lured someone during that time onto our boat, they need to be very much in love with us if we want them to stay with us. A lot of extracurricular romantic activity is advisable and even that is no guarantee for a happy after. It is amazing how boats can accelerate the natural process of relationship difficulties at least a hundred times. Something that may not have surfaced for fifty years can pop up in just a few month even with the benefit to have shore leave more frequently then on the high seas.
Who do we think want to live a lifestyle like that? So our Honey is soon getting the cabin fewer syndrome and comes up with stories of her own to escape this environment. It could be that they need to take care of family members who are in need of a third eye transplant, a second liver or a new growth of hair on their chest. Others find it necessary to find a job in a Far, far away Kingdom to earn money and promises to return when things are better. They of course want to remain friends because one never knows.
So here we are, the poor drags of a barrel of wine turned vinegar with a long face that could be mistaken for a cowboy’s old horse wondering what happened to the love forever and soul mates since time immemorial.
Sailors are suckers for romantic movies, stories and songs because they recognize their own life in them. It’s a blues that most of us could sing but I would be hard pressed to find any other species other than sailors susceptible to as much disillusions as they go through.
In all harbours I met sailors, males and females who had stories that would make a stone cry and it still did not make them calloused for romance and their eyes still had that sparkle that make them attractive and look-alive. There must be something in this lifestyle that is keeping them young and curious and interesting and that maybe the reason why they are wanted for a while until the hardships of this kind of life is getting too much for the average person and they look for an easier life and less demanding on them.
When they move on, they leave behind a confused sailor who would like to understand what the hell this people do not like about a life on the sea that gives them skills, knowledge, self-confidence, freedom, a deeper understanding of all that is and a sense of awe about human potential.
We want to share this opportunity with those less fortunate land-dwellers, after all, they got used living on the land for such a long time they forgot that they came from the sea, and feel rejected when they do not want to or are afraid to go and find themselves on the oceans as many others did. It is only a matter of getting used to it and not a disability to do it.
Maybe there is somewhere a silver lining in the clouds once we reach the horizon but for me the end of the water is just out of reach.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
POVERTY, A STATE OF MIND
pov·er·ty n
1. the state of not having enough money to take care of basic needs such as food, clothing, and housing
2. a deficiency or lack of something
3. lack of soil fertility or nutrients
Encarta® World English Dictionary © 1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Developed for Microsoft by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.
Whoa! That’s a big slice. But not, if you have a big appetite. And it seems the majority of humans have an insatiable appetite for things.
I first became aware of this when we arrived in West Germany in 1957 after our escape from Hungary. I could not speak the German language but I had made some friends and we played after school soccer or cowboys and Indians and somehow I was most of the time a redskin. That was not surprising for me because I have dreamed often about living with horses free like the wind and roaming on the Pusta (Hungarian for Prairie) where you could see on Wednesday both Sundays and didn’t had to go to church. The cowboys had guns around their waists, which made sounds like guns, hats on their heads and a star on their vests. I had a naked upper body, paint of coal on my face, and a loincloth over my underwear. For a weapon I had a stick that was either a rifle or a spear, depending on demand, and my mind to dig traps, lay tripping wires and hide in plain sight. I learned to be a savage early and enjoyed it. My cowboy friends thought I was an Indian because I was poor and could not afford a cowboy outfit. They also got a cold at least twice a year and did what the white man was doing to the red man, giving them the flu for his land.
After I was killed and properly mutilated and then massacred my friends thanked god for his help in getting rid of the heathen, godless wild savages and invited me to watch TV with them because it is the right thing to do when you have killed them. No one should have to die without having the chance to watch TV after death. (With the programs today that will finish you off for good.)
I enjoyed watching a show where a little guy with an umbrella and wits was fighting guys with guns and muscles and won. I was fascinated how I was able to see pictures in a small box and it was just like in the movies. Then my friends asked me why we didn’t have a TV. I had had no idea why we should have had one. They had one and many of us were able to watch it. But he said it was theirs and if we had one too, then we didn’t have to watch theirs. What was his point? We were all together and had a good time and did not harm the TV by looking at it. Then he said the word: youarepoorandcannotaffordaTV. Till then I never felt poor, not even in Hungary when we had nothing to eat for two weeks. We felt hungry but not poor. So I told my father that we were poor because we did not have a TV and he bought one. We were rich. A few years later we were poor again because we did not have a colour TV. And so we were poor in a country that had everything and we didn’t. It seemed like we would never ever have enough because there was always more to be had.
So I was poor for many years but still today I don’t know what it feels like to be poor. I felt hungry, thirsty, angry, cheated, betrayed, deserted, to name some of the things that I would consider bad feelings but how does it feel to be poor?
I own a sailing yacht that many rich people envy me for and it is not big if you consider 11.65m enough for a couple. They tell me how they wish to have a lifestyle like I have and how they could never afford it. They have millions, so why not? I’m broke most of the time to the point where I cannot even pay attention, so why would they, with all the money they have, feel that they would not be able to afford it? Do they feel poor?
How does it feel like to have all that money and not be able to afford a lifestyle like mine?
Somehow that money or the way they manage it must make them feel poor. Or maybe it is greed that there will never be enough to afford a lifestyle that is free from the feeling of poverty. Poor rich man.
Again, in Buddhism there is a saying that says: “ True happiness is wanting what you have, not having what you want.
Could it be that this poverty has its roots in the need to prove to others that they are worthy of their respect and love? What and to whom do they have to prove anything? Or are they slaves to their possessions? I found out long ago; I don’t own things, they owned me. It seems the key to wealth is in the ability to let go. We may use things and with the purchase of them we earned the right to do so, but that should not turn us into bondage. In my life I have moved from one house into another and for a time it was my place but when I moved out it became someone else’s. I USED IT FOR A TIME BUT IT WAS NOT MINE. All things I can touch can be taken from me in a snap of a finger but the things that really matter nobody can take. Love, Wisdom, Knowledge and Experience are the things we acquire things with.
But we are so attached to things that we even call children, husbands, wives and friends ours and overlooking the fact, they are with us, not for us.
What makes us rich is the ability to experience all that life offers, the love we have for the experience, the wisdom of acceptance and the knowledge how to utilize it.
So my childhood in Hungary and Germany was a great preparation for my future outlook on life and how I look at fairness and justice. I understood that it was not important to own things but to share them with others. That way we all took responsibility for its maintenance and enjoyed an afternoon together after the killing was over. Us redskins were treated to TV and snacks after our torments, the cowboys had their share on bruises and justice was done when they had to accompany their parents to church while we Indians hid in the woods. Who says there is no god?
I felt no poverty and now in Mexico I see people who claim to be poor by North American standards but I see them laughing more, their children seem to be happy with the things they got but when they grow up the same poverty stricken expression sets on their faces as I see on other adults who have everything. I think the wanting more is the problem and it creates a feeling of being poor. To me, the bigger the distance between what we have and what we wish for, determines the degree of our unhappiness and poverty.
Worth remembering these lessons came full into play when I had encountered the opposite sex. There was this Goddess of my youth in her glory playing a murderous flirting game with all my friends and there was not one who did not want to die for her. (Being mutilated was not considered dying) Our fantasies had no limits and inside of two minutes we went through all possible scenarios from courtship to divorce by beheading.
You probably know the game “spin the bottle” and we played that game on a day when there was this Goddess around and that became an obsession with me. My friends knew of my affection and used it shamelessly to call her to play. Due my newly discovered “poverty” I did not have the guts to ask her out or to even consider myself a possible candidate to participate in the game. I had nothing of value to offer and so remained in the background while all the guys had a good time and enjoyed kissing this girl that was in my fantasies 26 hours a day. (I borrowed the two hours from the end of my life)
Then the incredible happened; the bottle pointed at me through a gap that opened temporarily when one of the boys shifted his position. I nearly fainted from the joy and the fear that sprung up like a grasshopper. My heart stuck in my throat and I put all my weight into my pants at the same time. All eyes were on me and hers were the only one that I noticed. There was a mixture of panic and fear and I thought repulsion. I could not move and someone shoved me toward her with the words: “We’re waiting. Hurry up.” What they were waiting for I never know but when she just kissed me on the forehead, I felt the whole world collapsing and the whole weight of it crushing me. How I made it home is still an unknown accomplishment and my face was still there but there was something wrong with the mirror, because my face looked somehow distorted and my eyes were swimming in a lake. The humiliation of rejection paralyzed me and I thought it had something to do with the situation of being poor. Shortly after we moved to another town and I was spared the agony to see her going out with one of my friends that was now the god we all wanted to be.
Years later I met her again and she looked incredible, still single and working as a photo model for a clothing company. Not as shy as when I was younger I asked her out for a movie and she agreed. We met two hours before the show and while having I bite to eat our conversation came to that game with the bottle. To my question why she had kissed me only on the forehead she replied: “You were always different from the other guys and not very popular because of the way you talk and act. I knew you liked me and I liked you too, but I enjoyed the attention of all the guys and did not want to be seen hanging out with you and be seen as weird as you.”
Not that this made me feel better but I was relieved to know that it had nothing to do with me having no money or things. I relaxed and from then on we were friends and if I would not have had a girlfriend at the time, who knows what would have happened.
It looks to me that the image of poverty is only in the mind and then affects our behaviour, stifles our creativity and drive for adventure.
We like to believe that other countries that have not as much as we do are poor and need our help. This makes us feel good not the ones we degrade with our gifts.
It’s been said: The easiest way to keep a beggar a beggar is to give them. This allows us to feel superior and demonstrate our “goodness”. That is the ultimate in humiliating others. It is not poverty this people fear as much as the condescending attitude from the “good Samaritan” if they still have some dignity left. And giving is condescending any way you look at it.
You may recall the proverb: If I give you fish today, you have something to eat for today. If I teach you how to fish, you have fish every day.
Old sayings are old because they have enduring truth in them.
Poverty exists only in rich peoples mind and those who want more, the others just work to live and don’t think much about it. There is no shame in not having more than what is needed to live but we are not satisfied with that and so we hoard large quantities of money, food or things for future use and then we die howling that we have not use the things while living.
You know, there are no limits to greed but there is one for moderation. The art of living is with how little you can do with, not with how much. Any idiot can live with a lot and only the wise know how much is needed.
As I mentioned before, I have a sailboat and some people look at it and thinking I must be stinking rich because I have a boat. They have a house, a car, TV, video and stereo equipment that would blast holes into the fabric of our universe and they envy me for the boat and thinking I’m rich? That is all I have as far as things go. No big car, a house with three bedrooms, kitchen, bathrooms, storage and garage, a patio and backyard, but I live free and go when and where I want to for as long as I like. I work where I am and when I need money. When I want a change of scenery, I cast off the lines or weigh anchor and move. No packing things and discover all that junk that I once thought I would use one day, no real estate problems and all that comes with it.
You see, when you own a house that house is yours, not the one in front or behind you, to the right or to the left, but the one you are living in. When you own a boat the whole world is yours. You don’t have to own a lot of things to enjoy them and you may remain poor and be rich.
I took out a lot of people sailing without getting paid for it and made friends. When I needed assistance they came to my aid even with money. Some took off time from their busy schedule to transport an engine to the repair shop, others lend me money to get the repairs done and some carried parts through customs on risk of discovery of smuggling. Money is not that important as we like to think. You are rich when you have friends. Know how to make them and be theirs also. You will be surprised how much people will value real friendship that comes from an authentic amity because there is not much of it around anymore. We often buy “friendship” because it’s easier than to earn friendship but how enduring is that? We all know the answer.
Cultivating friendships is where wealth is found, in mutual support and in assistance, not help, to get out of a difficult situation. When help is necessary, it should be only used when there are no other options to assist. The word help implies that the other cannot get out of the situation on his or her accord and we got to be careful not to come across superior. A good way is to ask for something in return that the other can do.
That would allow them to retain their dignity and after they recovered we may ask for the balance if there is any. But the way we are today, we maintain the thought and condition of poverty because we need it to feel good about ourselves when we give. It releases us from feeling guilty about having and they have not, so by giving we can always say that we do the best to eliminate poverty but do not realize that we are in fact perpetuating it. Why in the world would anyone want to work when you get it for free? All one needs to do is look poor and hold up a can and some mug comes along to release some guilt.
Look at some welfare recipients. I heard many of them saying that they would be stupid to work for minimum wages when they get more from welfare for doing nothing.
Need more examples?
I wanted to find out how it feels to be begging for food or money so I stopped shaving for a few days and very much to my discomfort avoided water. Within three days I felt like a bear, not strong physically but in smell. Then I sat on the curb of a busy street and in a jiffy I was chased away by another gruff looking individual who owned that section of the street. After a while one of the gruff-squad members took pity on me and told me to go home and clean up. He did not buy my act. I explained to him what I wanted to do and he, for a price, offered the information I sought. That would not do so I insisted that he let me do my own begging and finally he agreed to “rent” me a section of his street. For a week I begged money, food and advise from my “rental agent” how to make money. He never told me but volunteered to give me some insight into his income per week. It was more than I made when I was working as a painter for an outfit in Vancouver. When I expressed my doubt he gave me an example. He approached a car with a women sitting inside getting ready to go shopping and he changed his behaviour to a subservient one and became a helpless “invalid” in an instant. I would not have recognized him if I would not have known him for a week. What he was saying I could not hear but after three minutes or less he came to me and tossed me a twenty-dollar bill. “Keep it,” he said. “I get some more. Wait here.” With that he left and I decided to get a coffee. When I returned to my section, he was there, took my coffee and showed me another ten-dollar bill. I was just looking at the money and wondered how in the world he did that. “You got to act, man.” His act must have been good enough to go to Hollywood. “I could stroke easy 500 a day without sweat but I don't do coke and I work only four hours. Tops”
I made $120, - in eight hours as a painter when I started.
He may have been an exception but he charged me $100 a day for sitting on my butt and collecting haemorrhoids and change.
There is an untapped income tax source bureaucrats would love to know about.
What is poverty? Just a perception from the outside, slogans that can be exploited like anything else. It is all business and has nothing to do with humanitarianism but a lot with humanity at large.
1. the state of not having enough money to take care of basic needs such as food, clothing, and housing
2. a deficiency or lack of something
3. lack of soil fertility or nutrients
Encarta® World English Dictionary © 1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Developed for Microsoft by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.
Whoa! That’s a big slice. But not, if you have a big appetite. And it seems the majority of humans have an insatiable appetite for things.
I first became aware of this when we arrived in West Germany in 1957 after our escape from Hungary. I could not speak the German language but I had made some friends and we played after school soccer or cowboys and Indians and somehow I was most of the time a redskin. That was not surprising for me because I have dreamed often about living with horses free like the wind and roaming on the Pusta (Hungarian for Prairie) where you could see on Wednesday both Sundays and didn’t had to go to church. The cowboys had guns around their waists, which made sounds like guns, hats on their heads and a star on their vests. I had a naked upper body, paint of coal on my face, and a loincloth over my underwear. For a weapon I had a stick that was either a rifle or a spear, depending on demand, and my mind to dig traps, lay tripping wires and hide in plain sight. I learned to be a savage early and enjoyed it. My cowboy friends thought I was an Indian because I was poor and could not afford a cowboy outfit. They also got a cold at least twice a year and did what the white man was doing to the red man, giving them the flu for his land.
After I was killed and properly mutilated and then massacred my friends thanked god for his help in getting rid of the heathen, godless wild savages and invited me to watch TV with them because it is the right thing to do when you have killed them. No one should have to die without having the chance to watch TV after death. (With the programs today that will finish you off for good.)
I enjoyed watching a show where a little guy with an umbrella and wits was fighting guys with guns and muscles and won. I was fascinated how I was able to see pictures in a small box and it was just like in the movies. Then my friends asked me why we didn’t have a TV. I had had no idea why we should have had one. They had one and many of us were able to watch it. But he said it was theirs and if we had one too, then we didn’t have to watch theirs. What was his point? We were all together and had a good time and did not harm the TV by looking at it. Then he said the word: youarepoorandcannotaffordaTV. Till then I never felt poor, not even in Hungary when we had nothing to eat for two weeks. We felt hungry but not poor. So I told my father that we were poor because we did not have a TV and he bought one. We were rich. A few years later we were poor again because we did not have a colour TV. And so we were poor in a country that had everything and we didn’t. It seemed like we would never ever have enough because there was always more to be had.
So I was poor for many years but still today I don’t know what it feels like to be poor. I felt hungry, thirsty, angry, cheated, betrayed, deserted, to name some of the things that I would consider bad feelings but how does it feel to be poor?
I own a sailing yacht that many rich people envy me for and it is not big if you consider 11.65m enough for a couple. They tell me how they wish to have a lifestyle like I have and how they could never afford it. They have millions, so why not? I’m broke most of the time to the point where I cannot even pay attention, so why would they, with all the money they have, feel that they would not be able to afford it? Do they feel poor?
How does it feel like to have all that money and not be able to afford a lifestyle like mine?
Somehow that money or the way they manage it must make them feel poor. Or maybe it is greed that there will never be enough to afford a lifestyle that is free from the feeling of poverty. Poor rich man.
Again, in Buddhism there is a saying that says: “ True happiness is wanting what you have, not having what you want.
Could it be that this poverty has its roots in the need to prove to others that they are worthy of their respect and love? What and to whom do they have to prove anything? Or are they slaves to their possessions? I found out long ago; I don’t own things, they owned me. It seems the key to wealth is in the ability to let go. We may use things and with the purchase of them we earned the right to do so, but that should not turn us into bondage. In my life I have moved from one house into another and for a time it was my place but when I moved out it became someone else’s. I USED IT FOR A TIME BUT IT WAS NOT MINE. All things I can touch can be taken from me in a snap of a finger but the things that really matter nobody can take. Love, Wisdom, Knowledge and Experience are the things we acquire things with.
But we are so attached to things that we even call children, husbands, wives and friends ours and overlooking the fact, they are with us, not for us.
What makes us rich is the ability to experience all that life offers, the love we have for the experience, the wisdom of acceptance and the knowledge how to utilize it.
So my childhood in Hungary and Germany was a great preparation for my future outlook on life and how I look at fairness and justice. I understood that it was not important to own things but to share them with others. That way we all took responsibility for its maintenance and enjoyed an afternoon together after the killing was over. Us redskins were treated to TV and snacks after our torments, the cowboys had their share on bruises and justice was done when they had to accompany their parents to church while we Indians hid in the woods. Who says there is no god?
I felt no poverty and now in Mexico I see people who claim to be poor by North American standards but I see them laughing more, their children seem to be happy with the things they got but when they grow up the same poverty stricken expression sets on their faces as I see on other adults who have everything. I think the wanting more is the problem and it creates a feeling of being poor. To me, the bigger the distance between what we have and what we wish for, determines the degree of our unhappiness and poverty.
Worth remembering these lessons came full into play when I had encountered the opposite sex. There was this Goddess of my youth in her glory playing a murderous flirting game with all my friends and there was not one who did not want to die for her. (Being mutilated was not considered dying) Our fantasies had no limits and inside of two minutes we went through all possible scenarios from courtship to divorce by beheading.
You probably know the game “spin the bottle” and we played that game on a day when there was this Goddess around and that became an obsession with me. My friends knew of my affection and used it shamelessly to call her to play. Due my newly discovered “poverty” I did not have the guts to ask her out or to even consider myself a possible candidate to participate in the game. I had nothing of value to offer and so remained in the background while all the guys had a good time and enjoyed kissing this girl that was in my fantasies 26 hours a day. (I borrowed the two hours from the end of my life)
Then the incredible happened; the bottle pointed at me through a gap that opened temporarily when one of the boys shifted his position. I nearly fainted from the joy and the fear that sprung up like a grasshopper. My heart stuck in my throat and I put all my weight into my pants at the same time. All eyes were on me and hers were the only one that I noticed. There was a mixture of panic and fear and I thought repulsion. I could not move and someone shoved me toward her with the words: “We’re waiting. Hurry up.” What they were waiting for I never know but when she just kissed me on the forehead, I felt the whole world collapsing and the whole weight of it crushing me. How I made it home is still an unknown accomplishment and my face was still there but there was something wrong with the mirror, because my face looked somehow distorted and my eyes were swimming in a lake. The humiliation of rejection paralyzed me and I thought it had something to do with the situation of being poor. Shortly after we moved to another town and I was spared the agony to see her going out with one of my friends that was now the god we all wanted to be.
Years later I met her again and she looked incredible, still single and working as a photo model for a clothing company. Not as shy as when I was younger I asked her out for a movie and she agreed. We met two hours before the show and while having I bite to eat our conversation came to that game with the bottle. To my question why she had kissed me only on the forehead she replied: “You were always different from the other guys and not very popular because of the way you talk and act. I knew you liked me and I liked you too, but I enjoyed the attention of all the guys and did not want to be seen hanging out with you and be seen as weird as you.”
Not that this made me feel better but I was relieved to know that it had nothing to do with me having no money or things. I relaxed and from then on we were friends and if I would not have had a girlfriend at the time, who knows what would have happened.
It looks to me that the image of poverty is only in the mind and then affects our behaviour, stifles our creativity and drive for adventure.
We like to believe that other countries that have not as much as we do are poor and need our help. This makes us feel good not the ones we degrade with our gifts.
It’s been said: The easiest way to keep a beggar a beggar is to give them. This allows us to feel superior and demonstrate our “goodness”. That is the ultimate in humiliating others. It is not poverty this people fear as much as the condescending attitude from the “good Samaritan” if they still have some dignity left. And giving is condescending any way you look at it.
You may recall the proverb: If I give you fish today, you have something to eat for today. If I teach you how to fish, you have fish every day.
Old sayings are old because they have enduring truth in them.
Poverty exists only in rich peoples mind and those who want more, the others just work to live and don’t think much about it. There is no shame in not having more than what is needed to live but we are not satisfied with that and so we hoard large quantities of money, food or things for future use and then we die howling that we have not use the things while living.
You know, there are no limits to greed but there is one for moderation. The art of living is with how little you can do with, not with how much. Any idiot can live with a lot and only the wise know how much is needed.
As I mentioned before, I have a sailboat and some people look at it and thinking I must be stinking rich because I have a boat. They have a house, a car, TV, video and stereo equipment that would blast holes into the fabric of our universe and they envy me for the boat and thinking I’m rich? That is all I have as far as things go. No big car, a house with three bedrooms, kitchen, bathrooms, storage and garage, a patio and backyard, but I live free and go when and where I want to for as long as I like. I work where I am and when I need money. When I want a change of scenery, I cast off the lines or weigh anchor and move. No packing things and discover all that junk that I once thought I would use one day, no real estate problems and all that comes with it.
You see, when you own a house that house is yours, not the one in front or behind you, to the right or to the left, but the one you are living in. When you own a boat the whole world is yours. You don’t have to own a lot of things to enjoy them and you may remain poor and be rich.
I took out a lot of people sailing without getting paid for it and made friends. When I needed assistance they came to my aid even with money. Some took off time from their busy schedule to transport an engine to the repair shop, others lend me money to get the repairs done and some carried parts through customs on risk of discovery of smuggling. Money is not that important as we like to think. You are rich when you have friends. Know how to make them and be theirs also. You will be surprised how much people will value real friendship that comes from an authentic amity because there is not much of it around anymore. We often buy “friendship” because it’s easier than to earn friendship but how enduring is that? We all know the answer.
Cultivating friendships is where wealth is found, in mutual support and in assistance, not help, to get out of a difficult situation. When help is necessary, it should be only used when there are no other options to assist. The word help implies that the other cannot get out of the situation on his or her accord and we got to be careful not to come across superior. A good way is to ask for something in return that the other can do.
That would allow them to retain their dignity and after they recovered we may ask for the balance if there is any. But the way we are today, we maintain the thought and condition of poverty because we need it to feel good about ourselves when we give. It releases us from feeling guilty about having and they have not, so by giving we can always say that we do the best to eliminate poverty but do not realize that we are in fact perpetuating it. Why in the world would anyone want to work when you get it for free? All one needs to do is look poor and hold up a can and some mug comes along to release some guilt.
Look at some welfare recipients. I heard many of them saying that they would be stupid to work for minimum wages when they get more from welfare for doing nothing.
Need more examples?
I wanted to find out how it feels to be begging for food or money so I stopped shaving for a few days and very much to my discomfort avoided water. Within three days I felt like a bear, not strong physically but in smell. Then I sat on the curb of a busy street and in a jiffy I was chased away by another gruff looking individual who owned that section of the street. After a while one of the gruff-squad members took pity on me and told me to go home and clean up. He did not buy my act. I explained to him what I wanted to do and he, for a price, offered the information I sought. That would not do so I insisted that he let me do my own begging and finally he agreed to “rent” me a section of his street. For a week I begged money, food and advise from my “rental agent” how to make money. He never told me but volunteered to give me some insight into his income per week. It was more than I made when I was working as a painter for an outfit in Vancouver. When I expressed my doubt he gave me an example. He approached a car with a women sitting inside getting ready to go shopping and he changed his behaviour to a subservient one and became a helpless “invalid” in an instant. I would not have recognized him if I would not have known him for a week. What he was saying I could not hear but after three minutes or less he came to me and tossed me a twenty-dollar bill. “Keep it,” he said. “I get some more. Wait here.” With that he left and I decided to get a coffee. When I returned to my section, he was there, took my coffee and showed me another ten-dollar bill. I was just looking at the money and wondered how in the world he did that. “You got to act, man.” His act must have been good enough to go to Hollywood. “I could stroke easy 500 a day without sweat but I don't do coke and I work only four hours. Tops”
I made $120, - in eight hours as a painter when I started.
He may have been an exception but he charged me $100 a day for sitting on my butt and collecting haemorrhoids and change.
There is an untapped income tax source bureaucrats would love to know about.
What is poverty? Just a perception from the outside, slogans that can be exploited like anything else. It is all business and has nothing to do with humanitarianism but a lot with humanity at large.
Sunday, January 13, 2008
agreements
Often I’m running into trouble like a mosquito into a Mack truck with my fellow humans about my ideas and opinions, head-on. And it starts so promising; “Oh, I like the way you think” and “how interesting, I never looked at it that way and then comes this: I don’t agree.
As if I share my views with others to have them agree or disagree. I’m not looking for converts or followers, a herd of sheep to look after. I’ll leave that to theologians and politicians. Let them be happy with sheep and use their wool and lead them to the slaughterhouse.
If they need to agree, why don’t people just tell me what they want to hear so they have me telling them what they already know and support their opinions and beliefs? But I notice that humans need others to tell them what they want to hear so they can feel safe and secure in their own views and opinions no matter how stupid or smart. Don’t look to me for any kind of support of ideologically infested craziness.
Long ago I found out that I didn’t learn anything by listening to others sprouting my own views but for the majority of people this seems to be the normal thing to do. We come up with an idea or someone planted it sometime into our heads and then we keep playing with it until we really believe it is the truth. It then becomes a point of view from which we measure and evaluate other ideas, accepting or dismissing them by agreeing or disagreeing, depending if it fits into our point of view or not. I think that only when we listen without agreeing or disagreeing can we learn new things.
Now, I am not free of points of views and when I listen to other people’s opinions and I become aware of wanting to agree or disagree I stop and exam why I do that. Invariably I discover identification with my own ideas and the need to defend or cherish them. However, ideas can be made and discarded in a blink of an eye without loosing anything of importance but we are so proud of our “product” that when someone dares to question it, we go to war.
I became aware of this odd behaviour when I had a conversation with a couple of mixed culture. During our pleasant chat I noticed how a tension came up between the couple and when I asked if there was something the matter they explained to me that they had a different view about what people need to do to be happy and then they laid out their ideas. Her idea was not his and when I asked why love was not sufficient to be happy and why it was important for one to go along with the others point of view when all that really mattered was the love they shared, both defended their ideas with teeth and claws. This couple was very indicative for how the world got to the point of self-destruction over ideas. Love and peace are sacrificed for ideas. Love is a feeling and an attitude of acceptance and so is peace. It has nothing to do with ideologies. Even an atheist knows love and peace but we mix-up ideas with feelings and then ideologies and dogmas create an attitude of who is right and all is lost. Love is not an idea neither is peace. We fight over who is right when it is about what is right.
And so it is also when we are on the same playing field. We’ve all had experiences how we seem to go along just great, we feel one with each other, in fact so much that we know what the other thinks or is going to say, and then we feel that the other is taking over and takes all the stage and we diminish to virtually nothing. So in order to be noticed we stir up some controversy. Then when our idea is being opposed, we start to defend it because after all it is our “product” and so the war is on.
Let ideas be ideas without the need to agree or disagree, see if it works for you, if not, see it as what it is, another view and if it is working, you’ve just learned something new.
There is a view in the world that we need to agree on things to accomplish things and I can see the value in that when we set out for a task to do like building a bridge, a house or have a common goal, when ideas need to be co-ordinated to have the desired result but it needs to be restricted to the result to accomplish the task and not to satisfy feelings. If we need to have others to make us feel good, to have them to be in agreement with us is a sure sign of fear and of our own incompetence and it would be wise to look for different ideas to learn from and those ideas are not going to be the kind we already know. Our ideas got us into the situations of incompetence and fear in the first place and will not help to get out of them but will get us deeper into it. So the question is: What are we going to do other than what we did so far?
Someone said: Doing the same things you’ve always done will get you the same things you’ve always got, therefore we could define ultimate stupidity by doing the same things we’ve always done but expecting different results.
I’d like to point out that pushing takes us sometimes to places except through doors marked “PULL”.
By insisting on doing things the way I believed to be the only right way to do it, I got into some real hairy situations.
In my youth I did get into fights like most boys and I learned a few tricks to walk away from a confrontation victoriously. But in one instance I run into a guy who previously was beaten by me and knew my trick to grab his wrist and diving under his arm and thus ending up behind him with his arm twisted up on his back. This time he knew what to do and when I grabbed his wrist and dove, he simply turned with me and I ended up looking into his face with my both hands on his wrist while his other hand in form of a fist reshaped my nose. I needed a new technique along with a new nose and realized that there are many ways to skin a cat, not the same cat though.
A suggestion to have more peace in the world is that when we let go of our ideas as an important fact of life and strife for harmony and tolerance instead, the frictions in the world will be lessened and we could begin to promote a better understanding of each other. Agreeing or disagreeing only creates friction that will lead to conflict and argumentations and if we look at the world today, that is what we have now and it is not advancing peace. So let’s focus on Love and Peace like the idea was in the 60ties but never got carried through.
When we put our intentions to harmony and peace in all our dealings with others and looking for a way where no-one walks away feeling like a looser but all feel they won, then we are on the right track. It is not an easy task but it’s doable. What we need is to put more effort into it and examine why we need to be right. Set up a dialogue and listen to each other. Just think: Even a terrorist fights to create peace. We may not approve of the method but behind it is the desire to have peace. So what the hell is the problem? That’s what we’re fighting for too but fighting can never create peace. It’s like fornicating for virginity. Only peace can create peace. Wars ended only because they run out of resources and people and were too weak to continue but not because the lack of ideas. And the wars have always been about ideas. One group did not agree with another. Look into any family conflict, what are the reasons for arguing? Ideas that one person has and the other do not. When they put their efforts into solving a situation, all of sudden things go smoothly. That is called agreement for a common goal and not common feelings. I once had to tell an employer to tell me what to do not how to do it. What mattered was the end result, not the method but this fool was insisting that I should do it the way he did the job even though my job was better and easier than his way. He told me that he did it his way for more than twenty years and if it were good for him, it would be good for me too. I replied that his forefathers dragged their knuckles in the dust and I wanted to know if he was doing that also.
It seems to me that people feel security only when others following their lead and maybe feel their leadership is threatened when others find other ways. Perhaps they think when their clique see different approaches they will secede and leave them behind and instead of adapting new ways they try to force their methods on the group. They want us to agree with their ways so they can feel secure.
That’s how traditions are created and it is one of the most retarded ways to keep people in line and isn’t it funny how well it works? When someone mentions traditions almost everybody pays reverence and nobody dares to question its validity. We abandon common sense and good judgement in favour for tradition. We agree to stupidities because it is a tradition.
It is time to wake up from “Zombie-ism” and question tradition, established procedures and customs. Let’s start fresh and ask why it is important to follow someone’s lead and ideas. There are possible necessities to come together under one leader for a given task but once the task is finished be an individual again and stay away from habits, they only create a rut and it takes a lot of effort to get out of them. Have the guts to be you because it is impossible to be somebody else.
As if I share my views with others to have them agree or disagree. I’m not looking for converts or followers, a herd of sheep to look after. I’ll leave that to theologians and politicians. Let them be happy with sheep and use their wool and lead them to the slaughterhouse.
If they need to agree, why don’t people just tell me what they want to hear so they have me telling them what they already know and support their opinions and beliefs? But I notice that humans need others to tell them what they want to hear so they can feel safe and secure in their own views and opinions no matter how stupid or smart. Don’t look to me for any kind of support of ideologically infested craziness.
Long ago I found out that I didn’t learn anything by listening to others sprouting my own views but for the majority of people this seems to be the normal thing to do. We come up with an idea or someone planted it sometime into our heads and then we keep playing with it until we really believe it is the truth. It then becomes a point of view from which we measure and evaluate other ideas, accepting or dismissing them by agreeing or disagreeing, depending if it fits into our point of view or not. I think that only when we listen without agreeing or disagreeing can we learn new things.
Now, I am not free of points of views and when I listen to other people’s opinions and I become aware of wanting to agree or disagree I stop and exam why I do that. Invariably I discover identification with my own ideas and the need to defend or cherish them. However, ideas can be made and discarded in a blink of an eye without loosing anything of importance but we are so proud of our “product” that when someone dares to question it, we go to war.
I became aware of this odd behaviour when I had a conversation with a couple of mixed culture. During our pleasant chat I noticed how a tension came up between the couple and when I asked if there was something the matter they explained to me that they had a different view about what people need to do to be happy and then they laid out their ideas. Her idea was not his and when I asked why love was not sufficient to be happy and why it was important for one to go along with the others point of view when all that really mattered was the love they shared, both defended their ideas with teeth and claws. This couple was very indicative for how the world got to the point of self-destruction over ideas. Love and peace are sacrificed for ideas. Love is a feeling and an attitude of acceptance and so is peace. It has nothing to do with ideologies. Even an atheist knows love and peace but we mix-up ideas with feelings and then ideologies and dogmas create an attitude of who is right and all is lost. Love is not an idea neither is peace. We fight over who is right when it is about what is right.
And so it is also when we are on the same playing field. We’ve all had experiences how we seem to go along just great, we feel one with each other, in fact so much that we know what the other thinks or is going to say, and then we feel that the other is taking over and takes all the stage and we diminish to virtually nothing. So in order to be noticed we stir up some controversy. Then when our idea is being opposed, we start to defend it because after all it is our “product” and so the war is on.
Let ideas be ideas without the need to agree or disagree, see if it works for you, if not, see it as what it is, another view and if it is working, you’ve just learned something new.
There is a view in the world that we need to agree on things to accomplish things and I can see the value in that when we set out for a task to do like building a bridge, a house or have a common goal, when ideas need to be co-ordinated to have the desired result but it needs to be restricted to the result to accomplish the task and not to satisfy feelings. If we need to have others to make us feel good, to have them to be in agreement with us is a sure sign of fear and of our own incompetence and it would be wise to look for different ideas to learn from and those ideas are not going to be the kind we already know. Our ideas got us into the situations of incompetence and fear in the first place and will not help to get out of them but will get us deeper into it. So the question is: What are we going to do other than what we did so far?
Someone said: Doing the same things you’ve always done will get you the same things you’ve always got, therefore we could define ultimate stupidity by doing the same things we’ve always done but expecting different results.
I’d like to point out that pushing takes us sometimes to places except through doors marked “PULL”.
By insisting on doing things the way I believed to be the only right way to do it, I got into some real hairy situations.
In my youth I did get into fights like most boys and I learned a few tricks to walk away from a confrontation victoriously. But in one instance I run into a guy who previously was beaten by me and knew my trick to grab his wrist and diving under his arm and thus ending up behind him with his arm twisted up on his back. This time he knew what to do and when I grabbed his wrist and dove, he simply turned with me and I ended up looking into his face with my both hands on his wrist while his other hand in form of a fist reshaped my nose. I needed a new technique along with a new nose and realized that there are many ways to skin a cat, not the same cat though.
A suggestion to have more peace in the world is that when we let go of our ideas as an important fact of life and strife for harmony and tolerance instead, the frictions in the world will be lessened and we could begin to promote a better understanding of each other. Agreeing or disagreeing only creates friction that will lead to conflict and argumentations and if we look at the world today, that is what we have now and it is not advancing peace. So let’s focus on Love and Peace like the idea was in the 60ties but never got carried through.
When we put our intentions to harmony and peace in all our dealings with others and looking for a way where no-one walks away feeling like a looser but all feel they won, then we are on the right track. It is not an easy task but it’s doable. What we need is to put more effort into it and examine why we need to be right. Set up a dialogue and listen to each other. Just think: Even a terrorist fights to create peace. We may not approve of the method but behind it is the desire to have peace. So what the hell is the problem? That’s what we’re fighting for too but fighting can never create peace. It’s like fornicating for virginity. Only peace can create peace. Wars ended only because they run out of resources and people and were too weak to continue but not because the lack of ideas. And the wars have always been about ideas. One group did not agree with another. Look into any family conflict, what are the reasons for arguing? Ideas that one person has and the other do not. When they put their efforts into solving a situation, all of sudden things go smoothly. That is called agreement for a common goal and not common feelings. I once had to tell an employer to tell me what to do not how to do it. What mattered was the end result, not the method but this fool was insisting that I should do it the way he did the job even though my job was better and easier than his way. He told me that he did it his way for more than twenty years and if it were good for him, it would be good for me too. I replied that his forefathers dragged their knuckles in the dust and I wanted to know if he was doing that also.
It seems to me that people feel security only when others following their lead and maybe feel their leadership is threatened when others find other ways. Perhaps they think when their clique see different approaches they will secede and leave them behind and instead of adapting new ways they try to force their methods on the group. They want us to agree with their ways so they can feel secure.
That’s how traditions are created and it is one of the most retarded ways to keep people in line and isn’t it funny how well it works? When someone mentions traditions almost everybody pays reverence and nobody dares to question its validity. We abandon common sense and good judgement in favour for tradition. We agree to stupidities because it is a tradition.
It is time to wake up from “Zombie-ism” and question tradition, established procedures and customs. Let’s start fresh and ask why it is important to follow someone’s lead and ideas. There are possible necessities to come together under one leader for a given task but once the task is finished be an individual again and stay away from habits, they only create a rut and it takes a lot of effort to get out of them. Have the guts to be you because it is impossible to be somebody else.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)