This is a brief examination of the essence of the concepts of egalitarianism and socialism. While capitalism is mentioned, I think most people are all too aware of what capitalism is and how it is playing out in our world. I am very confident that, in the world today, there are many people who claim to want a socialist society when, in reality, the concept they have in their mind is of a more egalitarian society. In 20/20 hindsight, I know I have made that semantic error. Words are powerful. Using the correct term to accurately express the concept we have in our mind is important. I think we often fall into the error of the misuse of a term, especially when that misuse is common around us.
“1: a belief in human equality especially with respect to social, political, and economic affairs
2: a social philosophy advocating the removal of inequalities among people”
I think, when a lot of people use the word “socialism”, the above qualities are actually what they have in their mind. One other notable aspect which I think often accompanies the use of the word “socialism”, is that when thinking of increased equality, it is common for a person to be thinking only in terms of the rewards, the benefits, available within a society. True equality also means sharing in the work involved in developing and maintaining a society. There is much needed, in many different areas, to maintain a healthy society. Everything from picking up the trash on the side of the road, to brain surgery. It all matters. There cannot be viable equality in a society in which some only receive, or in which some only give. The imbalance will cause the society to topple. It’s such a simple principle, yet one that is so often overlooked: imbalance engenders instability which can, and will, result in a toppling.
All that being said, Merriam-Webster’s definition of socialism is as follows:
“1: any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods
2a: a system of society or group living in which there is no private property
b: a system or condition of society in which the means of production are owned and controlled by the state
3: a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done”
I do not believe that this is what most people today who are using the term “socialist” or “socialistic” have in mind. I have a great deal of confidence that most people in the United States who use this term do not have “no private property” in mind. I know I don’t. I want to be able to leave my home in the morning and return to find it is still my home. The same with my car, tools, and essential personal property. On the other hand, sometimes working and contributing together to see that essential goods and services are available to all is a very good thing. Such a method is used widely to provide schools, police, fire fighter, and emergency response services. There are more essential goods and services which using a similar societal/cooperative approach in the provision of, could stand to benefit humanity greatly. That is another topic, not for this article.
It seems to me that the common use of the term “socialism” in the United States is a reaction to the extreme economic imbalance which is only increasing under the current under-regulated capitalistic economic system. In every city, I venture every town, in the United States today we see people being marginalized. People are experiencing their needs going unmet, often not for a lack of actively contributing to the wellbeing of their community. We are seeing the end result of allowing the predatory reality, which is a purely capitalist system, unfettered by adequate social responsibility and concerns, to determine our economic reality. However, in contrast to egalitarianism, socialism opens the door just as wide as capitalism does to an extreme imbalance in economic reality and political power. In putting all property in the hands of the governmental body, it puts great temptation in front of those holding high office within the government.
A reality we perpetually face is that any system is ultimately going to be as viable and sustainable as those in power opt to make it, or not.
I recommend those using the term “socialism”, as an alternative to “capitalism”, more closely examine it’s definition. Then examine the definition of “egalitarian”. Words matter. What term more accurately describes the reality you want to see emerge in the world?
Over the past 6+ decades “our” Federal Government has lied to us about the JFK and RFK assassinations. Also, the Vietnam war, the Oklahoma City Bombing, the first WTC bombing, MK Ultra, UFO’s, 9/11, WMD’s in Iraq, and more. Why are so many people so willing to blindly accept that we are getting the truth about COVID and the “vaccines”? To the best of my knowledge, there has never been a time, nor a set of issues, when so many qualified, independent, professionals have felt compelled to speak out against what the Government and “mainstream” media are presenting to us. Professionals from various medical, biological, other scientific and legal disciplines are putting their professional credibility, their livelihoods, on the line to speak out.
What is the reason for the “tunnel vision” that has gripped so many educated, caring people? The “masses” have blindly followed the directives to destroy livelihoods, to impose isolation, to deprive youth of educational opportunities, to witness dramatic increases in poverty, depression and suicides. To be complicit in coercing neighbors to be injected with an experimental substance which those people did not want inside their bodies. All this based in fear of a disease, which, if left totally untreated, has a 99.9% + survival rate. If the WHO had not unilaterally redefined the term “pandemic”, from it’s traditional meaning, during the time of the Swine Flu, what is going on would not be a “pandemic”.
It is time to remember our humanity, our individuality. It’s time to stop trying to force our own health care decisions upon everyone. The value and necessity of individualized care has been a standard within the medical field for some time. Prior to being “vaccinated” or treated for COVID, are people being truly given the benefit of informed consent? Are the options which are recognized and utilized with success in other countries being made available? To the best of my knowledge, there has never been a time when those at the top of the pyramid of the medical, political and media establishment in the United States have worked so diligently to keep accurate information about a disease, and about viable treatment options, away from the general public. And there has never been a time when the American public has been so amenable to such censorship.
It’s time we recall our humanity. It’s time we remember that while we all are of essentially the same biology, within the basic similarity there are many significant differences. Differences which have come about via genetics, injuries, and/or exposures to a variety of experiences. Some of these individual differences can have a determination upon how various medical treatments and pharmaceuticals affect us. That is an essential reality of our human experience. Is it something we are ready to cavalierly dismiss in deference to…what…corporate profits?
Nothing kills the ability of individuals to run for office and make a difference like partisan politics. Once a country has accepted the presence of political parties, and those parties become so powerful it is all but impossible for an average citizen to successfully run for a national office without their support, they, the parties, own the system. And therefore, those who run the parties run the system. Those controlling the parties become the political “bosses”.
Within this type of political structure it doesn’t matter who runs for office, because, whoever is elected is only going to be the new mouthpiece for the bosses. Yet, the bosses know it helps obfuscate their presence by running candidates who at least have the appearance of being distinct political personalities.
It’s time we end political parties. Let individuals run for office. Return to a system wherein the media must give equal time to all candidates. That will also limit the number of repetitive political ads we’re subjected to. I’m sure the media will be happy to simply run one or two informative programs or articles on who the candidates are and what their positions on the issues are. In such a system we have an infinitely better chance of a candidate actually following through with their stated positions if they’re elected.
Much of what’s taking place in the world today has been made possible by amazing communication technologies. While these technologies bring much of positive value to the world, as with so many other developments, they also offer those with dishonorable motives new avenues through which to prey upon communities. The latter application of these technologies has reached such proportion, If I wasn’t seeing it happen, I’m not sure I would have believed it to be possible. I grieve that it is.
I was born in 1950. I remember the U.S. Presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy. I remember what I saw as a child of life in those times. I remember the post WWII mind set which was predominant in those days in the midwestern United States. There was an undercurrent of optimism, positivity. Diseases were being conquered, diplomacy, rather than war, occupied the headlines. People felt good that tyranny, authoritarianism, genocide, had been defeated. As is all too clear now, the world wasn’t as free of some of these human problems as many believed.
It’s not that everything was ideal, not at all. There were (and sadly still are) issues of ignorance, misunderstanding, fear, hatred, between people of differing races and religions. There were the major rifts between the nations identifying with capitalism and those identifying with communism. However, during WWII, people from many nations, nations with histories of distrust, antagonism, had pulled together to defeat a common enemy. There was optimism that the common values which had surfaced during the war could be built upon to establish lasting peaceful relationships. It was a time of the belief in unlimited possibilities for a better world.
What is absolutely apparent now, is that those who perceived the possibilities for improving the conditions of life for all people, weren’t the only ones seeing unlimited possibilities. There were those who saw the potential of using the new technologies, the developments in transportation, communication, psychology, medicine, and other disciplines, as tools for plunder. Rather than embracing the opportunities to engage in massive development, to facilitate improvements for the common good, they saw, and continue to see, human deficits through the lens of exploitation. Not as areas of need to be addressed with pervasive development and education, but as openings to be exploited in order to establish themselves in predatory positions of power within the systems of the world.
It is apparent now, that post WWII, those seeking personal wealth and power have been working, manipulating public perception. Often co-opting the very symbols which had represented the defeat of tyranny, authoritarianism and inhuman behaviors. They employ words and symbols which once stirred the most positive motives within people to obfuscate and shield their predatory agendas. One of the first major coups these people won was, via magazines, television, and other media, establishing the idea of unrestrained pursuit of personal wealth as a positive primary value in the psyche of people around the world. Once that lie, a lie which ignores basic values necessary to maintaining both healthy individuals and healthy cultures, was pervasively established in the minds of the population, the door to pandemonium was opened.
Competitive economics establishes a system in which those at the top have the distinct advantage. The oppressive, sometimes murderous, methods used to maintain and expand the wealth of those at the top become just the methods of “business as usual”. After all, it’s what you would do if you had all that money? Isn’t it? It’s the value system the media repeatedly portrays as the way of the world. And many, especially those who have never been exposed to something different, simply assume that impression to be the global, inescapable reality.
Abraham Maslow provided us with a working framework, a skeleton, within which it is possible to “flesh out” not only healthy, thriving individuals, also healthy, thriving cultures.
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
How do we know what is needed to “flesh out”, to establish a viable, worldwide, thriving human culture? We have the findings of the work done in many scientific disciplines over many centuries to guide us. Psychology, sociology, medicine, agriculture, engineering, all of these disciplines, and more, hold information which provides the necessary answers. There are the developments in science and the arts which provide much instruction for the establishment and maintenance of a healthful, thriving human culture. There are answer available to us to the problems of housing, health, energy, pollution, and more. Sometimes these answers go unused because they interfere with the profit motive of those in positions of power. And we accept it because the culture of competitive economics has become normalized.
The thing is, we have got the tools we need to establish a world in which people of many different backgrounds can live together as vital aspects of our world ecology, interacting and enhancing each other’s experience of life. What is missing is the focus to make it happen. I would have said the “will” to make it happen, but I believe that will is present, inside every living human being. Sometimes it is dormant, sometimes it has been covered in so much pain and trauma, so many lies and misdirections, that it expresses itself in twisted, destructive ways. But it is there.
As a teacher of mine once said: “Life takes work, it’s death that’s easy. Just do nothing and you will die.”
All people emanate from and are inextricably a part of the Divine Creative Spirit. This aspect of our existence is represented by the golden circle in the center in the diagram above. The next area, the circle which surrounds the center circle, is the “Worldly Persona” which is the identity the rest of world knows us by. It is defined by our words and deeds which are observable to the rest of the people in the world. It is this persona that is the product of the process described below. Our persona reflects the sum total of our worldly experiences, desires and decisions.
There are no “bad people”, there are no “good people”, there are only people. What makes the difference between tyrants such as Adolf Hitler, Mary I of England, or Pol Pot and revered personalies such as Gautama Buddha, St. Teresa of Calcutta, or Martin Luther King Jr.? It is not some mysterious, unknown variables. The difference lies in the sum total of their individual experiences (education, indoctrination, relationships, interactions), their desires, and their decisions. It is important to note here that the “sum total” may include the experiences, desires and decisions of many lifetimes. Also that biology and/or injuries can play a major role in the development of an individual’s persona.
However, we are thinking beings with free will. We have the potential to change. We can mold not only ourselves, but the world we live in. If we decide we desire a better, more harmonious, world, and we act upon that desire, we can bring that vision to reality. It may take time, but the sooner we start, the sooner we arrive.
With the determination to do so, bitterness can be transmuted to understanding. Fear and hatred can be transmuted to caring and love. However, we must stay aware that the opposite is also true. Caring and love, with enough abuse and trauma, especially when accompanied by input and reinforcement to do so, can be replaced with hatred and cruelty. We must end the mistreatment, the cruelties we impose upon one another. We must see each other as being the children of the same Creator, which we are. As we now know, we are all inextricably interconnected. Isn’t it time we established the positive, harmonious, joyful, reality we all, at the core of our being, long for?
In summation, while we all can, at times, be negatively affected by the world around us, through enlightenment, education, understanding, we can transmute negative impulses into constructive actions. We can play a more positively determinate role within our own lives, within our relationships, and within the world around us.
At this time, around the world, we are being advised by individuals and agencies, which wield substantial worldly power, to be fearful. We are being urged, coerced, to be compliant, to follow the instructions we’re being given. Instructions which appeal to the fear the media and corporate powers are largely responsible for instilling. In their positions of power within the media, the corporate powers are wielding an incredible ability of censorship over information. They routinely do not publish truths which disagree with, which dispute the predatory agendas they are implementing. A predominant one at this time is the COVID/”vaccine” agenda. Any information which contradicts the fear based agenda they are pushing, is either censored in corporate media, or, if it is referred to, it is done so in such a way as to discredit that information.
A collection of various and sometimes overlapping people have introduced a previously unknown disease into the world apparently in the pursuit of a homicidal, special interest, agenda. And they may introduce more. They are offering toxic, death-dealing treatments and doing all they can to repress the knowledge of the existence of safe, effective treatments. And throughout it all, they are engineering the flow of vast amounts of the world’s wealth into their hands. Yet we can make the decision to comply with this heinous agenda, or not. We have the final decision in whether or not to allow the pollution of our minds and spirits with the fear and hate they are promoting. And, we have the final decision whether or not to allow the pollution of our bodies with the toxic substances they are pushing.
Changing the focus back to our inherent divine origin and heritage, even when we are being motivated by fear, anger, hatred, even then, through the filters of our mind which are active at that time, we are expressing the innate desire for life which is present within all of us. However, if we desire a more harmonious, healthful, joyful life, we need to discipline ourselves to refrain from expressions which lead to more harm, more trauma, more fear, anger and hatred in the world. While we cannot ignore such emotions when they are present, we must learn to see through to the primary, underlying reality of the desire for life which is there. We must learn to see it not only within ourselves, but in “the other”. When we can do that, and when we embrace the values of negotiation, understanding, mutuality, and the desire for resolutions which enhance the harmony of human interactions, we can have a genuine heaven on Earth.
All through my life I have heard skeptics, cynics, say that such a thing is “too idealistic”, not practical, not possible. Even they, in doing so, inadvertently acknowledge the ideal nature of such thinking. If we aren’t devoting our time and energies toward seeking and establishing the ideal, what are we spending them on? Seeking and establishing the mediocre? The dysfunctional? Or are we just letting entropy, the slow slide into dissolution, be our guiding motive?
Ultimately, whether in the United States or someplace else in the world at large, the term coined in the U.S. by the authors of the Declaration of Independence, “We the People“, represents a reality which can stop tyrannical abuses andelevate humanity. It is within our individual decisions, that we collectively possess the ability to determine the direction this period of history will follow.
For over a year we have seen small businesses closed, people isolated, depression on the rise, suicides on the rise, homicides on the rise. We have seen billions funneled toward Pfizer, Moderna, Johnson and Johnson, and Astra Zeneca. We have seen the “big box” stores; Walmart, Costco and others, including the online store Amazon, reaping billions from the shut down of competition. Now thousands, if not millions, are losing, or will lose, their jobs due to the draconian mandates by President Biden and many State Governors. There are millions experiencing death and crippling reactions from the so-called “vaccines”. The most authoritative report on the subject, the “Lazarus Report”, more formally entitled “Electronic Support for Public Health-Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (ESP:VAERS)” in their study of the adverse event reporting system, data collected from 6/2006 to 10/2009, they found that only 1% of vaccine adverse reactions are reported. The current VAERS report of deaths from the COVID vaccines is 16,766. Using the aforementioned Report’s findings, that predicts deaths from COVID vaccines are more in the area of 16 million. This is not even counting crippling neurological reactions and other adverse reactions.
There has never been such an egregious case of the “cure” being worse than the disease. Yet, driven by the media’s fear mongering, millions of Americans, blinded by that fear, continue to support harsher and more pervasive mandates. All being done under the misguided, if not criminal, pretense of protecting the public. All in response to a virus which has negatively affected far fewer lives than has the brutality of the official responses; shutdowns, mandates. We are seeing first-hand how fear can drive people to abandon both rationality and civility.
In the midst of all this we should not lose sight of the fact that an elite few are reaping windfall profits from the ongoing events. And that those few occupy positions of extraordinary influence within the halls of government and industry, including all forms of media.
Now the profiteers are looking to expand the sales (and it is sales, we do pay for the injections people are receiving “for free”, via our tax dollars) to inject children over the age of 5. Considering the extremely high probability that most of the damage being done by these “vaccines” is going unreported, being almost entirely ignored by media, this is a move which is heinous in it’s disregard, if not it’s contempt, for the lives of the children being targeted.
The media’s use of descriptors such as “surge”, “breakout”, “runs rampant”, would lead a person to believe that people are succumbing to COVID in incredibly large numbers.
Take a breath.
Here are some figures from the mainstream sources who claim to be tracking COVID. Let’s start with getting some perspective, the population of the U.S. is officially, as of today, August 31, 2021, is 328,240,000. That is three hundred twenty-eight million, two hundred and forty thousand people. That is us, the residents of the United States of America. Among us, cumulatively from the beginning of COVID hitting our shores, 39,343,501 of us are confirmed as having, at some point, contracted COVID. That is 0.1198% of us as a whole. In reality, a very small percentage of us. Further, this isn’t the number of people who got so sick that hospitalization was needed, this is just confirmed cases. Of this small percentage of us who did contract a confirmed case of COVID, just slightly more than one/tenth of one percent, 1.647%, or 648,051 of us, officially died of COVID. That means that out of the entire population of us, 0.00197% of us have died of COVID. Or less than two one-thousandths of a percent. When it comes to the media’s sensationalism of COVID, we are being sold a tempest in a teapot.
Are around six hundred and fifty thousand deaths from COVID a good thing? No. But is it a catastrophe that warrants closing small businesses, does it warrant millions of people losing jobs, incomes, housing, educational opportunities? Does it warrant the rise in depression, addiction and suicides which are taking place in the nation? Does it warrant the loss of individual rights which is taking place throughout the U.S.? I don’t think there’s any question that countless more lives have been hit with tragedy due to the mandates which President Biden, Anthony Fauci and numerous Governors have waged than have been tragically affected by COVID.
Time to get some perspective and restore the freedoms, of livelihood, of education, even of the ability to choose the medications we, as individuals, would like to use if we face infection. Right now the U.S. has the highest mortality rate, small as it is, from COVID from than most, if not all, other countries in the world. Many other countries, India for one, have benefited greatly from the use of Ivermectin, others are reporting positive results with Hydroxychloroquine. In the U.S. it seems these effective medications are being withheld. Recently I calculated the mortality rate within ten countries using the official figures. I see very little difference in the rate whether a country has vaccinated a lot, or a little, of their population. As mentioned above, the U.S. has the worst rate of those I checked. I invite you to check a few more. Post your results in the comments to this post.
So here we are, the good news is we’re facing a very beatable challenge. The bad news is we’re being misled into believing it’s much more virulent than it is and that it is an all but unbeatable challenge. The draconian measures being put forward by those in positions of political power like being (figuratively) asked to cut off our limbs as a precaution, and we’re doing it. This is much more related to the power of the press than the reality of COVID.
The Noble Failure is a character in American politics which has been showing up with increasing frequency. The Noble Failure knows what people want. When campaigning for office, the Noble Failure speaks to the needs and wants of the people, and does so convincingly. The Noble Failure will emote, inspire, speak of noble aspirations and a better, fairer, more equitable world. People will be led to believe if only they can get the Noble Failure elected, things will improve. The thing is, that is all just part of the show, the main attraction. It is intended to draw voters, and the reality of Presidential elections last few decades show it works. Why wouldn’t it? People aren’t going to vote for what they don’t want to hear.
However, the promises are never, not from day one, meant to actually be fulfilled once the Noble Failure is elected. Once in office the excuses are pulled out of the closet. “The Legislature won’t get on board.” “The projects can’t be funded.” “We need to first increase the military budget.” “It’s not a good idea to increase the national debt.” “We need to infuse cash into our big corporations to compete internationally.” “It’s the damn ________________ (Democrats/Republicans, liberals/conservatives).” “We need focus our energies on attacking _______________ (fill in the blank).” Or, maybe, the new standard: “It would be a socialist program.”
So, the Noble Failure puts forward the face of grief, of sorrow, maybe even of having been betrayed. They bemoan the inability of others in power to appreciate the vision they sold to the American public. They may villainize those identified as obstacles to their stated campaign goals. This is the 21st century American Presidential/political reality. It didn’t begin in the 21st century, but it’s the only one we’ve had since the turn of the century. It’s the contemporary script: align your stated goals with what the people want and need. Make a few gestures toward fulfillment, then blame someone else for the failure to produce. Repeat in the next election cycle. The only people who don’t get excuses after the election are the 1/10th of 1%’ers who always come out ahead. Sometimes more than others, but the national wealth, the wealth resulting from the work of millions of people, just keeps flowing into their bank accounts. Policies keep coming which support their goals.
At the end of the day, the key players attend their private clubs, extravagant parties, concerts, events, have a few drinks and pat each other on the back. Maybe arrange to give each other official accolades and medals. Or, quite possibly engage in some dark rituals or forms of entertainment. A troupe of Machiavellian actors showing up for the after show reception.
It was the script from the beginning of the campaign, as it has been for several decades. It’s one reason why, from the perspective of the Noble Failures and their cronies, control of the White House, and the Legislature, cannot be allowed to slip from the control of a small circle of “their” people. They have been exercising an increasingly pervasive control that has been jealously guarded since 1963.
What does the general population get from all this? Frustration, disenfranchisement, increasing debt and poverty. One thing we can see from all this is that when the majority are not able to see the issues that are negatively affecting their lives addressed at the source, people will turn on each other. Like an animal caught in a trap. The animal can’t open the trap, so in order to escape, it chews it’s own leg off. “We the People” turn on each other, divide and be conquered. And those who occupy the seats of power and control the monopolized media are all too ready to throw some fuel onto those fires.
The difference between us and an animal caught in a steel trap is we that have minds capable of finding better solutions. We need to stop inadvertently, or as “wannabes”, cooperating with corruption, the disease, that is destroying the dream of a society that can work for all. Quit turning on each other. Quit buying into the incessant fear mongering dispensed to keep us distracted and paralyzed. Treat each other right; personally, economically, and in every way. Not just within the United States, also internationally. Create a culture that doesn’t have to kill and conquer in a misguided attempt at creating international “cooperation”. Create a culture that others want to emulate because it works and works well. Create a culture with the organizing principle of human wellbeing, reflecting our mutuality rather than fear and greed. Stop blindly following, believing in, the proclamations of those whose goal it is to keep us distracted, disorganized, fearful, and subservient.
Circulation. Everything that keeps humanity alive circulates. From what we know at this time, it seems that everything that supports life in the entire universe, circulates. What happens when circulation is hampered? Stagnation, toxicity, starvation, illness, death. Without the proper circulation of the blood within our bodies, our cells will begin dying from starvation of oxygen and life supporting nutrients. Then our body as a whole will die. Without the circulation of the air and water upon our planet, our planet will lose it’s ability to sustain life. Within our cells, if the processes of life, of replenishment of nutrients and the disposal of waste were to stop, the circulation of the materials which sustain our bodies, the cell will die. On every level, from the microcosm to the macrocosm, circulation is an absolutely essential feature of the maintenance of life. Quite possibly of the existence of the universe itself.
Turn on the circulation of electricity through a light bulb and the light comes alive. Turn off that circulation and the light goes dark, dead. That same principle applies for the circulation of every life giving, life sustaining substance that there is and the existence of human life on Earth.
The awareness of this inescapable truth within the natural world leads one to ask whether this same principle applies to the realm of human creations? For those versed in metaphysics, it calls to question whether the axiom “As above so below; as below so above.” applies to the essential nature of the circulation of life sustaining resources. First, we must define what is a human, rather than a nature, created resource which is essential to the sustaining of life in the world? To the very best of my knowledge, there is only one: money.
This may be argued by some. Some may present that a person living simply off the land (first you must have land) which is blessed with the resources of water and temperate climate suitable for agriculture, can live quite nicely. In fact, there still are a few primitive tribes which live in such a fashion. Of course that means doing without all the conveniences and the assistance which modern technology and medicine offer. While I tend toward the simplification of life as a general proposition, there are limits beyond which I find myself reticent to venture. I like a number of the medical and technical benefits we receive from our collective human ingenuity. In fact, without some of those, it is a salient question whether or not I would still be alive in my current incarnation. Certainly I would not be writing this essay on a computer.
The reality for the vast majority of people alive on Earth today, is that money is an essential resource for the sustaining of life. Of course this is made a truth by the systems of commerce we have constructed within our societies. We have made money an intermediary, a regulating agent, between us and the, more or less, natural resources we inescapably require. Resources such as food, shelter, fuel and even water. I am quite sure that there are people, at this very moment, trying to figure out how to make us pay for air. While, in our modern world, there is often human effort required in the manufacture of what in earlier times were more purely naturally occurring resources, the fact is, ALL material substance comes to us via the beneficence of the creative forces of the universe. Humankind can manipulate these naturally provided resources to better suit the needs, or wants, of any or all of us, but the raw materials, the substances required, are all provided, free of charge, by the creative forces, the creative intelligence, underlying and within everything we see and are.
All the resources, all the life sustaining substances we rely upon are in circulation within the universe we exist within. All of them. From the most fleeting to what we perceive as the most stable, the most solid. Everything, including planets, stars and galaxies, is in circulation. Everything material comes into being, exists for however long it exists, and then ultimately is recycled back into the primordial stuff from which it emerged.
The rate of circulation conducive to the healthfulness of various substances under different conditions can vary. “Healthfulness” being relative to human life. Why would we measure it in any other terms? For instance, water, when frozen for centuries, can still retain the healthful qualities necessary and conducive to human life. However, if water sits for much less time, relatively motionless, within a pond or a puddle, it is most likely going to be stagnant. Stagnant, anaerobic, and possibly/probably containing substances toxic to human life. For us humans, the value of natural resources exists primarily in the value of that resource in sustaining our own lives.
That being said, how we manage that resource can depend a great deal upon how well we understand the interrelatedness of the world, the universe around us. For instance, to primitive humans the value of trees may have been exclusively their usefulness in building structures and making fires. Later we came to understand that trees and other plants are responsible for producing the oxygen we require for life. Now, a living tree has value where previously it’s value was realized only after it was chopped down. The value we place upon the resources, the “things” that exist around us, is dependent upon how well we understand the function of those things in relation to the interdependent web of existence, of which we are a part.This reality of how we place value extends to every person being born on Earth. We have no idea, no matter how inauspicious the circumstances of their birth may be, what contributions a person, newborn or elderly, may make to our communities and to our lives. It is a fault which surfaces frequently with us humans that we tend to judge the value of a thing, or a person, using the particular criteria the society we live within espouses. Often, if not always, in the greater scheme of things, that criteria is liable to be narrowly defined and hampered by lack of awareness of the interconnected realities a particular society does not yet recognize.
Which brings us back to essential circulation, resources, and the essential human-conceived resource; money. While the concept and reality of money is a human thing, the fact that money, in it’s practical application, has to do with the acquisition of the natural resources one needs to live, makes money, by extension, a critical aspect of life on Earth. The excessive withholding, hoarding, of money from circulation within communities, among citizens, has every bit the stagnating and/or deleterious effect upon life as would the withholding of the air or water from circulation upon the Earth. This is a lesson we must learn from our own bodies. We need enough. Too little, or too much, leads to unhealthful conditions within the body.
The viable management of all resources, including money, is a task which is all too easily sabotaged by the human ego. The challenge we all face is the cultivation of true humility, to recognize one’s genuine place, and role, within community. None of us are “all that”. And none of us are nothing. We exist as components within a spiritual/organic system. We are all dependent upon that system. For any of us to think we can co-opt the balance, the viability of the system for our own purposes is a symptom of a spiritual/mental illness within that individual. When we learn to act within a spirit of love, in our contributing to and taking from the collective wealth which has been developed by collective effort, we will find ourselves facing a present, and a future, wondrous enough to meet, and exceed, our most cherished expectations.
In Washington State a State Senator recently bemoaned the ongoing nature of the special emergency powers ceded by the Legislature to Governor Inslee. This is a very important, very timely issue. It appears that on both the Federal and the State level, Chief Executives have gotten way too comfortable with a unilateral decision making ability. It is time we restored the democratic republic to the form it was intended to be. Would we be experiencing, suffering from, the ongoing oppressive mandates, nominally justified by the, again, nominal Covid pandemic, if the experiences and the wisdom of the people were indeed being followed by a representative government? I don’t think so. The fact is a relative few people have experienced the kind of devastating illness potentially resulting from Covid that the media persists in broadcasting as if it were the reality in every house next door.
This is not to trivialize the suffering of those who have been the hardest hit by the virus, but that being said, we cannot continue to react to the experiences of an extreme minority as if that is the reality for all. While giving such minority experiences the time and attention they deserve, it is not wise governance to base the parameters of the functioning of the entire society upon the abilities or vulnerabilities of the most vulnerable among us.
If the vast majority of Americans took inventory of their own first-hand reality and urged our State and Federal legislators to either enforce, or lift, the harsh mandates based on that inventory, mandates which have led to many citizens losing their jobs, incomes, mental health, physical health or even their lives, we would have seen the mandates lifted months ago, for good. If we would have ever seen them imposed in the first place. I tend to think we may have opted for the initial “flattening the curve” 2-3 weeks, but not the ongoing, oppressive marathon we have experienced.
But that is not the reality we are facing. When it comes to the Covid mandates, we are not being governed by a representative body. We are being dictated to by an authoritarian few, often in an arbitrary manner with only the sketchiest, if any, actual evidence to support their dictates.
It is past time for us to insist upon the reassertion of a genuinely representative government.
One of the biggest problems facing humanity is the problem of electrical energy. As shown in the documentary “Planet of the Humans”, the much touted solutions of solar and wind energy, in the final analysis, require the expenditure of as much fossil fuel to create the equipment and subsidize them when they cannot adequately produce due to weather conditions, as if fossil fuel were just in place without them. And as for the so-called “Green Energy”, it is just a horribly misguided idea which involves massive deforestation. However, it must be noted that the only solutions big energy evidently wants to look at are the solutions which include keeping massive energy grids in place. The big energy corporations do not want solutions which would change the system to smaller grids, local companies, and/or house by house production.
Our current reality seems to be that big corporations, including energy companies, have become intoxicated with and addicted to wealth and control We cannot look to them for leadership in eco-friendly, human-friendly solutions to the world’s problems. Two solutions I know of, and I am not at all the most knowledgeable person about the myriad possible solutions that actually exist, are the (extensively documented) machine developed by Joseph Newman, and an invention by K.R. Sridhar I read about years ago which involved no moving parts but uses a chemical action to produce a significant amount energy. This system uses a unit the size of a microwave, or smaller, to produce enough continual energy to power a house. And there are other options which I’ have heard or read bits and pieces of here and there.
The thing is, these solutions would take much of the business away from the big energy producers we’ve grown accustomed to and place it right in the home being powered. These solutions hold the promise of being ecologically friendly and freeing people from exorbitant energy bills. So of course big energy doesn’t want us to adopt such solutions. And, interestingly, we don’t hear much about them unless we go digging.
The issue of energy production is just one arena in which a problem which is pervasive across many industries is coming to the fore. How do we manage an economy in which technological advances are continually decreasing the workforce needed for factory production and other jobs previously occupied by humans? People still need homes, food, education, etc. And, we need to feel that we are contributing to our communities, our collective wellbeing. It’s part of our reality as social beings.
We need to be actively involved in developing solutions to these challenges. I submit one aspect of the solutions will necessarily involve wealth being less concentrated in the hands of a few and more equitably spread across the whole of the population. I believe such system will incorporate some aspects of most, if not all, economic systems attempted in the past. Primarily, we need to be looking for answers that work for us as a species, as a whole and which take the entirety of our being, our make-up into consideration. Abraham Maslow gives us a solid foundation from which to expand our thinking.
Why do I use Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs so often in my articles? Because it informs us of a concept key to a successful life as a person or for a culture.
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