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September 2009

THIS MONTH's THEME:

New times

Can anybody remember
when the times were not hard
and money not scarce?

Ralph Waldo Emerson


A greeting, for today

Hello everybody!
Welcome back to my blog and home site.
It has been a long pause, and a hard work, so I won't try to catch up with it, let's simply make it a fresh new start. Better for me, as I need it, and for you too, as I will deal with the now and the future, not getting stuck with the past.

Is that what is happening in the World too?
This will be the theme of this month, I will try to have a look at the actual World situation, at the global crisis and at the eventual turns in our politics and economy and social life.

As always, being it also my own blog, it will be mixed with some personal facts and news, about my music too, and with other thoughts about different events in life and observations of the nature around me.

I hope you will enjoy this new version of my home page. Feel free to visit my virtual home and have a look around the different sections. I will write more about it in the next days.

Have a nice day,
see you later..


Me?

Well, I guess I have to start with myself, then.
I simply feel that it is the most miserable and the best time of my life at the very same time, right now.

How to explain this?
There is no doubt about the miserable part: what is left of my life, considering in the many past years I have made mistakes, have failed, taken wrong decisions, lost friends, jobs, homes, loves and not few of some lives I loved, been poor, unusually unlucky, and disconcertingly watching this world around going more and more nuts?

Yet, looking at myself now, I might see someone a bit battered, but so much better as a whole than what he was before.
Believe it or not, I am so proud of myself, and deeply serene. For the first time in my life I feel that I am mature and right what I wanted to be.
Not proud of what went wrong, of course, but of having carried this now 30 years long project through without setting my values aside.
It has been a hard work to get here, but I have not compromised, I can look myself in the mirror, and there is so much to enjoy every single day now, and so much potential for the future.

I think the key is that I always learn out of what happens to me. Learn, change and evolve.

And not all what went wrong was my fault, definitely not.
In fact there are no dramas in my own world, the problem is I do live in this world, and that's not easy at all.

So, what is the state of our World? We will look at that in the next days.

Beginning with answering Emerson's question then, I certainly personally do remember when "the times were not hard and money not scarce", they are very vivid in my memories, thank you, Ralph, don't worry.

He was certainly neither asking me, nor concerned about me at that time, rather provoking us on what a good life and society, and economy are.


The World?

Let me start immediately stating that it is undeniable our world is experiencing the same apparent duality, as the one in me.
During the last times of crisis, it has both been broken, or on the verge to be, and showing evident signs of change (and hope?) at the same time.
I do not want to repeat myself, so I invite you to reread just the beginning of a previous blog of mine, from December 2007, "Concluding this mind-boggling year".

You must admit I was a prophetic Cassandra, when I wrote:

“ It seems like everything is in total dissolving,
and this both opens for completely new possibilities
and warns a global collapse at the very same time. ”

Well, didn't Marshall McLuhan once say:

“ artists can warn us of future disasters ” ?

While most economists and world institutions and politicians were busy telling us everything was fine, I read the signs in stead.
And that's pretty much the same situation we are in, still.

There would be much to say about the nature of this crisis, and I probably will, but anyone telling us we are already out of that, is mad. There are millions of people paying the consequences of it right now, in the whole world.
Loosing their money, their jobs, their houses, and all what follows of disgraces.
It's just that, as you know, we live in a mediatic Truman Show, and what is not shown on that box simply doesn't exist.
Have you seen millions of workers on your TV lately, prime-time even? I haven't.
But I still magically have access to that channel that is called reality, that's my only secret.

Don't despair, how to deny too that, unbelievably, some things are really changing for the better, at the same time?

It's enough to mention a simple fact: until last year we had not Obama, now we have.
He is not the Messiah of course, he is better! Kidding, God forgive me, but it is really astonishing what that guy has achieved already, in less than one year. And keeps on doing, we can trust that. We should rather fear the sclerotic system he has to deal with will sabotage him.

Will it be enough? Of course not, but there is much more going on, as we will see.


My thumb is stuck half-way

Just to point it out: I am not coloring the World with my own issues. I do keep the two spheres separate. As much as it is possible, beware.
And there are also differences, in fact.

Regarding me, I absolutely feel these are new times for my life. I am greatly excited about what the next years will bring with them.
It's not hope, it's not illusion, just serenity of spirit.

I haven't got the same feeling with the World. Truly, I don't know which tendency will prevail, whether the destructive or the constructive one.

You see, haven't got any "Perfect World in 3 Weeks" DVDs to sell you. I can afford to be honest with you then.

The main reason why I doubt is that I don't let appearance fool me, I want the substance. Cosmetics doesn't work, there are fundamental, systemic, global issues lying under this crisis, or any one else that could happen.
I see some sorts of changes, true, this is good news, but they risk to be 'too little, too late', if they won't touch those core reasons at the root of the problems of our World.
Such as:

  • economy:
    • money and speculation based
    • competitive, not collaborative
    • oligarchic in stead of democratic
  • ecology
    • not sustainable in the short-medium-long term
    • nonrenewable sources vs. renewable ones
    • shortage of resources
    • climate changes
  • work
    • 'white deaths', due to lack of safety for the workers
    • jobs based on the needs of the money-makers, not on those of the individuals involved
    • forced labor, where working is a need and not a life-enforcing pleasure.
  • ethics
    • falsity, lack of respect for the truth; marketing, deception, occult persuasion
    • lack of sense of the 'other'
    • politics as power in stead of service

The list would continue, but it was just to give you an idea of what I mean by 'core, structural issues'.
We ought to change them, or even the new events we will experience in the World, won't scratch more than a thin surface.


What crisis?

As we are bombarded every day with this word 'crisis', and I have used it too right in the last days, it is not a sophistication to have a look into it.

If we think about the financial part of it, that's really no news, there is always time for a good crisis, as it doesn't depend on anything concrete, more on the mood of those cynical and reckless agents, and on how much they make a fool of themselves.
It's enough to recall a random day at the stock exchange and you will get the picture. Can all those shouting hysteric people, running and behaving like mad monkeys in a cage, lead to anything sane at all?
Nothing I find more boring in life than the daily news from the stock market, how perfectly insignificant can those numbers be?
What could I possibly care if Dow Jones goes up and Nikkei 225 goes down, that specific day? You can know for sure, the day after Dow Jones will go down and Nikkei 225 up. And the day after Dow Jones will go up again and Nikkei 225 sadly down once more.
So what? What a drama isn't it, yawn...
Love to kid those gray men in jackets, as they take themselves so seriously. But they have little to do with real economy, it is about speculation, and speculating on moods, needs and fears, and captious mechanism to capitalize on virtual resources.

Speculation is the true cancer of our economical systems, it has replaced real economy and to understand why and how it could happen, I can suggest this book as a good explainer:

The Speculation Economy:
How Finance Triumphed Over Industry,
Lawrence E Mitchell Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2007

What matters is not rolling our eyes every day to follow the indexes curves ups and downs, but the long-term economical effects of our global and local activities.
Exactly as it would be meaningless to worry every hour about our glycemic index (blood sugar level), instead of focusing on our nutrition and healthy life, every day, month and year through all our life.


Finance and Economics

Right, regarding what I wrote yesterday, it is undeniable that new tones are being heard in the various international contexts (U.N., G20 etc.)

Cases like Lehman Brothers crack and Madoff scam, or similar, have created a wave of outrage that it is impossible for politicians and institutions to ignore.
At times they even seem sincere when attacking those speculations, trying to hammer out ways to address the crisis.
If you have some free time during the week-end [how could you possibly, when you have to visit all my new home site? ;) ] and you want to have some 'fun', you can see how many and devastating the financial scandals have been, you can do it at this Exeter University site:

Financial Scandals

The measures are two-fold: those against speculation are absolutely right, and it was about time they were undertaken.
Illegal exporting of capitals, financial paradises, bank secrets, golden bonuses to corrupted, inefficient and irresponsible managers, and more, all these things are criminal activities and have to disappear from the earth's surface. We need a pitiless crack down on all that scum, period.

More doubtful appears the action for sustaining real economy. Like stabilizing the markets, facilitating the bank credit to enterprises and the like.
On this vital side, still too little is happening, as long as we are not really addressing those core values I wrote about earlier.

In particular, all the new and very welcome talks about sustainability will be just boiled air if we will continue to endorse and stick with the conventional 'growth' paradigm.
There are news also on this front though. Just imagine I have to compliment Sarkozy for this, my goodness!, but he did it right with establishing the

Commission on the Measurement of
Economic Performance and Social Progress.

I will leave the word to the all-star trio Amartya Sen, Joseph Stiglitz and Jean-Paul Fitoussi then, have a nice week-end.

See you on Monday...


Don't worry, be happy

As an annotation: today the President of the ECB (European Central Bank), Jean-Claude Trichet, speaking at the European Parliament's Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee warned:

“ [...] it would be premature to declare the crisis over. [...] As there are signs of stabilisation, the ECB is expecting to see in the months ahead 'a very gradual recovery', but still, this expectation remains uncertain.”

A confirmation of what I have been writing in the past days.

More help came suddenly yesterday. While I was searching for something completely unrelated, I stumbled upon the following clip of one of the séances by Esther & Jerry Hicks with the Abraham entity.
It is called: "Abraham On The World Financial Crisis"

It is not channeling, it's kind of Esther getting inspiration by this "group consciousness from the non-physical dimension", and then she talks and answer questions from the audience.
No matter what one can think about all this, it is undeniable she's got talent, and it is intriguing listening to the subtle Abraham.

Incidentally, from this started the 'law of attraction' and all what followed, like "The Secret" and the big hype about all this, in the New Age world.
You know already I am very critical, to say it mildly, of many of the concepts that are spread in that movement, and the 'law of attraction' is no exception, but I respect any attempt to have a new and positive and inspiring look at reality.
Besides, Abraham is quite entertaining.

This was the first of this short month's last three days , trying to provide some inputs about whether we are on the verge of New Times or not.

source: Youtube


One color of hope

It's very late now, over midnight, so I will be short today and leave you in company of a beautiful documentary, a perfect ending to this month's blog.
It is "Indigo Evolution" about some evolved children, called in different ways, but usually Indigo Children, that are popping out in the world, especially in the last times, some say.
It seems like the film is released to the public now but I didn't link to it, even if it is available anywhere on internet, as I am not sure about its copyrighting, the same ever-returning problem. One thing is to embed a short clip, like I did yesterday, which can be considered as a 'fair use', another matter is to embed an entire film.

When mentioning the documentary, I have to accompany it with a link to an Indiana Skeptics article
{dead link, was: [http: //indianaskeptics.org/mt-archives/2006/02/skeptics_view_t.html]}
where they criticize it. I usually consider this kind of conventional-rational critics as boring in the best case, but being the substance of the controversy very, very serious, you get thus two sides of information about it, at least (and some were reported in the Wikipedia article already)

Again, no matter what you or I think about it, it is undeniable that the children in the documentary are awesome and deeply moving and inspiring. I would actually much better have preferred that the documentary was all with them, rather than on them, interviewing so many 'experts' and so few and little of them.

Are they really special, and coming here to prepare a new era for us? I don't know, honestly, and that's already something for me. In any case, long live the Indigo children, they have all my sympathy (as all children have)

The question remains the same: are economical processes and more in general, times and crises, random events, or is there any coherent meaning behind them?


Not concluding conclusion

Time to end this short month trying to answer the last question I posed, whether we live in an incoherent, random World or there is something more than that, or different than that, that we just need to discover or rediscover.

Well, I think I have expressed my opinion clearly, several times before. I personally live in an integrated World, not a dualistic one. Even if I often highlight the contrasts that we experience side by side in our life, every single day, I do think that is not the optimal life.
The material and the spiritual shouldn't be so sharply separated, and even enemies with each other.
I am very open to anything that goes beyond our common reality, but I don't despise it at the same time at all.
Small things and big things, all matter and have their place and their significance.
There is no need always to think in that 'either..or" fashion. Either to get stuck in reality, or to escape from reality.
There is a more fulfilling alternative.

In Economics, this means it is positive not to slowly dehydrate in the crude reality of numbers, stimulating all the human resources and wonders that are potentially available.
This will, hopefully, finally lead to getting human beings back to their core and central role, where they have not been for way too long time, after the Industrial Revolution.

We should still always remain with both feet solidly on the ground at the same time. The essential material structures and systems are not sufficient, but still necessary for sure.
To obtain good and fair societies and economies we do need to deal with it, to face it. And address all the issues I mentioned on the 23rd and more.

The risk with those who put too much weight on the spiritual is always to end up blaming the single person because he/she is not good enough. There is richness and abundance everywhere, so "if you are poor it is your fault. If you can't get access to credit is your fault, if you die in an unsafe working place is also your fault", kind of.

Dealing with the unfair reality of our World is not thinking negatively, it is one of the highest purposes we can have.
Good work to everybody (if you have such).