I had this incredibly frustrating day that ended in my psyche feeling wretched, as though it was trapped like a mouse in a laboratory maze. Utterly defeated and helpless, I left the office and sat in the car and screamed my head off to relieve the stress before I started the engine. (No one was left at the workplace, I was the last one to leave, so no one was there to see.)
...and then it dawned on me....
The depravity of realizing fortuitous certain future profits is creating a sense of paranoia in the leadership of the company I work for. The board and the CEO seems to be under the influence of an antiquated version of aggressive parasitic economics as their solution. Yes, they were previously good and generous managers. Yes, they also were surviving on an extreme water slide of pure old fashioned luck. But, they had never lost before.
In their ensuing worry over their 401K and portfolio losses, apparently they decided to overtly exhibit their anxiousness and anger by funneling it toward the employees and dependants of the business they own--- the company that so many work for. The issue is how like with 'Reaganomics', the cesspool of negative energy trickles slowly downward to the extension of all the 'employees'. So various VP's and directors suddenly become extended voices of the new manifesto: "COST CUT, FIND MONEY, MAKE LARGER MARGINS, MAKE SALES HAPPEN OR FIRE EVERYONE"....
Suddenly there are demands for activity and project lists, minute by minute updates, increased workloads, severe productivity orders, AND --- a multitude of added conference calls, emails, meetings, checks, calls, text messages, project updates... and so on ... and then more priority shifts... more cancellations of projects... more experts... less staffing... new projects... ... ... ... ... ...
In the last few months, the new year has been met with a steady and silent punishment by the board members to make up for their losses. Gone are the bravos of the successes of last season or the inconceivably remarkable growth of the company acquisitions and distribution of the last few years. Gone is the former recognition for the successful launches of ribbon awarded products only a few months ago. In its place is a series of back stabbing, finger pointing, double speak politics and crumbling trust with a pride in cutting corners and many times, lies and round about talks to create diversion from the very lack of productivity caused by this new chaos. Somehow, the Madoff ponzi disaster that so directly affected the board's and manager's portfolios became our psychological burden, as the newly structured lay off patterns left only those who were politically savvy and eager to micromanage others in their quest to provide a dehumanized spreadsheet of our deemed 'usefulness'.
This new disease that spreads mental abrasion is actually an old one. Embarrassingly I recall the father reared by war that shed his negative management on my toddler hood, childhood, teen years--- and early adult years, until the day I left when I finally realized as much as I could not heal his emptiness or pain, he could no longer leash me from my freedom.
We are all born with the undeniable right of freedom, or so I wished to believe with all of my heart. Then a realization hits me in early adulthood. To live in a society that barters by credit and printed money-- I am shackled to the burden of trading my skills, my possessions, my life, myself--- to the quest of a steady stream that would support my quest for freedom.
As I became jaded with the never-ending cycle of living costs and life demands, the cynicism that we labeled much of the elder generations from the depression begins to sink into my own mind. This societal environment has conditioned us all---- we have become forced to believe in a system of greed because there is never enough money to have the freedom that movies and media have taught us is possible. Most of us are not able to have or earn enough to travel on the Concorde to see the Eiffel Tower at a moment's notice; there is even fewer with the privilege of seeing the Serengeti or northern lights in Siberia. And eventually, as we overcrowd nature with our desires for the temporary material toys most are 'allowed' to afford--- most will not be able to afford the luxury of visiting or enjoying nature in its non-manufactured and majestically self-evolved state.
I drove home in the anguished self-loathing of having become enslaved and micromanaged by the burden of want of affording freedom--- again. I wondered too, if the managers that forced their micromanagement on me had unwittingly ignored their reason and merely become unconsciously enslaved to this notion as well. Their negative impact on my mind is not easily shed, as I am judged by how much I am like, or not like them--- as they release the weight of their burdens upon me.
In my choice to not be a continuing part of the negative chain, I submit to the deafening drone of my consciousness reminding me how I had to leave the father who could not stop his cycle of shifting anger and blame to those around him. When I left-- he stated to strangers that he wished me to suffer and become damaged as much as he. I swore I would seek freedom at almost any cost (but within the boundaries of my ethical needs to never sell myself). But as an adult in a land that demands basic living needs, I find myself barely able to afford a small portion of the freedom I seek to explore the world--- or, be free to choose the type of productive life that would find me joy.
I know my sentiments are not alone. I can only hope my patience withstands the attacks of this world of burdens and I will not submit to wishes of my managers to contribute to the negativity while attending to my responsible 'duties'.
And I wonder how many multitudes of other souls that walk this earth now, am caught in the same web. I wonder if the web can be re-woven, and re-balanced, re-shaped, to become as beautiful as one found in a remote forest sunrise, where the dew sparkles rainbows to let our minds wonder again with the vision of a new dawn. It is in human capacity to hope for miracles, and to bond together to make dreams into reality. Civilizations and philosophies changed over history, as buildings and empires crumbled and were reborn. Shifts in conscious awareness changed history-- and impacted human lives over millenia. Single amino acid sequence order switches changed entire genepools. And a singular desire to respect, share and honor with each other, just might, release us of the burden of greed.
I allow that hope to carry me through the night into the next day... and the next... and the next... or until I am fortunate enough leave this reality for the one I hope for....
30 April 2009
29 April 2009
self-questions about truth
why is it we have become so afraid of accepting the responsibility of owning our own truth(s)?
what is truth by definition?
what does it actually mean to us now?
are reality and truth equal?
is truth a burden or a freedom?
what is truth by definition?
what does it actually mean to us now?
are reality and truth equal?
is truth a burden or a freedom?
dare we trust our own perception?
Ready for an early appointment, several people sit awaiting their turn in the dentist's chair. Most are neighbors, evidently, discussing a number of different events and local gossip. Evidently, one of the men recently noticed another neighbor with a new dog, a doberman pincher. The man described in anxious and flurried details of how no human should ever befriend or own a doberman. He deeply believed all dobermans were deranged, unstable and 'unworthy' of being loved as a pet or for any human interaction.
I left the office after the appointment, distressed in those comments. I could not fathom judging one dog, let alone an entire sub-species of dog, as unstable or unworthy of being loved, as a pet or not.
Several days pass and the first true warmth allows the first drive of the season with the windows down and the top open. While stopped at a light, I notice the leaves of the trees beginning to mature from the spring buds washed anew by the April rains, the misty air attracting my attentions to the sounds of the chirping fledglings in the nests and recall fond memories of young rabbits and birds in the wild from my youth. We had 'barn cats' then - raised free in the remote suburbs on a small farm plot, where they were allowed to form their own packs, form their own dominance order, hunt, reproduce, and play as they chose. One even adopted a small beagle as her own non-feline companion-- as she had turned too wild to feel comfortable by the other cats that enjoyed seeking our 'human scent' attentions (or rather, 'scenting us' as 'their' humans). I remembered also, how the female cats with young would proudly take the kittens on their first hunt, within 2 months of age. I'd watch them playfully bound through the tall grass and walk with tails swaggering high on their first successful hunt --- while attempting to find a sunny spot in which they might sit a moment to cleanse the blood from their fur.
As the light changes and I focus on present reality again, the landscapers near the roadside are trimming the trees and carefully planting the 'male' flowering bushes and trees in perfectly plotted dimensions across the suburbia we have so become accustomed to accept as our 'natural surroundings'. There is dusty grass shavings blowing in the air from the weed whackers and lawn mowers, the smell of mulch and fertilizers and overwhelming noise from the various lawn care motors. My eyes begin to itch a moment, until I have pulled away with the traffic ahead of me.
As these moments rummage through my consciousness, suddenly the scenery around me changes shape. I consider a multitude of theories determined in human history as 'significant discoveries', whether of art, music, science, philosophy or any number of 'classifications'. Then the angst that so lingered in my childhood mind returns---- perhaps it was my childish notion then, but the recurring thought strikes me over and over. In the context of human language, we have been experiencing and observing life in the quest to find meaning. Yet-- in our seemingly advanced times of mankind, we have become too accustomed to the notion of 'assigning meaning'. The first ones to observe or discover during their life experience, receives accolade and credit, then is rewarded with 'assigning' the name by which we shall all 'know' that discovery. If the 'idea' or device should be found a useful power, the inventors and discoverers are bowed to like the Pharaohs of Egypt, as the seats of conquest determine political usefulness and honor of the 'one'. The greater the usefulness or omnipotence, the more celebrated the honor. And usually, by the answer from, in the name of, and in the hope of becoming, "God" (or all-powerful and all-knowing.)
Mary Shelley once wrote that man's true desire was to emulate our creator and become as great and omniscient creator as God. She challenged our thoughts on morality and ethics at the dawn of modern industrialization in Europe. Things we thought improbable became new reality and things impossible became probable. She came along and challenged our perception of ourselves at a moment of sudden self-discovery and realization of modern mechanics by humans. We call her the 'founder of science fiction'.
We have been wrong many times in history, from the concentric (egocentric) view as earth at the center of the universe to believing the sun was a chariot in the sky. But we changed our perceptions along the way, and discovered new truths, and the reality as we know it to be today.
Or is it?
As I reminisce on the conversation of the man that labeled all dobermans as unworthy--- I cannot help but wonder how egocentric our judgement and assumptions have become. I wonder about how much we have accepted as truths about nature--- only to realize we've driven nature out of balance with those assumptions. We think creatures fear or despise us, yet refuse to understand how much we have taken away from their hunting grounds and their lairs. We change our landscape to suit our vision, without acknowledging we might just be pieces of the greater landscape ourselves---- not 'worthy' of judging what the landscape should be. And we plant only the flowering bushes while medicating ourselves to avoid suffering from the allergy reactions to the extreme pollen the trees produce to find it's female blossoms.
I wonder then, perhaps our perceptions have been tainted by our own desire for 'omniscience' as challenged by Mary Shelley. Perhaps we are wrongfully creating our own deformed offspring and future by not realizing the spirit that sleeps within. Perhaps, it is time for a new challenge to our perception..... Perhaps we need to realize the miracle of being human is not achieving our desires of omnipotence and omniscience--- but rather the ability to change, adapt and integrate our perception into a universal and harmonious vision---- if we so choose??
I left the office after the appointment, distressed in those comments. I could not fathom judging one dog, let alone an entire sub-species of dog, as unstable or unworthy of being loved, as a pet or not.
Several days pass and the first true warmth allows the first drive of the season with the windows down and the top open. While stopped at a light, I notice the leaves of the trees beginning to mature from the spring buds washed anew by the April rains, the misty air attracting my attentions to the sounds of the chirping fledglings in the nests and recall fond memories of young rabbits and birds in the wild from my youth. We had 'barn cats' then - raised free in the remote suburbs on a small farm plot, where they were allowed to form their own packs, form their own dominance order, hunt, reproduce, and play as they chose. One even adopted a small beagle as her own non-feline companion-- as she had turned too wild to feel comfortable by the other cats that enjoyed seeking our 'human scent' attentions (or rather, 'scenting us' as 'their' humans). I remembered also, how the female cats with young would proudly take the kittens on their first hunt, within 2 months of age. I'd watch them playfully bound through the tall grass and walk with tails swaggering high on their first successful hunt --- while attempting to find a sunny spot in which they might sit a moment to cleanse the blood from their fur.
As the light changes and I focus on present reality again, the landscapers near the roadside are trimming the trees and carefully planting the 'male' flowering bushes and trees in perfectly plotted dimensions across the suburbia we have so become accustomed to accept as our 'natural surroundings'. There is dusty grass shavings blowing in the air from the weed whackers and lawn mowers, the smell of mulch and fertilizers and overwhelming noise from the various lawn care motors. My eyes begin to itch a moment, until I have pulled away with the traffic ahead of me.
As these moments rummage through my consciousness, suddenly the scenery around me changes shape. I consider a multitude of theories determined in human history as 'significant discoveries', whether of art, music, science, philosophy or any number of 'classifications'. Then the angst that so lingered in my childhood mind returns---- perhaps it was my childish notion then, but the recurring thought strikes me over and over. In the context of human language, we have been experiencing and observing life in the quest to find meaning. Yet-- in our seemingly advanced times of mankind, we have become too accustomed to the notion of 'assigning meaning'. The first ones to observe or discover during their life experience, receives accolade and credit, then is rewarded with 'assigning' the name by which we shall all 'know' that discovery. If the 'idea' or device should be found a useful power, the inventors and discoverers are bowed to like the Pharaohs of Egypt, as the seats of conquest determine political usefulness and honor of the 'one'. The greater the usefulness or omnipotence, the more celebrated the honor. And usually, by the answer from, in the name of, and in the hope of becoming, "God" (or all-powerful and all-knowing.)
Mary Shelley once wrote that man's true desire was to emulate our creator and become as great and omniscient creator as God. She challenged our thoughts on morality and ethics at the dawn of modern industrialization in Europe. Things we thought improbable became new reality and things impossible became probable. She came along and challenged our perception of ourselves at a moment of sudden self-discovery and realization of modern mechanics by humans. We call her the 'founder of science fiction'.
We have been wrong many times in history, from the concentric (egocentric) view as earth at the center of the universe to believing the sun was a chariot in the sky. But we changed our perceptions along the way, and discovered new truths, and the reality as we know it to be today.
Or is it?
As I reminisce on the conversation of the man that labeled all dobermans as unworthy--- I cannot help but wonder how egocentric our judgement and assumptions have become. I wonder about how much we have accepted as truths about nature--- only to realize we've driven nature out of balance with those assumptions. We think creatures fear or despise us, yet refuse to understand how much we have taken away from their hunting grounds and their lairs. We change our landscape to suit our vision, without acknowledging we might just be pieces of the greater landscape ourselves---- not 'worthy' of judging what the landscape should be. And we plant only the flowering bushes while medicating ourselves to avoid suffering from the allergy reactions to the extreme pollen the trees produce to find it's female blossoms.
I wonder then, perhaps our perceptions have been tainted by our own desire for 'omniscience' as challenged by Mary Shelley. Perhaps we are wrongfully creating our own deformed offspring and future by not realizing the spirit that sleeps within. Perhaps, it is time for a new challenge to our perception..... Perhaps we need to realize the miracle of being human is not achieving our desires of omnipotence and omniscience--- but rather the ability to change, adapt and integrate our perception into a universal and harmonious vision---- if we so choose??
22 April 2009
There is a silent whisper that calls to all of us
In the annals of history are reminders of the stories that define our ‘human-ness’. The fables of the Pacific Islander’s birds that flew between the physical and spiritual worlds; the mysteries of the blessings of Ra and Isis; from the wrath of Kali to the stories of babies delivered by pelicans. How wonderful it was to be blessed by any one of the goddesses, Bast, Brigit, Bendis or Ishtar--- as fertility (of womb and crops) would reign steadfast. Or be blessed by the muses of Sophia or Oman, depending on the final creation, that is. Or maybe how some wished to have the knowledge of Sinaa or Uaica, to be free to be healed and able to foretell events.
These are the fantasies and fables that bring us pleasure (or, to some, smirks of our formerly primitive comprehensions) when we are told of them in this world of explained technologies and postulated sciences. We mock the world of totem spirits and creatures that would haunt us. We jest at the thought of magical elves and witches or gypsies that would be known to curse. Yet wishfully with great joy, teach our children of Santa Claus and Leprechauns.
Perhaps as you read this, your childhood fancies alight for a moment in those comforting memories from years past. But then we take a second moment to recover our thoughts to dismiss the notions, pulling ourselves together. We revive our recognition of the present state, only to laugh at our insignificant silliness of those innocent times, when we dared to believe in the ‘fantasies’ too easily, as those juvenile by-gone years delivered carefree longing forever.
Yet, in today’s world -- as we muse against the backdrops of words by governing officials — as advertised by the new venues of corporate marketing, the entertainment media--- in our perhaps over stimulated, chaotic and droll personal world -- we might make ourselves integrally an unwitting partner to new fables and global rumors. Fondly missing national unity that once existed in times of war, we are too eager to accept words like ‘axis of evil’ and believe in a biased one-sided report of giant factions of devilish sentries walking the earth. The grandeur of such organized dangers, conjures the imagery of the armies of Goliath or the walking dead of Hades. And in reactive eager state, then seek the master general or leader that would lead us past the dangers, a new father or mother figure to be hailed as the new savior and new legend. So we bear witness to the creation of a new pharaoh or emperor that will become the superhero, able to do the impossible and cast away the Chibchachum(s) or keep away Batara or quell Musso-Koroni. There will be stories made of this leader, grandeur ceremonies, books and maybe even film. In all cases, this leader becomes the new legend and we believe him/her not to be all powerful, but at least all persuasive, commanding, and to carry our expectations through for us.
I can only wonder then if we are truly exercising our advancements and evolved philosophies. How then, are we to separate ourselves from our naïve pasts if in our innocent trust of flash media, we find ourselves so eager to believe in the modern fables of danger and angst, daring to profess personal responsibility to a new superhero, rather than accepting our small but significant role in the transcendence to peaceful universal unity? In our impetuous needs to believe in the creation of a foe and searching for the new mystical commander, we desperately create the same fear of unknowns, of scarcity, of ‘aloneness’ and create justification for outlets of aggression and destruction. Instead of honoring or revering the cycles of nature (life, death, recreation and natural disintegration) --- we spend futile precious hours of our life in pursuit of finding OR, becoming our created definition of a God (to control, to be omniscient, to have power and to be savior ---- but we add the greed.) We refuse to believe in symbiosis and delicate balance as the source of the cycle of life and the universe--- as we cannot possibly believe the things we cannot see, no matter the centuries of scientific exploration or, exploitations. We too often enjoy choosing aggressive bonds to pre-empt suggestions of competition, rather than finding the bonding rewards of comradery from friendly competition.
The silent whisper that speaks to us, will often murmur the message of nature as we watch the normally competitive and fierce creatures joining together to signal each other of impending dangers and storms. In their language, we assume the tigers are angrily screaming at gazelles lunging in their path when running from a flood. However, the tigers do not kill those in their path-- it is their language to insist on moving faster. We have even marveled at the family pets that nurtured wild animal cubs as their own--- something humans do so rarely for their own, let alone other species.
Yet, on the same note-- we see normally docile, tortured and human over-bred farm animals in cages attack and kill each other for sake of just an inch buffer of freedom of space. We assign and glorify this as a value of Darwinian survival skills, as the alpha personas impose their power on the recessive ones. It seems it is the way of nature to seek balance and number itself into space -- so nature will redefine what it must if imposed upon. Or, is it our tampering and our interpretation of perception that assumes this to be 'survival of the fittest'?
If we truly are here to assume our philosophical superiority in the animal kingdom, why is it then, we choose to create our power-packs allegiances via outer adornments (clothing or pins), hair styles, dominance intended aggressions--- and blinding our own faith and power in order to submit to the social order? Perhaps it is easier than accepting there are laws and boundaries within a universe beyond our making--- and that even our 'superiority' is flawed and with limitations. Or perhaps it is because we have chosen to dismiss our own truths to find escape in entertainment based alter-realities that would circumvent symbiosis with our neighbors, nature or this planet.
Or just maybe, we have forgotten how to be within our dream with nature and have instead chosen to accept our own 'new modern fables' to maintain our insistence of superiority over anything, even to even our ancestors? I wonder then, where is the truth in our 'human-ness'???
These are the fantasies and fables that bring us pleasure (or, to some, smirks of our formerly primitive comprehensions) when we are told of them in this world of explained technologies and postulated sciences. We mock the world of totem spirits and creatures that would haunt us. We jest at the thought of magical elves and witches or gypsies that would be known to curse. Yet wishfully with great joy, teach our children of Santa Claus and Leprechauns.
Perhaps as you read this, your childhood fancies alight for a moment in those comforting memories from years past. But then we take a second moment to recover our thoughts to dismiss the notions, pulling ourselves together. We revive our recognition of the present state, only to laugh at our insignificant silliness of those innocent times, when we dared to believe in the ‘fantasies’ too easily, as those juvenile by-gone years delivered carefree longing forever.
Yet, in today’s world -- as we muse against the backdrops of words by governing officials — as advertised by the new venues of corporate marketing, the entertainment media--- in our perhaps over stimulated, chaotic and droll personal world -- we might make ourselves integrally an unwitting partner to new fables and global rumors. Fondly missing national unity that once existed in times of war, we are too eager to accept words like ‘axis of evil’ and believe in a biased one-sided report of giant factions of devilish sentries walking the earth. The grandeur of such organized dangers, conjures the imagery of the armies of Goliath or the walking dead of Hades. And in reactive eager state, then seek the master general or leader that would lead us past the dangers, a new father or mother figure to be hailed as the new savior and new legend. So we bear witness to the creation of a new pharaoh or emperor that will become the superhero, able to do the impossible and cast away the Chibchachum(s) or keep away Batara or quell Musso-Koroni. There will be stories made of this leader, grandeur ceremonies, books and maybe even film. In all cases, this leader becomes the new legend and we believe him/her not to be all powerful, but at least all persuasive, commanding, and to carry our expectations through for us.
I can only wonder then if we are truly exercising our advancements and evolved philosophies. How then, are we to separate ourselves from our naïve pasts if in our innocent trust of flash media, we find ourselves so eager to believe in the modern fables of danger and angst, daring to profess personal responsibility to a new superhero, rather than accepting our small but significant role in the transcendence to peaceful universal unity? In our impetuous needs to believe in the creation of a foe and searching for the new mystical commander, we desperately create the same fear of unknowns, of scarcity, of ‘aloneness’ and create justification for outlets of aggression and destruction. Instead of honoring or revering the cycles of nature (life, death, recreation and natural disintegration) --- we spend futile precious hours of our life in pursuit of finding OR, becoming our created definition of a God (to control, to be omniscient, to have power and to be savior ---- but we add the greed.) We refuse to believe in symbiosis and delicate balance as the source of the cycle of life and the universe--- as we cannot possibly believe the things we cannot see, no matter the centuries of scientific exploration or, exploitations. We too often enjoy choosing aggressive bonds to pre-empt suggestions of competition, rather than finding the bonding rewards of comradery from friendly competition.
The silent whisper that speaks to us, will often murmur the message of nature as we watch the normally competitive and fierce creatures joining together to signal each other of impending dangers and storms. In their language, we assume the tigers are angrily screaming at gazelles lunging in their path when running from a flood. However, the tigers do not kill those in their path-- it is their language to insist on moving faster. We have even marveled at the family pets that nurtured wild animal cubs as their own--- something humans do so rarely for their own, let alone other species.
Yet, on the same note-- we see normally docile, tortured and human over-bred farm animals in cages attack and kill each other for sake of just an inch buffer of freedom of space. We assign and glorify this as a value of Darwinian survival skills, as the alpha personas impose their power on the recessive ones. It seems it is the way of nature to seek balance and number itself into space -- so nature will redefine what it must if imposed upon. Or, is it our tampering and our interpretation of perception that assumes this to be 'survival of the fittest'?
If we truly are here to assume our philosophical superiority in the animal kingdom, why is it then, we choose to create our power-packs allegiances via outer adornments (clothing or pins), hair styles, dominance intended aggressions--- and blinding our own faith and power in order to submit to the social order? Perhaps it is easier than accepting there are laws and boundaries within a universe beyond our making--- and that even our 'superiority' is flawed and with limitations. Or perhaps it is because we have chosen to dismiss our own truths to find escape in entertainment based alter-realities that would circumvent symbiosis with our neighbors, nature or this planet.
Or just maybe, we have forgotten how to be within our dream with nature and have instead chosen to accept our own 'new modern fables' to maintain our insistence of superiority over anything, even to even our ancestors? I wonder then, where is the truth in our 'human-ness'???
21 April 2009
free to pursue happiness
Some day I want to know that I need not change my perception to project an assumed happiness.
Some day I want to know the pursuit is truly within my freedom of rights.
Some day I hope to see all souls experience happiness and find satisfaction.
Some day I hope my gratefulness is the assumption and not the forethought.
Some day I hope everyone sees gratitude as a gateway to truth.
Some day may we honor that truth with love and peace.
Some day I want to know the pursuit is truly within my freedom of rights.
Some day I hope to see all souls experience happiness and find satisfaction.
Some day I hope my gratefulness is the assumption and not the forethought.
Some day I hope everyone sees gratitude as a gateway to truth.
Some day may we honor that truth with love and peace.
03 April 2009
incorruptible spirit
Several years ago, there was a life changing interview with a man who would become my superior. Surprisingly I admit I could not read the fellow at first; he pretended to not be guarded, yet there was a distinct guardedness about him that would not allow others in. To most, he was gregarious and open, and thrived on change yet adored the conservative. His heart was very deep; probably a destined romantic that decided romance does not provide the stellar credit score required to find way to stability of the conservative. It seemed his very persona was a dichotomy of a desperate need for freedom quelled by a stern self-stifling discipline wrapped in a package of freshly pressed shirts and slacks every day. It was obvious he had his demons, as he struggled with physical illness issues and moments of self-doubt. His head was oft heavily laden with the burdens of choices beyond his desirable controls, as his need for ethics was as great as his need to breathe.
It was those very same qualities that created a generous compassion and wonderful superior. I don’t know if he chose to hire me because he needed a productive skill set and team member, or, if he connected with me on an intuitive level of a similar mindset. Yet, somehow, after time had passed, I was interviewed again and he asked if I was indeed certain I wanted the position. I told him I wanted to work for him, but I was also honest enough to let him know I would be considering this only semi-permanent as I had plans to move to another country within three years, even if only temporary. He called me to let me know I’d receive an offer the following week.
In the next two to three years, I came to know this man and as he became more impressed by me, which completely surprised me. I’d always had a lack of self-value in the field, because I did not take career path decisions seriously enough. I knew all of life was short and careers even shorter, having jumped several times. But as his illness became more apparent and he would be out for occasional terms, I decided to self-manage with as many organizational and job task acquaintance-ship opportunities as I could muster. Each week, I’d try to prepare a brief to his email to allow him to review the priority list and agenda status of projects and department issues. I’d compile spreadsheets with potential consolidations and alerts, as well as present potential solutions to problems from alternate company locations that would arise.
As he grew to trust my capabilities, he would alert me to realizing my self-abilities in the career and trust me with much higher responsibilities. He continued to say he knew I could handle more than I realized, and at one point, fought to have me reinstated at a higher position than hired, because he felt I had undervalued myself.
He also appreciated the way I fought to maintain integrity of projects throughout the political mayhem that can overtake any corporate decision making process. Unfortunately, as the numbers of chiefs overseeing a project grew, so would the scarcity in the numbers of the people who were actually physically involved with the actual products. Eventually, an entire line of new products and projects could be touched and managed and decided upon, by a slew of faces that had never bought or seen similar products. Many never would even know the manufacturing process, nor would they care. Sometimes, products would be released for sale on the appearance of a photo or final package label, with no one at the top level ever even knowing the history or process of that product.
My boss had almost 30 years with a brand name that covered many of the products we worked on. Somehow, as he excelled early on in that particular industry and brand, I think he fell in love with it. He fell in love with how he became part of the creative living force of the brand, the products, and the joy it would bring to customers of those products. As he jumped job to job early on, somehow, the brand had also fallen in love with him --- the companies would merge and move to bring him back into the same area. It was like the universe had married this man to creation of these items. For him, it was his art; for the brand, he was its engineer.
Unfortunately as time passed, companies merged and larger financial firms made its way into ownership of some of these manufacturing businesses. They would buy up these aged consumer product businesses and turn them into leveraged assets, to ‘diversify’ their assets and interests. When business was good, it would be a profit. If it was bad, it was a tax write off. If it was worse--- they would rob the business of every penny that could be mustered through a ‘value engineering’ process --- and ultimately, after every penny was found and jobs were eliminated, sell off the remainders by selling off the ‘rights to the brand’.
As the masters and the experienced ones became entwined in this litany of bureaucratic company turnover chaos, there was always a price or casualty. Productivity demands from false expectations and misinformed senior level financiers would interfere with the truth and integrity of the humanity and the products themselves. Often, the suffering chain would create a negative aura of disgust on the faces of the people at the production floors, as their very pride was stripped away when the products lost more and more purity.
My boss was one of those who saw this. At first, his conscience led him to follow the chain of command, hoping time would find a better chain when the tides would turn and the brand would be flooded with demands of quality again. He would seek hope and trust in his fellows in the industry, and maintain his dream of being able to achieve integrity and pride in his work again. He wanted to be the good example and great father to his son and outstanding husband to his wife they’d have pride in. He counted on truth and justice to reign in the end. And he encouraged those in others.
He left the company before I did, and told me the words, “I can’t live the lie anymore”. He had felt he sold his soul to continue to maintain a bunch of products he didn’t believe in anymore, because he knew the senior financiers never intended on these products being anything more than a saleable commodity. He knew they didn’t believe in giving these products life.
After I’d left he was given the opportunity to go back with new (financier) owners and to try again. There were a handful of people remaining there, but a few had been career long friends of his. However, by now, everyone had families and heavy mortgages, worrying about retirement and children in college. Everyone was now part of the machine and had become complacent.
A couple months later, I received a phone call. The only words on the other end of the phone I heard was 'he shot himself'.
The strangest part of this conversation was that there was an inexplicable knowing of all the reasons why this would have happened. In the last years of this man's life, I came to respect, then understand, he could not recover from a betrayal so deep that his very soul was dying because it could not really be bought. Perhaps some may have considered it boyish – but I think he still dreamt of a truth and honor in giving life to things in this world, so loyalty and promises meant everything to him. Deep within himself, he refused to corrupt his soul. The saddest part is as much as he sought out a ray of hope in the overwhelming crowds of faces encountered in his professional and private life, the turmoil within could not find the vision to seek his way out of the bindings that gripped his spirit's freedom to believe. I don’t know if he blamed the brand, the industry, the people or the times. But I do know he still believed in hope and friendship and for a better future for his son, where his son would not see his defeated dying spirit, or his burdened face. Whether it can be judged or not, he accomplished his last pleading statement: For us to make different choices for the future, to make things happen for hope and life - in a single shot.
It was those very same qualities that created a generous compassion and wonderful superior. I don’t know if he chose to hire me because he needed a productive skill set and team member, or, if he connected with me on an intuitive level of a similar mindset. Yet, somehow, after time had passed, I was interviewed again and he asked if I was indeed certain I wanted the position. I told him I wanted to work for him, but I was also honest enough to let him know I would be considering this only semi-permanent as I had plans to move to another country within three years, even if only temporary. He called me to let me know I’d receive an offer the following week.
In the next two to three years, I came to know this man and as he became more impressed by me, which completely surprised me. I’d always had a lack of self-value in the field, because I did not take career path decisions seriously enough. I knew all of life was short and careers even shorter, having jumped several times. But as his illness became more apparent and he would be out for occasional terms, I decided to self-manage with as many organizational and job task acquaintance-ship opportunities as I could muster. Each week, I’d try to prepare a brief to his email to allow him to review the priority list and agenda status of projects and department issues. I’d compile spreadsheets with potential consolidations and alerts, as well as present potential solutions to problems from alternate company locations that would arise.
As he grew to trust my capabilities, he would alert me to realizing my self-abilities in the career and trust me with much higher responsibilities. He continued to say he knew I could handle more than I realized, and at one point, fought to have me reinstated at a higher position than hired, because he felt I had undervalued myself.
He also appreciated the way I fought to maintain integrity of projects throughout the political mayhem that can overtake any corporate decision making process. Unfortunately, as the numbers of chiefs overseeing a project grew, so would the scarcity in the numbers of the people who were actually physically involved with the actual products. Eventually, an entire line of new products and projects could be touched and managed and decided upon, by a slew of faces that had never bought or seen similar products. Many never would even know the manufacturing process, nor would they care. Sometimes, products would be released for sale on the appearance of a photo or final package label, with no one at the top level ever even knowing the history or process of that product.
My boss had almost 30 years with a brand name that covered many of the products we worked on. Somehow, as he excelled early on in that particular industry and brand, I think he fell in love with it. He fell in love with how he became part of the creative living force of the brand, the products, and the joy it would bring to customers of those products. As he jumped job to job early on, somehow, the brand had also fallen in love with him --- the companies would merge and move to bring him back into the same area. It was like the universe had married this man to creation of these items. For him, it was his art; for the brand, he was its engineer.
Unfortunately as time passed, companies merged and larger financial firms made its way into ownership of some of these manufacturing businesses. They would buy up these aged consumer product businesses and turn them into leveraged assets, to ‘diversify’ their assets and interests. When business was good, it would be a profit. If it was bad, it was a tax write off. If it was worse--- they would rob the business of every penny that could be mustered through a ‘value engineering’ process --- and ultimately, after every penny was found and jobs were eliminated, sell off the remainders by selling off the ‘rights to the brand’.
As the masters and the experienced ones became entwined in this litany of bureaucratic company turnover chaos, there was always a price or casualty. Productivity demands from false expectations and misinformed senior level financiers would interfere with the truth and integrity of the humanity and the products themselves. Often, the suffering chain would create a negative aura of disgust on the faces of the people at the production floors, as their very pride was stripped away when the products lost more and more purity.
My boss was one of those who saw this. At first, his conscience led him to follow the chain of command, hoping time would find a better chain when the tides would turn and the brand would be flooded with demands of quality again. He would seek hope and trust in his fellows in the industry, and maintain his dream of being able to achieve integrity and pride in his work again. He wanted to be the good example and great father to his son and outstanding husband to his wife they’d have pride in. He counted on truth and justice to reign in the end. And he encouraged those in others.
He left the company before I did, and told me the words, “I can’t live the lie anymore”. He had felt he sold his soul to continue to maintain a bunch of products he didn’t believe in anymore, because he knew the senior financiers never intended on these products being anything more than a saleable commodity. He knew they didn’t believe in giving these products life.
After I’d left he was given the opportunity to go back with new (financier) owners and to try again. There were a handful of people remaining there, but a few had been career long friends of his. However, by now, everyone had families and heavy mortgages, worrying about retirement and children in college. Everyone was now part of the machine and had become complacent.
A couple months later, I received a phone call. The only words on the other end of the phone I heard was 'he shot himself'.
The strangest part of this conversation was that there was an inexplicable knowing of all the reasons why this would have happened. In the last years of this man's life, I came to respect, then understand, he could not recover from a betrayal so deep that his very soul was dying because it could not really be bought. Perhaps some may have considered it boyish – but I think he still dreamt of a truth and honor in giving life to things in this world, so loyalty and promises meant everything to him. Deep within himself, he refused to corrupt his soul. The saddest part is as much as he sought out a ray of hope in the overwhelming crowds of faces encountered in his professional and private life, the turmoil within could not find the vision to seek his way out of the bindings that gripped his spirit's freedom to believe. I don’t know if he blamed the brand, the industry, the people or the times. But I do know he still believed in hope and friendship and for a better future for his son, where his son would not see his defeated dying spirit, or his burdened face. Whether it can be judged or not, he accomplished his last pleading statement: For us to make different choices for the future, to make things happen for hope and life - in a single shot.
"we are what we eat"
At the age of three, my father decided to raise our first pigs and make his first home made sausage. He bought livestock at the nearest farmer's market auction in the early spring, built large comfortable wood platform board pens on stilts under a light birch and oak tree canopy and placed 3 or 4 piglets into each pen. The pigs were surprisingly organized and bright, it seemed, as each decided to make hay beds and choose only one corner to use as a 'toilet' area (usually opposite the feeding troughs). And they had their play area. As the piglets grew, my parents would separate them into their own pens, so they could each have plenty of room. But the slats dividing the pens were wide, and though large, the pens were within visual range of each other, so the pigs remained somewhat social--- as I would hear them squeal or snort to each other or peer their heads above or between the panels. And each had their own way of greeting each of us, recognizing us, and sometimes, even attempting to be playful as though they were a pet to us. It was very funny how when they were hungry, they'd push the troughs over as close to us as possible with their snouts, then look up with a gesture of asking -- nodding their heads towards the trough.
I learned to respect the animals then-- not just the pigs, but all animals. Slowly, however, the end of summer was near for the pigs, and my father began his first butcher process. He chose one of the pigs and got out a gun. I ran and hid and held my fingers in my ears, as I could not bear to hear the shot or watch. I heard there was no struggle and it done quickly, as humanely as possible. Then I stood and watched as he proceeded with the skinning and cleaning process. Because both my parents had known hunger and respect for nature, he was rather cautious in his method, carefully hanging and cleaning well, cutting perhaps amateurishly, but with care. Some of the cuts were wrapped to be taken to a friend's smokehouse. Some were salted. The gut regions were cleaned well and dipped in prepared salt and vinegar solutions and washed again, so they could be used to make sausage. Everything was done with the focused energy like an artisan crafter might put into an ornate grand ice sculpture.
As a child, the meat from this tasted wonderful. Everything was done with the old fashioned concerns of selecting the feed, caring, maintaining cleanliness, then selecting only enough to fill one freezer for the family. The other animals were traded or kept for breeding next season. Nothing was wasted --- as the bones were cooked in stews, then given to the dogs, or crushed and put back into soil to fertilize.
He did the same with poultry and beef much of my childhood. Even milk was from local dairies, and all types of fish from neighbors and friends who'd fish.
I stopped eating meats regularly sometime ago, and almost all of the times remain vegetarian now. When I stopped eating meats, it never seemed to taste the same, or there is something missing in the meats -- like a distasteful energy is interfering with receiving the energy from the food.
Sadly, a recent documentary film on HBO shed light on the new world of food. (www.hbo.com/docs/programs/deathfactoryfarm/index.html)
The animals appear diseased in body and spirit. Their eyes showed the emptiness of disdain for their circumstance, and a longing for what might be. In the hierarchy of nature, animals are quite aware of the food chain and expect to eat and survive or be eaten. It is not their way to not understand the possibility of their purpose, as their connection to nature and the universe is more their state of being than ours. But their destiny, to feel the energy of life and the feel of soil between their hooves, or let soft rain fall on their open mouths while running on pastures --- will not be theirs as we capture their spirits in the confining pens in which they cannot turn and then beat them when they beg to know the sun.
These are the fodder that are handled roughly and kicked before they are weighed on scales to determine their worth in goal. In this instance, the humans corralling the pigs have only malice on their faces, as they only realize the physical commodity of the livestock. The under weights and the ill ones are killed off and thrown about carelessly into open graves as useless carcasses. The handlers do not even think them worth stock for fertilizer or for animal feed. They have no respect or connection to what nature or the universe gifts them for their survival. The livestock is merely a nuisance required in their daily routine and nothing more.
When viewing the brutality of the nonhuman character that emerges with such a blind and unfocused need to exhibit a useless power over the most helplessly crippled creatures, I could only feel pity for the dead soul that betrays the movement of the body exterior. The dark spirit explodes a shallow but destructive force of negative disease so great that nature is divided by unseen barriers--- breaking the very foundations of life. I ask myself then, what reason came by our ancestors as to create a proverb that ‘we are what we eat’. Does this mean we can be diseased not only in body but in spirit as well?
I cannot but help recall the fables and stories of the rituals of the primitive cultures that would perform ceremony to celebrate and give thanks to the life of every plant and animal that would bring us nourishment. A successful hunt as natural law allowed would insure survival of all the species if within the symbiosis boundaries. We would not be able to always hunt down the most dominant creature--- usually capturing a more recessive (or most unlucky) trait animal as the meal. Yet, the fighting spirit of the animal was honored, and the carcass would insure nourishment to the family for strength to continue in new generations. As we grew strong, so did the animals around us, as we adapted to each other’s strengths and survival skills. We evolved as the universe intended us to.
In this ‘new world’ of mass production of food that is stabilized and respect forgotten, when do we reconnect to nature? Where is the sanctity of the parallel evolutions of different species? Are we so conceited that we have removed nature’s bounty and replaced it with a slow and self-destructive disease?
We are what we eat. Clarity of goals and achievements come with choice of actions. And we still have free-will. Maybe it’s time to reconnect with natural order.
I learned to respect the animals then-- not just the pigs, but all animals. Slowly, however, the end of summer was near for the pigs, and my father began his first butcher process. He chose one of the pigs and got out a gun. I ran and hid and held my fingers in my ears, as I could not bear to hear the shot or watch. I heard there was no struggle and it done quickly, as humanely as possible. Then I stood and watched as he proceeded with the skinning and cleaning process. Because both my parents had known hunger and respect for nature, he was rather cautious in his method, carefully hanging and cleaning well, cutting perhaps amateurishly, but with care. Some of the cuts were wrapped to be taken to a friend's smokehouse. Some were salted. The gut regions were cleaned well and dipped in prepared salt and vinegar solutions and washed again, so they could be used to make sausage. Everything was done with the focused energy like an artisan crafter might put into an ornate grand ice sculpture.
As a child, the meat from this tasted wonderful. Everything was done with the old fashioned concerns of selecting the feed, caring, maintaining cleanliness, then selecting only enough to fill one freezer for the family. The other animals were traded or kept for breeding next season. Nothing was wasted --- as the bones were cooked in stews, then given to the dogs, or crushed and put back into soil to fertilize.
He did the same with poultry and beef much of my childhood. Even milk was from local dairies, and all types of fish from neighbors and friends who'd fish.
I stopped eating meats regularly sometime ago, and almost all of the times remain vegetarian now. When I stopped eating meats, it never seemed to taste the same, or there is something missing in the meats -- like a distasteful energy is interfering with receiving the energy from the food.
Sadly, a recent documentary film on HBO shed light on the new world of food. (www.hbo.com/docs/programs/deathfactoryfarm/index.html)
The animals appear diseased in body and spirit. Their eyes showed the emptiness of disdain for their circumstance, and a longing for what might be. In the hierarchy of nature, animals are quite aware of the food chain and expect to eat and survive or be eaten. It is not their way to not understand the possibility of their purpose, as their connection to nature and the universe is more their state of being than ours. But their destiny, to feel the energy of life and the feel of soil between their hooves, or let soft rain fall on their open mouths while running on pastures --- will not be theirs as we capture their spirits in the confining pens in which they cannot turn and then beat them when they beg to know the sun.
These are the fodder that are handled roughly and kicked before they are weighed on scales to determine their worth in goal. In this instance, the humans corralling the pigs have only malice on their faces, as they only realize the physical commodity of the livestock. The under weights and the ill ones are killed off and thrown about carelessly into open graves as useless carcasses. The handlers do not even think them worth stock for fertilizer or for animal feed. They have no respect or connection to what nature or the universe gifts them for their survival. The livestock is merely a nuisance required in their daily routine and nothing more.
When viewing the brutality of the nonhuman character that emerges with such a blind and unfocused need to exhibit a useless power over the most helplessly crippled creatures, I could only feel pity for the dead soul that betrays the movement of the body exterior. The dark spirit explodes a shallow but destructive force of negative disease so great that nature is divided by unseen barriers--- breaking the very foundations of life. I ask myself then, what reason came by our ancestors as to create a proverb that ‘we are what we eat’. Does this mean we can be diseased not only in body but in spirit as well?
I cannot but help recall the fables and stories of the rituals of the primitive cultures that would perform ceremony to celebrate and give thanks to the life of every plant and animal that would bring us nourishment. A successful hunt as natural law allowed would insure survival of all the species if within the symbiosis boundaries. We would not be able to always hunt down the most dominant creature--- usually capturing a more recessive (or most unlucky) trait animal as the meal. Yet, the fighting spirit of the animal was honored, and the carcass would insure nourishment to the family for strength to continue in new generations. As we grew strong, so did the animals around us, as we adapted to each other’s strengths and survival skills. We evolved as the universe intended us to.
In this ‘new world’ of mass production of food that is stabilized and respect forgotten, when do we reconnect to nature? Where is the sanctity of the parallel evolutions of different species? Are we so conceited that we have removed nature’s bounty and replaced it with a slow and self-destructive disease?
We are what we eat. Clarity of goals and achievements come with choice of actions. And we still have free-will. Maybe it’s time to reconnect with natural order.
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