Sincerity – with others and with oneself – is one of the few tools we have for gaining our personal freedom. The value of sincerity is of great importance, now more than ever, as we are surrounded by tales, stories, and gossip, selling us such things as immediate ascension, new ‘light bodies’, cataclysmic futures, and [...]
For many of us, 2012 has felt like it's been a continued test of endurance as aspects of our lives undergo change and challenge. Ever since the financial markets crashed in September 2008, the globalized world of international media has been telling us that we are all in crisis. The banks, we are told, are [...]
Human life upon this planet, it seems, is about to undergo a period of transition that will test our capacity to re-adapt and re-emerge on an unprecedented scale. Perhaps it is time to ask ourselves -- what type of "revolutions" are we set to face on this "small planet" of ours in the days and [...]
There is an old folktale that tells of the wise fool who arrives at the door of the king's castle asking for entry. He is immediately told by the guard that the king's decree is for anyone who tells a lie to be hanged. Then, upon asking for his destination, the wise fool replies, "I [...]
If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you… … Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it (Rudyard Kipling – ‘If’) The above lines - taken from Rudyard Kipling’s poem If - serves to remind us that we have gained the Earth, our sense [...]
The incumbent global financial system is in dire straits and is a behemoth waiting to implode. It is intrinsically unsustainable with its labyrinthine financial agreements and credit swaps. These include mortgage-backed securities, collateralized debt obligations, credit default swaps, predatory lending, derivatives and off-balance sheet financing, etc. The financial system has become an almost impossible marketplace [...]
The world is awash with grand announcements of spiritual rebirth, Armageddon scenarios, and self-help commercialism that are forming a global skin that circumscribes our entire mental world. Political theorist Benjamin Barber has noted that the commercialism behind the global takeover of the mental sphere amounts to a kind of "default totalitarianism." If we are not [...]
'If you never change your mind, why have one?' – Edward de Bono There is a story that is told about a wandering stranger who once stopped a king in the street. Furious, the king shouted, ‘How dare you, a man of little worth, interrupt the progress of your sovereign?’ The stranger answered: ‘Can you [...]
As celebrated thinker Edward de Bono notes: ‘If everyone is going in the same direction, then anyone who is going in a different direction is “wrong”. The other direction might be better – but it is still wrong.’ Such is the powerful pull of social conformity. People cannot be fully trusted to say and do [...]
There is a famous 13th Century Persian poem that tells the story of an old woman whom upon encountering an eagle on her window sill captures it for she has never seen an eagle before. The old woman looks at the strange bird and finally says ‘what a funny-looking pigeon’! She then proceeds to clip [...]
The Argentinean writer Jorge Luis Borges once famously wrote of a great Empire that created a map that was so detailed it was as large as the Empire itself. The actual map itself grew and decayed as the Empire itself conquered or lost territory. When the Empire finally crumbled, all that remained was the map. [...]
The manufacturing of consentis endemic within modern societies. Throughout history, the need to "persuade and influence" has always been manipulated by those people in power as a means to maintain authority and legitimacy. In more recent years, the overall manipulation of the mass public mind has become less about making speeches and more about becoming [...]
