Mass Delusion amidst Mass Disinformation and Fear-Based Distraction

Today, three of us had a very provocative conversation here at this hostel in the middle of nowhere ‘Now Here’ in Portugal; a Portuguese guy, an Argentinian IT worker I’ve come to know in the last week and myself. We talked about how the media uses fear to manipulate people, how Pharma companies have lied about and manipulated the entire world towards feeling fear and guilt about vaccines (along with truths about Covid) and how one very inexpensive and effective cure Ivermectin has been quickly denounced and silenced. We talked about cell phone addictions and ultra materialism….and that many of the political satirists, from George Carlin years ago foreseeing how the government and media are puppets to multinationals who are actually the elite in control. 

The Portuguese guy says that it’s almost the same as an authoritarian dictatorship, except that a tyrannical ruler has a face you can point to and blame, whereas this convoluted machine of money and power driving people to busily occupy themselves with just trying to survive with high costs and who are complacently consuming social media (addictively and incessantly) wind up not really questioning or even being consciously aware of the degree to which they are being controlled.

The NY Times has had one after another super frightening article in the last days, yesterday about Philadelphia being rife with guns and shootings, more than NYC or LA. And today an article about a MASSIVE PERFECT STORM that will at any time hit California. Not earthquakes, droughts or fires, but a brewing mega storm with water building from Hawaii, to the extent of the Mississippi river in the sky…and that when it hits the mountains of CA, it will bring biblical rains. This was in today’s paper. So though it may very well be true, the media does its job of keeping people at a high pitch of fear and dread, because this is an excellent vehicle to control people.

The one guy was saying that George Carlin was so right on…and yet few people are aware enough to even question or seek to know. He and I have seen families, sitting with each parent looking down at their phone while their toddlers are acting out, simply seeking to get attention from a parent who sits there entranced, absent and unavailable to properly give he child attention.

I just made a list of (some) of the political satirists from whom I’ve been enlightened about issues, plus another Brit I hadn’t yet heard of till today, Ricky Gervais. If you haven’t listened to Russel Brand, Bill Maher, Trevor Noah, John Oliver, Jon Stewart, George Carlin, Bill Hicks, Hasan Minhaj…I suggest that you do.

They discuss truths in depth, which mainstream media averts talking about. And the three wealthiest men in the world – Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk and Richard Branson – who each coordinated their rocket launches with their massive carbon footprint and complete audacity to ignore the global warming occurring that is causing the massive droughts, floods, mass extinction, as if they are above it all and act with impunity with absolutely no regard for what is occurring on the earth – rather than using their money and power to instigate massive action to begin to heal the world, they are guilty for soaring mass delusion. 

What can we do about it? It seems not much. Except that the more that people become aware that our financial system is perpetuating our demise – 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0G6obeUKWmw&t=166s – the more that the massive population  – and the industries profiting from misinformation and disinformation – and government officials who are millionaire pawns pocketing their gifts and continuing as if we aren’t in the middle of a disaster of magnanimous proportions – can hold them accountable. But as long as people are sleep walking and bent over looking down at their phones rather than looking up and speaking personally with one another, nothing will change. 

Carol Keiter aka nomadbeatz welcomes donations for her writing, photography, illustrations, eBook and music composition. The PayPal donation button functions in Safari and Firefox, however is broken in Chrome.

Benjamin Zander’s Quiet Performance & Deafening Messages | Life Lessons & Classical Music

If you have ever loved or lost anyone, you will value Benjamin Zander’s TED talk über musik und leidenschaft / about music and passion. It’s an emotionally charged and humorous talk full of wisdom & life lessons, woven into a lecture and performance about classical music.  The talk is in English with German subtitles.

I just listened to Benjamin Zander’s emotionally charged and profound TED talk a second time in the space of a few weeks, and have tears streaming down my face. The first time I felt it was formidable. I realize now, that it’s one of the most profound lectures and performances, packed with humor and life-lessons, that anyone could deliver in 20 minutes.

Benjamin Zander’s emotionally charged and profound TED talk

It is about much, much more than classical music and perhaps should be something that one could turn into a course for a whole semester. I believe that we all could gain very much, listening to his lessons again and again. Wow! There’s so much to contemplate from the nuggets of wisdom that he weaves into it. It’s quite a challenge actually.

Please share it widely.

Sacred Economics by Charles Eisenstein | You’re at Your Best – Doing What You Love

Charles Eisenstein, I discovered through a Facebook group initially, “The More Beautiful World”, that our Hearts Know is Possible.

He created a short film to introduce the concepts of his book, through the direction and production of Ian MacKenzie

Sacred Economics with Charles Eisenstein 2019 remix

Sacred Economics with Charles Eisenstein 2019 remix

“Sacred Economics traces the history of money from ancient gift economies to modern capitalism, revealing how the money system has contributed to alienation, competition, and scarcity, destroyed community, and necessitated endless growth. As we imagine new ways of interacting with one another and with all life on the planet, we may find great opportunity to transition to a more connected, ecological, and sustainable way of being.

Sacred Economics with Charles Eisenstein is a book he wrote.
Here’s where you can learn more about Sacred Economics and purchase the book.

Sacred Economics book with Charles Eisenstein

 

 

 

Why is there a biodiversity crisis? Why are we drilling for more oil?…Many questions that you ask about the world come down after several layers of why, to the answer of money.

You can read the pdf file online, http://sacred-economics.com/read-online/ translated into 12 languages

This new narrative of sacred economics, shifts the individual to following what they inherently love doing and do best, so that rather than feeling incapable of pursuing what they love to do because of the lack of economic support, they are free to do just that. This is why I’ve incorporated the message of Joseph Campbell, a

The writer Joseph Campbell coined the term Follow Your Bliss.

The Power of Myth is the full transcript of 24 hours of interviews by Bill Moyers of Joseph Campbell

Great advice from Joseph Campbell – Follow Your Bliss

“Campbell saw as the greatest human transgression “the sin of inadvertence, of not being alert, not quite awake.”

 

You’re at Your Best – Doing What You Love

 >Make Your Play Your Work, and York Work Your Play<

His introductory short film ‘Sacred Economics with Charles Eisenstein 2019 remix‘, directed by Ian MacKenzie reveals a lot of information about quite a different narrative of perceiving and feeling about the natural world.

Sacred Economics with Charles Eisenstein 2019 remix directed by Ian MacKenzie

Charles Eisenstein’s book Sacred Economics. Is what he’s come to offer to the world as his gift, realizing that by following the truth and what is in our hearts, this concept will really take on a life of its own and spread physically, as more people become aware of it. Like reaching a critical mass, we can adopt it as a new universal way of looking at our world and our place in it. He talks of the money economy that we have been in, as both the source and the symptom, of an old narrative that has had to do with continually wanting and needing to take things that were once free and plentiful in nature and shared between people as gifts, and turned these into goods and services that we then sell back to one another.

Charles talks of the planet as a living being whose organs and tissues are all the natural systems and biomass; of the different natural waterways, forests, coral reefs, watersheds, elephants, bears, wolfs, butterflies and insects are all part of the planet and its health. The health of humanity and all creatures depends on the health and balance of all of these systems of life.

Here’s an interview of Charles Eisenstein by Russell Brand. Video · Climate Change – What’s The Whole Truth? | Russell Brand & Charles Eisenstein

Climate Change What is the Whole Truth Charles Eisenstein interview by Russell Brand

Charles Eisenstein who’s written a book on the subject, says that in the traditional sense, people are reducing all problems of the Earth from an environmental perspective to climate change.

Within it Charles talks of the living earth narrative.

In it Charles mentions that we are not recognizing the earth as a living being, with its tissues and organs equivalents to forests, grasslands, coral reefs, elephants, birds…He mentions that only talking about the environment and carbon output, is reduces the problems to one thing, CO2 levels, and completely ignores all the other different factors that are part of this massive ecocide (mass extinction) by reducing things only to numbers.

Sacred Economics with Charles Eisenstein 2019 remix

Sacred Economics traces the history of money from ancient gift economies to modern capitalism

 

 

Thanks for reading.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Carol Keiter aka nomadbeatz welcomes donations for her writing, photography, illustrations, eBook & music composition

The PayPal donation button functions in Safari and Firefox, however is broken in Chrome.

Joel Sartore photo ark picture and the blogger, Carol Keiter

the Green New Deal Takes Precedency & an AOC Endorsement Takes the Presidency

Turns out that I wrote too hastily before knowing the facts, therefore the initial message of my post was a misinformed hunch. I hadn’t realized that there’s a minimum age limit of 35 years to be president of the United States of America. Therefore, at best, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is campaigning to make sure that the Green New Deal plays a major role on all platforms. And as her popularity sky rockets because of her cleverness, authenticity and passion – as this article in the Guardian stresses – who she endorses will be a major issue for all contenders.

Democrats covet an endorsement from Ocasio-Cortez

This would be the time for Trump to throw out yet another executive order – bypassing laws – to lower the age limit of running for president. 🙂

Get Ready for the Green New Deal as expressed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

We are here to say “No More” “Basta”

As she states in this rally for the Green New Deal at Howard University in Washington D.C.

“We can not allow ourselves to be bullied out of our values, any more. Our history may be written, but our future is not. Cynicism is what the established 1% want you to have. Yet, the average every day person has never been more powerful than it is today. We all need to have these conversations, to elevate our collective consciousness. Big Money has never been weaker.”

Get Ready for the Green New Deal as being a central issue for whomever Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez endorses as a democratic runner for President.

“No More” “Basta”

She says, “We can not allow ourselves to be bullied out of our values, any more. Our history may be written, but our future is not. Cynicism is what the established 1% want you to have, yet the average every day person has never been more powerful than it is today; to have these conversations, to elevate our collective consciousness. Big Money has never been weaker.”

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Green New Deal speech

The Green New Deal campaign rally will convince the American public of the importance of taking care of our relationship to the earth, and to one another, above anything else.

 

Inequality and Earth Injustice ‘No More’

 

I’m all over it! For non-native English speakers that means, I’m full-on 100% aligned and in support of the Green New Deal and everything this beautiful, brave, articulate and erudite woman says. She’s extremely well educated and intelligent. She knows what she’s talking about AND she has the passion and down-to-earth humanity to communicate the feeling that you can trust her. I am so grateful that she is putting massive energy into putting many topics out in front, that have been side-lined or simply taboo to even discuss.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Green New Deal speech

I trust that the American people can listen and be convinced if they are on the fence, and fully embrace what she is saying from the heart about how much industrial and corporate powers have gotten away with at the expense of people who they trampled over. I believe that whoever she endorses, she will be continue to put on the heat and emphasize diplomatically to the world what needs to be on every leader’s table.

Ocasio-Cortez blows roof off building with EPIC speech

And it could be this heroic woman will actually, despite perhaps fear, reticence and reluctance at first, lead all of us to actually participate in saving our planet and as many species as we can.

I stand by her. I’ve been impressed with every speech. Therefore her campaign for the Green New Deal will certainly require anyone who she endorses, to be someone who will completely support it and promise to lead the public to make the dramatic changes that we need to make across the world, to save as many life forms of the planet from extinction and ourselves, and to change the course of the mainstream consciousness.

Just as with the actions and presence of Greta Thunberg, the Swedish girl who started the school strikes to end her governments and the world’s silence about global warming and extinction, I feel very hopeful that AOC has taken the world stage!

We Can do this, We Must do this Together and We Can Have a Great Time As We Make the Changes Together

> Learning, Creating, Inspiring and Conspiring <

Corporate Greed and Corpocrisy No More

Carol Keiter aka nomadbeatz welcomes donations for her writing, photography, illustrations, eBook & music composition

The PayPal donation button functions in Safari and Firefox, however is broken in Chrome.

Carol Keiter the blogger

Let’s Act Differently-Embrace All Life-Change Habits-Incite Responsibility-Share Incentives

I am sending this letter today, right now, to one after another individual and group on the list included at the bottom. Talk about complete transparency. I want each to realize who all the recipients are, so that they may also add to the list. I need a job, and this is what comes to mind; gathering many to coordinate education at the grass roots level, that all of us can participate in.

I’d like to work with you in starting a global, grass-roots educational campaign – coordinated between all – re: ecological emergency; informing and inspiring public response to changing habits and actions.

Hi, 

I would like to work with you towards shifting peoples’ perceptions from complacency to fully recognizing how their actions and habits make an impact on their immediate surroundings and cumulatively affect climate change. Offering education and incentives that people can relate to, to guide them to think and act differently. An edutainment campaign which reaches to the public to give them a voice, through asking them to participate in providing ideas, questions, answers and listening to their responses. The idea, that by allowing people to engage and participate, they will feel more connected, more empowered and motivated, more responsible, and feel excited and involved as they watch how their messages like waves, ripple to bring other people together. 

I don’t believe anything can happen unless everyone is involved. That’s why I’m writing to each of the (individuals and organizations) resources of information I’ve valued and whose messages I’ve shared. Altogether about 40 at the moment. In fact, I’ve just decided to include the entire list of who I’m writing to, so that each of you can fill in and add some more people or groups to the list; who may in fact be more pivotal and effective in initiating this. I’m a female American who loves to write, draw portraits, paint trees and landscapes, play piano and bass guitar, and use computer music programs to compose electronic music. My compositions often incorporate the sounds of different creatures: whales, dolphins, penguins, insects and birds, so far.

I am ready right now (as I will probably have no housing nor money to pay rent in a matter of weeks and am able and willing to relocate virtually anywhere on the planet) to join a movement that coordinates education to raise awareness and offer guidelines towards immediate action. I believe that by working together, across individual and organizational boundaries, across disciplines, that we could engage the public to respond, as if life on our planet depended on it. Well, because it does. Complacency or lack of information has no place. Leaders and polluters will not inform. Therefore, though the odds may be dramatically against us (comfort over change), we could nevertheless try to inspire a movement of actions from the ground up, for each of us to collectively change some habits, that may actually gather so much momentum that people will start to care about what BIG energy hogs and polluters are doing, and BEGIN to speak out to them. New habits are difficult to start, but if everyone starts to really engage because the same messages are rippling out to the public globally by a team of people who are echoing what you and your collaborators have improvised, there is no telling how a critical mass of people with awareness and action and their heart into it, may start to make this grass roots message really move. 

The idea is to instigate people to re-define their relationship to the planet and its life forms and inspire them to re-imagine a dramatically different relationship to all of life, in which humans act responsibly as guardians to the plants and creatures with whom we share the planet. Messages which convey the realization that our greatest treasure is the life that surrounds us, supports us and delights us on earth; containing inspirational guidelines as to how we can change our habits, to live in harmony with other life forms and feel their value; the natural cycles, beauty of flora and fauna and fertility of the earth. You could say I’m an idealist. 

I’m primarily concerned with the loss of well, everything, all life with which we could live in harmony. Defenseless species of plants and animals lose habitats through the encroachment of humans, their residual noise, air and water pollution, chemical poisoning and the formidable elephant in the room, global warming, for which human behavior and industry are responsible. A trend which could collapse all systems on earth that have sustained life as we have known it. Given, Americans are the biggest energy abusers, without recognizing their contribution through the demands they put on having ease and comfort. By its nature, the capitalist formula is based on ever increasing profits, measuring success through the GDP, without factoring whatsoever, the health and well-being of all systems on the planet. This perception and motif has been perpetuated through the mendacity of those wishing to uphold it, in their allegiance to profit. We could actually shift our awareness to valuing deeply every single species as part of the labyrinth of life on this planet which we share. Effectually shifting from the notion of primacy of humans, to one valuing and being guardians to the sovereignty of all life. 

I speak conversational German, French and Spanish, pretty close to fluent. I love to communicate. I’m presently available to relocate anywhere. I live minimally, acquire a bicycle wherever I live, have no dependents and am healthy, strong and resilient. I gained new perspectives quite different from how I was brought up in central Pennsylvania, though I’ve gathered quite different perceptions of the world through having lived in a variety of quite alternative communities (New York city, Washington D.C., Taos, New Mexico, San Francisco, California, Berlin, Germany where I lived for 7 years altogether, Paris and Montpellier, France where I lived last year for 7 months. I’m adaptable. I’m also a person who has all my life been able to walk up to strangers, approach people and begin conversations. There are plenty of other people who with the incentive to save the planet, would be happy to do the same. I have a strong appetite of curiosity and creative drive to communicate. I have to admit that many of my blogs and music need to be more concise to be more easily approachable. I’m working on delivering more elegant and simple message. I also think vlogs are the way to go, more powerful and compelling, with images and music for people who don’t have the time or patience to read.

My dream is that outspoken individuals and organizations like yourself would actually stretch across each of their own boundaries and work together to create a resoundingly clear and transparent message and movement. A message that moves people emotionally to act, because of how overwhelmingly obvious and compelling it is. And a message that is spread through teams of people who go out into the streets to talk with people and collect information from the public. Messages that are informative, humorous, and elicit community participation. I can help you to create this message, I can’t do it on my own. We can do it together.

Below are links to my blogs, music and book trailer. I am in search of the best fit.

I came upon this quote when I was writing an article in 2003 which I just re-located on my HD. This from an Adbusters article in March-April 2003 Issue, “our first problem is one of denial. (and that) our crisis is not fundamentally one of technology, but one of the mind, will and spirit.” The author wrote that our ” denial must be met with a world-wide ‘perestroika’, predicated on the admission of failure: the failure of economics, which became disconnected from life; the failure of our politics, which lost sight or the moral roots of our commonwealth; the failure of science, which lost sight of the essential wholeness of things; and the failure of all of us as moral beings, who allowed these things to happen because we did not love deeply and intelligently enough.”  

With heart, intuition and intent,

Carol Keiter

carolkeiter@gmail.com

(720) 243-2953

skype:  carol_keiter

social networks:

http://www.facebook.com/carol.keiter

http://carolkeiter.tumblr.com

résumé:

http://carolkeiter.wordpress.com/2010/12/24/curriculum-vitae-portfolio

portfolio:

http://carolkeiter.wordpress.com/2010/11/23/parcel-of-my-portfolio

blogs:

http://carolkeiter.wordpress.com/

https://digesthis.wordpress.com/

I searched under the themes of environment and happiness in each of my blogs, which resulted in several pages in each consolidating articles on these subjects. 

https://digesthis.wordpress.com/?s=environment

https://carolkeiter.wordpress.com/?s=environment

https://digesthis.wordpress.com/?s=Happiness

https://carolkeiter.wordpress.com/?s=happiness

ebook A Seahorse Tail trailer:

https://carolkeiter.wordpress.com/2013/05/23/educational-ebook-trailer-a-seahorse-tale-a-spin-on-the-matter-of-motion/

music:

https://soundcloud.com/more_nomadbeatz/sets

https://www.reverbnation.com/nomadbeatz

http://www.myspace.com/nomadbeatz

podcast:

https://deliciousmedicinalfood.wordpress.com

Recipients as of August 24^th 2018:  

Alternatiba
Avaaz
Beautiful Solutions Lab
Bill Maher
Bill McKibben 350.org
Brian Thomas Swimme – Center for the Story of the Universe
Center for Biological Diversity
Charles Eisenstein – The More Beautiful World
Climate Warriors
Collective Evolution
Dalai Lama
Daniel Pinchbeck – 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl
David Wolfe – Environmental Defense Fund
Defenders of Wildlife
Democracy Collaborative
Democracy Now Amy Goodman
DJ Spooky – That Subliminal Kid
Earth Guardians
Earthling Ed
Elon Musk
Gabor Maté
Gar Alperovitz – Democracy Collaborative
George Monbiot
Global Climate Action – Climate Network
Greenpeace
Interfaith Power and Light
International Animal Rescue
James Gustave Speth – World Resources Institute WRI
Jeremy Narby – Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge
Joe Brewer
Jon Stuart
Michael Moore
Naomi Klein
National Geographic
National Resource Defense Council – NRDC
Next System Project
Noam Chomsky
PlaceToB – Paris COP21
Pope
Prince Ea
Rob Brezsny
Russell Brand
Save Animals From Extinction
Stephen Colbert
Trevor Noah
Vandava Shiva
WildEarth Guardians
WWF – Nikhil Advani – WWF Lead Specialist, Climate, Communities and Wildlife

The Eloquently and Elegantly stated Truth

Nothing is more important than reading this. And then reading it again.

The most elegant and eloquent presentation of the facts, that anyone who can understand words, must be persuaded to hear and respond to emotionally and intuitively as the truth.

I have merely copied and pasted the text of this writing within the link below (minus the original links within it), feeling it to be the utterly most important statement of vast insight, that everyone must read. And continue to talk.

-.—.—-.—–.——.-.—.—-.—–.——.-.—.—-.—–.——.-.—.—-.—–.—-.-.—.–.-

http://www.grenzbegriff.com/2017/10/leaving.html

 

these are my words at the time of writing — I am more like tree than rock — as I bend to reach the sunlight

Wednesday, October 25, 2017

Leaving

Hi friends,

I’m leaving Google at the end of next week.

There’s too much I want to say.  🙂

I spent the summer away from work, outdoors in Oregon, awash in beauty.  I learned a lot.  I wept at how we’re treating the earth, as I rode past mile after mile of logged forests, polluted streams, and lifeless monocrop fields.

I got to be part of what I’ll call “alternative culture”, to explore ways of meeting all of our human needs through local community alternatives to basically everything we currently use money for.  I wrote some about this time here on this blog.  I barely scratched the surface though.  More and more people, perhaps millions now even in the West, are devoting their lives to new (and sometimes ancient) ways of living in healthy relationship with each other and with the earth.  While they are usually partly within the current system, when all of these new ways of living come together, the current system becomes obsolete.  I see joyous glimpses of this everywhere.

Meanwhile our dominant civilization is killing its own foundation: the healthy web of life on earth.  Through deforestation and pollution we are destroying the ability of the planet to support all forms of life.  We can see this in the oceans where the fish populations are collapsing, the silent fields that were once thriving forests, and the deserts where millions of people go hungry in drought.  This ecological crisis can’t be solved simply by swapping oil for solar panels.  I’m no longer optimistic that we will soon fix these problems with some new technology.  It’s quite possible that climate change is exacerbating the storms and droughts and fires, and that these will continue to become more severe in the next years.

The effects are not evenly distributed.  The unhoused breathe wildfire smoke while many of the housed have filtered air.  Some of us see our homes flooded or burnt while for others business continues as usual.  Most communities in the country and increasingly in the world have lost the ability to sustain themselves from their land, and now must import almost everything they need from elsewhere, which becomes precarious when those importing the goods see no profit in it (food deserts), or when disaster breaks down the supply line like in Puerto Rico.  Many communities no longer have access to clean water, or are losing it as I write.  On Monday I listened to a man from Guatemala talk about a new silver mine near his home that is polluting and drying up the water supply for many villages there.  Almost all silver is used to produce electronics, and demand is rising.  In Oregon this summer, ancient trees thousands of years old were cleared for fire breaks.  The entire planet is being saturated with chemicals that we ought never to have created.  These kinds of damage cannot be undone or fixed by technology.  The story for other species is even worse, as most wild animal populations have died off and we pack billions of animals in cages in horrific factory farms.  The coral reefs, the rhinos, the ancient forests, the whales, and even the insects… who speaks for them?  Some people do, and they end up in jail if their actions threaten profits.  Profits are made at the expense of Life.

And within our civilization, we have more prisoners and refugees, more drugs and anxiety and depression and stress and addiction than ever.  Even in wealthy regions, most people don’t like the work they do all day.  It’s also not physically healthy to be indoors or using a computer or riding in vehicles for as many hours as many of us who are “successful” do.  What is happening to us?

It seems the leaders of our world are apathetic or powerless, as they fight over the most gaudy deck chairs on this titanic.  While it pains me, I don’t hate them for this; their actions are the product of a traumatic history that touches all of us.  They don’t know what they’re doing.

I envision a more beautiful world where humans have a healthy part to play, to love and respect the earth, not to dominate and exploit it.  I see many people living that vision already, and want to live my life in service to it.  I see the extremes of both ugliness and beauty grow more stark.  Ugliness as we close down and protect ourselves from the ‘other’, beauty as we come together in community, in love with mother earth.  Will “society” as a whole make some kind of transition, or continue the march into dystopia and eventual chaos?  I don’t know.  It will be both at the same time.  Some people are already in an obvious dystopia, some are in a beautiful place yet in the shadow of a collapsing ecosystem.  To hope for a peaceful transition would be to ignore the incredible violence on which the current system lives.  It will be violent because it already is.  May we learn to be kind to each other as these changes unfold.

It’s been said that we need the darkness to see the stars.  We can open ourselves to what is happening, feel and honor our pain, grieve what is lost, and revel in our deep gratitude for the beauty of life.  I don’t mean to be a downer pointing at all this ugliness.  I feel that we have a deep need to see it and acknowledge it.  It makes the beauty that much more precious and worth living for.

“Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
With your one wild and precious life?”
-Mary Oliver

What should we do then?

I don’t know exactly what we should do.  I don’t have a rational “here’s what everyone needs to do” that will resolve all of these crises.  I want to let go of my need to control what happens, because I’m really not in control.  At the same time, even if I let go and accept whatever comes, I am a human being and it is natural for me to care and want to help, to serve what I love.  I will not deny that part of me either.  So I find myself thinking about how to help, even if it seems “hopeless” overall.  I need not stress about the outcomes, but I will still act.  What else would I do with my few short years here?

So what might I do to be practical?

I don’t believe our technology is serving us well.  We, the wealthy humans near the top of the power hierarchy may see it as indispensable, but if we consider the animals or the fish or the trees or the laborers in the sweatshops and mines and plantations, it’s not working out so well.  Yes, our technology relieves some suffering in some places, but at what cost?  We simply do not, and probably cannot, count the costs of development.  I am not enthusiastic that further technological progress will heal us.

I also don’t believe that our problems are mostly due to money being in the wrong hands.  Measuring everything by monetary value seems to me one of the roots of the crises.  The mentality that values money over life drives much of the pollution and resource extraction and oppression around the world, since humans first accumulated “property” and enslaved each other.  I don’t feel that getting as much money as I can and giving it to the non-profit side of the system is the best way for me to serve what I love.  I feel that the money abstraction and the distance it puts between us and the effects of our actions makes us feel disconnected and alone.

I also don’t like our culture’s valuing of measurable impact over everything else.  Much of what is precious to me cannot be measured.  What’s the measurable value of a 5000 year old yew tree?  What’s the measurable value of caring for a disabled child?

“May what I do flow from me like a river
no forcing
and no holding back
the way it is with children.”
-Rilke

So I don’t know what we all should do exactly, and I don’t know what I will do beyond the short term.  I’m skeptical of money and the dominant culture’s value system.  I want to trust what makes me feel alive over our culture’s normal stories that usually are rooted in fear.  I recognize that I’m one of the most privileged people in the world.  I know most people do not have the options that I have.  I don’t mean to judge, only to encourage.

Right now what’s happening is I’ve been living in a homeless protest encampment in Berkeley the last couple months, which has given me still another perspective on our society.  It got interesting this weekend and we’re fighting eviction, hoping to benefit and inspire homeless communities around the country.  With all of the disaster and war refugees today, and housing crises in many places, there are more and more people who can’t have regular housing, and we could learn to live together with more kindness and understanding.  I’m also involved with the community here in other ways like Food Not Bombs.  I expect soon I’ll be moving on to other places, to learn and to live in service to what I love.  To restore soil and help plants grow and be community.

I’ve learned I don’t need much money to live well myself, so I don’t need to earn it for myself.  Perhaps my perspective on money and impact will change and I’ll eventually decide that earning money and supporting my many friends who don’t have much money in their various causes is the best way to contribute, and then I might return to a job, but we’ll see.  “It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.”

Wherever I am, I’ll be with some kind of community learning how to live in healthier relationship with each other and with the earth.  There’ll be dark moments and joyous moments, and this is life.  Life is good.  Whatever comes, I will give attention to the beauty around me, the beauty of community and of nature and of every form.  Beauty everywhere begs our attention.

“An eye is meant to see things.
The soul is here for its own joy.

A head has one use: For loving a true love.
Feet: To chase after.

Rumi quote Spirit Mind

carol the blogger on her return hitch from Taos, New Mexico to Santa Fe. One side of my sign said Santa Fe, the other, Fanta Se

Band of Sisters | Universe Story | Ecotheology

A few weeks ago, I decided to do an impromptu viewing of a documentary film, presented as part of a colloquium course at a local college. I attended the screening of the Band of Sisters made by Mary Fishman, who was there in person to answer questions from the audience following the film.

Remarkable Journey of Catholic Nuns in the USA Band of Sisters

I wasn’t persuaded to go for religious reasons, but for educational ones. I learned that some Catholic nuns in the United States have been doing actions that have been really bucking the system. They’ve rolled up their sleeves and dealt directly with some populations that some find unsavory. This has caused some self-proclaimed religious people to shudder. The nuns have literally had to go through a lot of obstacles – including the Church itself – to accomplish what they’ve been doing. They’ve been welcomed with opened arms by the populations on the fringes of society whom they’ve been helping and healing; including gays, lesbians, the impoverished and the imprisoned.

What caused me to almost fall out of my chair and/or jump for joy in my amazement and applause, was one of the subjects brought up in the film, the Universe Story. A completely divergent way of viewing ‘creation’, the Universe Story extends beyond the dogmas that have been consecrated for thousands of years about how the Earth and Man were created. All the doctrines dictated by the Vatican and most churches in general, have held to the same track. This rather disparate point of view percolating among some of the nuns and other theological figures, was explored in the film. It is so off the beaten track. It’s not embracing the image of heaven and hell, with earth in between…but extending out to the entire cosmos – basically stating that from the earth, to man and woman to the ladybug, we are all part of the same atomic structure and ALL PART OF THE SAME FABRIC.

“The Universe Story” by Brian Swimme & Thomas Berry unites science and the humanities in a dramatic exploration of the unfolding of the universe, humanity’s evolving place in the cosmos and the boundless possibilities for our future.

The Universe Story or The Cosmic story are interchangeable titles describing the same concept of The New Story. This video link is narrated by Brian Swimme, the co author of The Universe Story. Swim states that “We have discovered such a tremendous amount of knowledge about the universe in the last 100 years; more than we have known during the entire history of human development. Our way forward, is to begin to formulate a new story, so that we can live in a way that is coherent with our universe as we have come to know it.”

Thomas Berry was a Catholic priest, cultural historian and ecotheologian, who called himself an ‘Earth Scholar’. In terms of ecospirituality, he proposed that a deep understanding of the history and functioning of the evolving universe is a necessary inspiration and guide for our own effective functioning as individuals and as a species.

The life and work of Thomas Berry was predicated on the conviction that human spiritual development is moved by the same universal laws as material development. The author Michael Colebrook describes two key elements in Thomas Berry’s thinking: “Firstly, the primary status of the universe. Secondly, the significance of the Universe Story’. The universe story is the quintessence of reality. We perceive the story. We put it in our language, the birds put it in theirs, we can read the story of the universe in the trees. Everything tells the story of the universe. The winds tell the story, literally, not just imaginatively. The story has its imprint everywhere, and that is why it is so important to know the story. If you do not know the story, in a sense you do not know yourself; you do not know anything.

Ecological Buddhism, Buddhist, Global Warming

Berry is considered a leader in the tradition of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin who abandoned literal interpretations of creation in the Book of Genesis in favor of allegorical and theological interpretations.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was a Jesuit priest and paleontologist who worked to understand evolution and faith. He was born May 1, 1881, and died on April 10, 1955. Teilhard fully participated in a life that included priesthood, living and working in the front lines of war, field work exploring the early origins of the human race and adventurous travels of discovery in the backlands of China. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin also participated fully in an intellectual life through the development of his imaginative, mystical writings on the evolutionary nature of the world and the cosmos.

His writings were rejected by ecclesiastical authorities. In his thinking and writing, Teilhard studied the intimate relationship between the evolutionary development of the material and the spiritual world, leading him to celebrate the sacredness of matter infused with the Divine presence.

I had written about some of Chardin’s quotes in a former blog https://carolkeiter.wordpress.com/2013/06/05/eureka-p-i-e-r-r-e-t-e-i-l-h-a-r-d-de-c-h-a-r-d-i-n-spiritual-beings-having-a-human-experience/

Spiritual Beings having a Human Experience Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

As a tree-hugger and environmental activist who believes in the rights to life (not talking anti-abortion) of all of the inhabitants of creation and their habitats, this struck a chord with my own devotion to nature and spiritual ecology. It was such a eureka moment, that…I had to blog about it.

When I learned of this movement rumbling among some of the Sisters that is completely askew from the top-down creation story I wondered if this is being met with resistance from within the Vatican walls. I can’t imagine that it would not be turning the church with its entrenched belief systems, on their head.

Though introduced to Christianity and raised attending Lutheran church services during my upbringing, I can solidly say that I’m not a religious person. I am however very spiritual. huh? How can that be? Well, I feel the Buddhist mentality and hear the Native American beliefs; that the intelligence of the universe can be seen and felt EVERYWHERE. As Deepak Chopra and Oprah Winfrey are illuminating to the public currently through their online meditation workshop – the divine is within. It is reachable if you only shut up and listen. uh, Sorry, what I mean to say more politely is: if you tune out the fear, the ‘what if’s’ and tune in to the recognition that life is this incredible miracle that is all around us and within us and realize that there is an intelligence in our cells which keep our bodies functioning, and that you can find ‘divine guidance’ through seeing and recognizing this and trusting that this intelligence can and does also pour through you! You can find it in all sorts of synchronicities that guide you, if you simply listen. The incredible intelligence that is happening within our bodies, in the cooperation of trillions of cells, in the patterns of weather, in the movements of the planets, the formation of the earth, of life, of the cosmos and the coordination of everything happening at the cellular and sub-atomic levels IS PERFECTION. It is HEAVEN on EARTH and well, HELL is what mankind stirs up through somehow missing the point and disregarding the fact that Nature, in all that it manifests, IS the Supreme INTELLIGENCE that is inside your fingernail, in the clump of soil that you pick up with your fingers from the dirt. It’s about re cognizing and ap prehending that there’s a reason that science and technology has mimicked nature, it is because it’s already the perfect, inspirational and fabulous design.

Where has humanity gone wrong? Perhaps it’s somehow inseparable from those nasty 5 letter words that drive wedges between people and create antipathy and competition instead of empathy and cooperation

 

p   o   w   e   r   |   m   o   n   e   y   |   g   r   e   e   d

(MTR) Museum of Television and Radio nYc poster : Two five-letter words: Lenny Bruce

 

Every day people are straying away from the church and going back to God. Lenny Bruce

 

 

 

 

 

 

As Brian Swimme says in the conclusion of his video introducing the concept of the New Story “we need to ‘provide a pathway to a future of vibrant life” …. and my words ….. because if we naively follow the paths carved out by politicians who are tied in with bankers and corporations who are only looking towards carving out their short-term goals for making a profit through toxic industries that are destroying the earth and the habitat of humans and all other creatures, then we will surely continue blindly towards our own path of peril and destruction.

“Man” | animation by Steve Cutts | rEvoLuTioN

I just saw this video for the first time a few moments ago (December 8th, late night 2014). It is exquisite in the telling of the story.

In his 3 minute animation, “Man”, Steve Cutts reveals the stark reality of man’s cruelty throughout history. Not representative of all cultures, but most. I’m so captivated by how fantastic it is, that I’ve simultaneously posted it on each of my blogs! https://carolkeiter.wordpress.com/2014/12/09/man-animation-by-steve-cutts-revolution/

It’s a scary bunch of images, that we really need to wake up to.

Something’s gotta change!

Time for an evolution, for a revolution.

“Man” animation by Steve Cutts displaying the history of human beings’ cruelty towards life forms in 3 minutes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfGMYdalClU

1989 Hillsborough stadium tragedy 25th anniversary | the Truth | Original Report Sanitized | Victims Criminalized

The price of Hillsborough, states Phil Scranton who authored the book “Hillsborough the Truth” is the ‘institutionalized injustice’ that the family members of the victims endured. His book uncovers the truth behind the Hillsborough stadium disaster which occurred in Sheffield, England on April 15th, 1989.

Flower tributes to victims of the Hillsborough football match stadium disaster in which 96 people died

The news media spoke of drunken football hooligans as the cause of the disaster in which 96 people were killed, a message that the local police force and stadium owners quickly staged. Those killed were actually scrutinized for their ‘blood alcohol levels’ and history of drug & alcohol use and behavior, to neatly frame them as having caused the disaster. Police reports had been heavily edited to sanitize the incident and make it look like it was the fault of the fans’ misbehavior as opposed to those in the control room, the stadium design and the police force who were responsible for crowd control.

As an American, I hadn’t known this until I viewed this BBC documentary Panorama Hillsborough – How They Buried the Truth Britain’s worst football disaster.

At the 20th year Anniversary Memorial Service in Anfield, Liverpool April 15th, 2009, a significant proportion of the 28,000 attendees interrupted the speech of the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, MP Andy Burnham shouting “justice for the 96”.

Announcement of my soon to be released eBook

I intend to release my first book around the summer solstice, June 21st.

“Adora & Vitali: A Spin on the Matter of Motion”

Due to having not a ‘low’, but ‘no’ budget ‘-) I’ll produce an eBook prior to the first print edition. Besides writing, illustrating and composing music for the digital version, I’m publishing and marketing it too; using iBook Author, Smashwords as well as (kdp) Kindle of Amazon, so that it can be read on whatever platform or device the reader prefers. I’ll also do a voice-over for an audio-book version. The print will be POD ‘print on demand’ for starters. It’s all new terrain and the whole process is a learning experience, about which I’ll be happy to share any information!

Below is an ‘inside/back cover’ summary about what the book entails! I’m open to any suggestions, yet particularly I’d love to hear about any venues (book stores/cafes in your area) which you recommend for me to contact to set up ‘readings’. Once I schedule dates at various locations, I’ll map out a tour. I’m always up for traveling and talking with people! From early on, I anticipated creating versions in French, Spanish and German, especially on the digital platform. This would give the reader the option to read the same content in another language as a learning tool. I’m conversant in these and love learning languages. Since I’m not fluent, I’ll naturally need editors who are native speakers.

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“Adora & Vitali: A Spin on the Matter of Motion” is a spiritual quest imbued with scientific concepts. It is woven throughout with parcels of information relevant to the phenomena that emerge in the story itself. It is specifically designed to inspire curiosity and evoke within the reader the desire to learn more about the fascinating nature of our universe.

A children’s book for adults or classroom textbook embedded within a tale, it has approximately 80 illustrations throughout (black & white as well as color): from scientific diagrams and charts to character and fantasy images. Interwoven throughout are about 120 (and counting) active links; a ‘live’ bibliography that not only substantiates the facts but gives the reader a means to explore in more depth each of the subjects covered.

The tale involves a young woman named Adora, who after learning of a place which enchants her because of its mysterious qualities, decides to journey there. The place not only has almost no gravity, which is extraordinary in itself, but the people residing there have exceptional qualities of mind and spirt. None are capable of lying – they are sentient beings able to telepathically read each others’ minds. A utopian, transparent world, where only truth and honesty exist; in which intentions are transmitted through love. To reach her destination, she is instructed to follow the magnetic lines. The book is a journey to this place with its supernatural characteristics, distilled with information revealing how this theoretically ‘could’ occur. For example, successive natural phenomena were triggered as a result of accelerated global warming.

Besides reading the book sequentially, it is designed as a reference tool in which one can jump from one topic to another; each covered on its unique page. The book is geared for curious readers from adolescent on; for students, science or science fantasy enthusiasts, or those curious about spirituality and consciousness. Generally, those intrigued with adventures into the unknown. Besides being a tale infused with symbolism and mystery (“Adora” means “love” and “Vitali” means “life”), it is a multimedia ‘expeditionary learning platform’, which peers into the phenomena of nature from the microscopic world of subatomic physics to the cosmic, including a smorgasbord of other topics from biology, to geology, chemistry and more, displaying how extraordinary ‘our’ world is. As the title suggests, among other phenomena in the natural world, the book strives to build an appreciation and understanding of the integral role that electromagnetism plays in all of life as well as the communication of love.

with love,
carolkeiter@gmail.com