First, a correction from my last
issue re Marianne Williamson's run for Congress: Several
readers wrote in to correct my statement that Williamson
had authored A Course in
Miracles. She is referred to in this way so often in
the media that I never before thought to question the
writing credit until you all wrote to me. Thank you for
the clarification.
For the record, the work was actually authored by New York
psychologist Helen Schucman with the help of another
psychologist named William Thetford.
Anyone interested in learning more about the origins of
the book can refer to its Wikipedia entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Course_in_Miracles
On another housekeeping
note, please accept our apologies if the formatting of some
of our messages has become corrupted in transmission.
Several technical issues related to this have been brought
to Yahoo's attention since the recent roll-out of their new
groups format, but not many of those issues have been
satisfactorily resolved as of yet.
Several other readers have already written in to
express how deeply moved they were by the story Jerry
shared in yesterday's issue relating to the very sad
series of medical mishaps that occurred to one of our
readers. Thank you for those messages. Personally, I was
quite moved
by the peace of mind that this individual could
cultivate in the face of such circumstances,
directly as a result of their nondual insight and
understanding.
The effects of climate change have
been on my mind this week, and reports of many thousands
of deaths possibly resulting from this week's typhoon in
the Philippines immediately brought to mind for me an
article that Gloria Lee recently excerpted about a
Buddhist perspective on what was referred to as the
eco-crisis:
http://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/NDhighlights/conversations/messages/5072
Our economic system institutionalized greed.
Racism and militarism
institutionalize ill will.
The corporate media
institutionalized delusion.
Any personal awakening we
may experience remains incomplete until it is
supplemented by a “social awakening” that realizes the
importance of responding to these institutionalized
causes of widespread suffering.
Web reporter Jason Kottke wrote the following short reflection
on a piece in The New
Yorker by Elizabeth Kolbert on a recent leak of the
latest IPCC report on climate change:
http://kottke.org/13/11/the-lukewarm-response-to-global-climate-change
Kottke also references a 2007 article
from The
Guardian which outlined some of the disastrous
scenarios from the then-latest IPCC report. From that article
came this disturbing conclusion (and remember that this was
from nearly 7 years ago, and the situation has worsened since
then):
The really chilling thing about the
IPCC report is that it is the work of several thousand
climate experts who have widely differing views about how
greenhouse gases will have their effect. Some think they
will have a major impact, others a lesser role. Each
paragraph of this report was therefore argued over and
scrutinised intensely. Only points that were considered
indisputable survived this process. This is a very
conservative document -- that's what makes it so scary.
__._,_.__
A recent article at Daily Kos digs
into the question of whether or not the climate crisis can
be meaningfully addressed at all within a capitalist
framework:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/11/10/1254532/-Can-we-solve-the-climate-crisis-under-capitalism
The biggest take-home point for me
from that piece has to do with how inherently wasteful the
capitalist system is. It’s difficult not to connect the
dots between the world’s growing obesity epidemic and the
massive consumption levels of the earth’s finite
resources, for example. The same goes for how much fossil
fuel we burn;how
much credit we use; and
how much damage we’ve done to our physical world and the
oceans, all in the service of maintaining our very high
standard of living.
Capitalism’s inexorable quest for
constant, unending economic growth in every consecutive
fiscal quarter has quite effectively cultivated a
pathologically consumeristic society. It is becoming
increasingly obvious to me that this pace of growth is not
sustainable in any way, and that our relentless and blind
pursuit of this growth can only be slowed by some sort of
radical inner shift across wide swaths of society. No
other obvious “external" solution to these issues appears to have been
unearthed so far.
Anyone
following the news (or at least Jon Stewart’s The Daily
Show) has no doubt heard about some of the recent
videos and other revelations about the behaviour of
Toronto’s mayor, Rob Ford. Since this self-described
populist (but admittedly buffoonish) mayor was first
elected from the suburbs of Toronto to lead the recently
amalgamated Greater Toronto Area, he has been the butt of
many jokes from amongst the intelligentsia and elsewhere.
Within the past year, however, a number of deeply
troubling facts have been revealed about Ford’s
activities, habits, and the kinds of people he spends the
most time with (among them confirmed thugs, drug dealers,
and criminals).
Once the police confirmed last week
that they have indeed gained possession of a video which
depicts Ford smoking crack cocaine, the media firestorm
gained a LOT of momentum. Later in the week, a video
emerged in which a profoundly inebriated Ford went on a
violent rant about how he would kill a certain hated
acquaintance with his bare hands. By the end of this week,
half the globe seemingly knew of his name.
It is miles beyond doubt that this
behaviour is unacceptable for the chief magistrate of any
city, let alone that from Canada’s most populous and
important one. However, with each new revelation I find
myself increasingly overcome with sadness for the man. It
is now very clear that he is quite ill, and that he
suffers from a major addiction to at least alcohol, if not
cocaine and perhaps food. The man is suffering greatly,
lashing out viciously at those around him like a caged,
injured tiger. The amount of stress he must be under right
now from this constant scrutiny is nearly unimaginable,
even if that scrutiny has been brought about by his own
actions.
All I see when I look at photos of
him now is a deeply wounded, suffering soul who needs
immediate medical care and attention. I hope that his inner
circle of enablers within his family and what few staff
remain can bring some of that compassion to bear in
order to facilitate his seeking appropriate treatment.
To
quote again from a recent issue of Gloria’s:
Stop trying
to have someone else's experience.
Stop chasing freedom or
happiness, or even spiritual enlightenment.
Stand in your own shoes
and examine closely what's
happening right here and right now.
—Adyashanti
And also from an issue edited by Mark
Otter in May of this year:
When I
observe some of our behavior, it really looks to me as
if human beings want to suffer. Judging from the way
we act, we do not seem to be truly interested in being
happy... We seem to want to keep the painful
experience of anger alive and close, and keep kindness
and happiness at bay. We act as if we treasure
suffering, so whenever we find it, we don't want to
let it go.
... We are operating on the
mistaken assumption of who we are is really this angry,
disturbed person. But we do not have to be that
person... At any moment, we have the option of being
different; we can be a person who is not angry or
disturbed. Let yourself be that other person - a person
who treasures true happiness, kindness and tranquility.
—His Holiness 17th Karmapa,
from The
Heart of Noble, posted
to DailyDharma
May peace be with you. Or
not. Either way, there is nothing underneath the
appearance of peace that is not also underneath the
appearance of suffering.
OM shantih
Dustin