14 responses so far ↓

• 1 pixie Sep 13, 2006

  Sagacity? Miasma? Butt Nuts? You are on a serious roll! I do not think that I make very good judgements sometimes. A tricky business that results in self judgement-wonderful! Perpetuating the cycle is all I needed…What grounds me in reality is a little tool made famous by the woman who made friends with the wind-Byron Katie: her process of inquiry cuts to the exact question and exact answer-beginning with “Is it true?” and followed by “Can you absolutely know that it’s true?” End of story for me. Reality is sort of whatever is true for me…weird, huh?

• 2 Felicity Sep 13, 2006

  Great question.
  I keep thinking about that comment too, worrying about it, and have been for several years. (or since he said it)

  I worry about my inability to have the kind of self confidence and conviction that makes for world shaping behavior. Us good-guys need to be changing the world in a good way. It seems like only greedy materialist do that these days. I want the kind of self confidence and certainty that George Bush has, only, in this fantasy, I put forth good things.

  The thing that scares me, we are the uncertain ones, us liberals, for whom nothing is exactly true, and we are all individuals, each with our own idiosyncratic variation on reality, nothing worth putting our collective energy behind. Democrats are so wimpy and uncertain and ineffective these days and the fundamentalists are shaping the world.

  I want that self confidence that Bush has………or is it not healthy.

• 3 Felicity Sep 13, 2006

  If Buddhism is “not knowing,” fundamentalism is ”knowing.” Buddhism makes for a quieter personal life – of that I am sure – but for making one’s way in the world…how does one do that without certainty? How do we “impose” peace?

• 4 helga Sep 13, 2006

  Clever questions! Personal “vs.” public/national experience – differrent yet the same in many ways.

  Personal: Probably my most devastating example of NOT listening to my own wisdom, while basing my life on what others told me is “right”, was to enter into a relationship with an abusive man. Finally divorced, I now know how many signs I ignored when my gut sent up screaming red flags. Like so many women in unhealthy relationships, I didn’t call it quits until he physically hurt our child – Domestic violence is a complex situation. One reason I stayed was my upbringing as a good, conservative, traditional catholic girl. The ultimate goal of Ma, Pa, 2.3 children, a retriever, and the white picket fence, was firmly drilled into me as a prime motivator. Only my maternal instinct to protect my child could compete with that indoctrination. I listen to my gut a whole lot more these days!

  Public/national – or whatever we want to call it: What if we looked at the lack of a “unified field theory” among us liberals and democrats as a strength instead of a weakness? Is not individuality as a freedom one of the tenets this country was founded on? Just because the folks with the money act as if they’re a united front (they’re not) doesn’t make it the right approach, nor does it dictate what the opposition must look like to be effective. Some posts ago we talked about the far-reaching power of the pebble in the pond. The reason for its effect is that it links with something primal in us. It’s the recognition of that connection that unifies us and will ultimately be stronger than any mere theoretical “conviction”.

  Finally: Just like conflicts in the animal world, all political and religious strife is ultimately a competition for resources, in our Western Civ. case that’s money and power. The foundation is species survival mode, and touted pillars of faith or morals or values are a facade. Don’t be fooled for one minute!

• 5 cindy Sep 14, 2006

  i do think there is a struggle for money and power, yet i also think money and power do not motivate some ppl in this world. for some extreme religions other things motivate. here i believe we are in a struggle of good versus evil. i believe only evil could convince someone that it is “holy” to blow one’s self up and “holy” to kill others in that process. to me killing others is evil. being motivated to kill others is evil. i believe as some famous quote said for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing. or something along those lines. so for me, i think we should strive to overcome evil with good. now i admit how that should be done is complicated, a mystery and a subject for much heated debate.

• 6 florida333 Sep 14, 2006

  That was one memorable comment, wasn’t it? I still remember hollering out loud to my husband when I read it in the Sunday Times magazine two years ago.

  Felicity, my reaction to your thoughts on knowing/not-knowing/confidence/etc.: It seems to be that those who are wired to be sure about things — the “J” personality types in the Myers Briggs profile — will almost always end up in charge because they like to make a decision, stick to it without questioning or revisiting, and then of course impose it on other people because they KNOW THEY ARE RIGHT.

  We who are the “P” type (which would include almost everyone who would read and post on this blog) are driven to continue perceiving and probing and pondering and seeing possibilities and potential other sides of issues.

  Sure, we get suckered in sometimes as we try on various ideas. But not for long, because unlike a J who gets suckered in (who will stick with that version of reality for life), we perceivers will soon see another part of the elephant and move on to enlarge our view.

  I think you have to be a J to be a Republican these days. That leaves the Democrats to try to absorb all of us P types who don’t like to agree on one gospel for the party. (And there are J’s in the Dems, thank God! so we have as much direction as we do!)

  I love being a P. I love people who are like me. I would SO vote for us every time if we would ever run for office.

  But we usually don’t, do we? Because to gain power in the traditional political sense, you’ve got to see things in black and white. They’ll cast you as a flip flopper.

  So what is the answer? How can we take a place in the halls of power?

  Thanks for the good discussion. I’m laid up with a newly broken ankle and this was so fun to think about today.
  –Sandy in FL

• 7 Tracy Sep 14, 2006

  Wow… what a thought-provoking thread! While I might agree that we are perhaps in the midst of a struggle between good and evil, I do not for a minute think there is a switch that turns people from ‘do-gooders’ to ‘evil-doers’. Although I don’t believe I know anyone personally who is an extreme fundamentalist, I’d be willing to lay bets that most extreme fundamentalists do not consider themselves evil, although many others may certainly perceive them that way. That certainly is where my fear lies when it comes to the state of the world today. Call it fundamentalism, call it brainwashing, call it passion, and in some cases I suppose, call it desparation… I have a hard time when it comes to pondering the humanity in all of this. I don’t want to trivialize by using a piece of fiction as an example, but at least this story is rooted in some truth… watch the movie ‘Syriana’. There is one young man who becomes a suicide bomber, and he is a prime example of someone who we start off seeing as genuiunely good, and then we watch how he unfortunately becomes a pawn used for what we consider evil actions. Can he really be considered evil? Are his personal actions rooted in evil? I know these questions have continued to haunt me since I saw this movie, and every time I hear a piece of horrific news I wonder… what really drove that person/persons to this place? What needed to happen in order to prevent that particular spiral of destruction?

  Having said that… I know that what is going on in the world helps make me a more conscious parent to my three kids. My husband and I just hope that what we are doing and teaching and modeling for our kids is enough so they know what is real for them, and they know what they can count on as they move through their lives.

• 8 helga Sep 15, 2006

  Hooking into the good/evil discussion Cindy started:

  Born and raised in Germany, I was brought up by a generation that survived WWII, my grandparents also WWI. Among family and friends were former Nazi soldiers, including my own father. I knew them as good, decent people, and always wondered how they could possibly have been participants in the horrors. The fragmentary picture that emerged from the questions I asked the oldtimers is that they were beautiful young men living in a country ripe for change. They were passionate and impressionable – Hitler was a highly charismatic speaker – and truly believed they were doing the right thing, for their home, their families, their value system. By the time they figured out what was going on, they felt powerless to change things. Those that read between the lines and resisted, like my father, found themselves in uncomfortable conversations with uniformed interrogators mentioning casually “So, you have a young wife and child[my older brother]? Wouldn’t want anything to happen to them, would you?” Given these circumstances, how can I judge my father for acquiesing? Would I have actively opposed? I honestly don’t know.

  When I tell my daughter about the uniform her grandpa is wearing in some old pictures, she is incredulous because she KNOWS him. I tell her about the history and the human circumstance, and she cries over her grandparents’ past anguish. I tell her that the same thing is going on in many places in the world right now, and we both feel deeply sad -and powerless. As we cuddle in the soft light of dusk, she says “Let us be grateful and peaceful tonight.”

• 9 Jennifer Louden Sep 15, 2006

  Helga, your story moved me to tears.

  I’m also wondering, given our thread here, what is our debt to reality? Is reality more precious than love? And as more and more brain research shows we may not even be accurately able to perceive reality where does that leaves us?

  And then we are also left with the idea or reality or possibility of evil – what does that have to do with reality?

  Now I’m all screwed up – but thinking, and that’s what I love to do!

• 10 detta Sep 15, 2006

  The only way I can get my head round ‘stuff’ is to keep it simple. We can’t make anyone do anything, the only thing we can do is be good to ourselves, and good to our immediate circle of people. We can make a real difference this way, even if it a very small difference. If we work from an inner peace springboard rather than who makes the loudest noise, we will be able to nurture ourselves and consequently others, which frequently has a knock on effect. So when we feel angry it’s good to release it in a place that doesnt affect an innocent and when we’re happy its great to release it to as many as possible. I try to practice this, it doesn’t always work but practice is better than just thinking!

• 11 Jennifer Louden Sep 15, 2006

  Whoa – another thought.
  Okay, Germany was depressed and ashamed after WW1 and along came this guy with a story lots of people wanted to believe. I could say that because the Germans were not paying attention to reality, they bought Hilter’s story– because they wanted it to be true.

  Another way to say this is if we want to see evil and defeat evil, we need to make it our civic and personal duty (In public and private) to keep looking for what is. For example, in a great conversation the other day, a friend was talking about being judgmental of other people who didn’t do what she thought they should at her child’s co-op preschool. One of the things I said was, “So the facts are you went into the kitchen at 10:20 am and only half the veggies had been sliced and no one was there.” She said yes. I said, “Everything else is an interpretation. That doesn’t make your interpretation right or wrong but in the space between the two, does anything shift for you?”

  What if we each had such a practice? I know, it’s not that simple and…

• 12 cindy Sep 16, 2006

  helga raises a valid question: what would any of us do when if our loved ones were threatened to be harmed? would we acquiese thus prevent harm to thos we love? or would we sacrifice our loved ones lives and health for the truth of what we know is good or evil? a very hard question! i know i cant say i know the answer right now myself.

• 13 Anne In Virginia Sep 16, 2006

  Hello, all. This is the first I’ve seen of that White House aide’s comment in the NYT, and it made me laugh. I spent the early years of my career in OMB and the Secretary of Interior’s office (in the civil service) during the Nixon and Reagan years and met many brash, arrogant young men of his ilk. My favorite example is the Bush I aide who attended a conference on privatization of the Postal Service in the early 1990s and claimed that the current institution was typical of Soviet Communism. We enjoyed informing him that the Post Office was founded by Benjamin Franklin in 1775! These guys live in an ahistorical world, and one generation never seems to learn from what happened to their predecessors. Perhaps our beloved “Fighting Bob” LaFollette (I’m originally from Wis.) said it best ca. 1905: “There is a sound barrier across the Potomac, through which no public opinion can pass.” The permeability of that barrier varies with the times and the administration. It seems particularly dense at the moment, because you have a small circle of people in the White House who talk and listen only to one another. It’s no wonder their view of the world is so skewed. Other places–Europe, the Middle East–seem equally polarized.

  Never fear, the wheel continues to turn, and the next turn will be particularly shocking to those who have forgotten that we control our actions but not their outcomes. I hope we as a nation soon find our way back to the middle, where we listen respectfully to a wide range of views and conduct civil debates, in our communities as in our legislatures, without demonizing those who disagree with us. I hope we will once again choose among candidates for public office on the basis of character, experience, and respect for our highest values (and I’m talking about those embodied in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights), not single-issue sound bites and slogans. The Democrats won’t help themselves by imitating the behavior of a small group of Republicans or by being captured by extremists at the other pole.

  Most of all, I hope the women who care and who express themselves so eloquently in forums like Jen’s will not turn away in despair from the polity and from their roles as citizens, feeling overwhelmed by confusion and bad news. As Margaret Mead said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

• 14 helga Sep 19, 2006

  Re. head-in-the-sand Germans:
  Remember, Jen, that, although I think it was like that in most small communities, I was talking only about folks I know directly. That is neither to say that there weren’t plenty of folks who did know, nor that many didn’t choose ignorance. Nothing like the Third Reich atrocities could happen, on a large scale, in Germany today – another indicator of the historical circumstances. Still, it will forever puzzle and profoundly sadden me how members of a people I love could have done what they did.

  Some years back, I was in Paris during the July national holiday celebrations, complete with huge military parade down the Champs Elysees. Equipment and soldiers proudly sported Desert Storm camouflage. As a fleet of gigantic helicopters flew low above my head, I got the strong mental image of some poor, head-dressed desert dirt farmer in the middle of nowhere, out in his near-barren fields barely scraping out enough for his family. A decent, hard-working provider and caregiver. That’s what he does, that’s all he’s interested in. When he sees the helicopters rise above the horizon, he drops his hoe and runs toward his house in the nearby village, knowing he won’t make it, knowing that his wife, kids, and everyone he knows will be killed in the blast. His last thoughts are for them, while his heart cries out “Why?”
  This is about as real as it gets.