Category: Philosophy

What I have learned about health and happiness from my dog.

I’m clearly not the only one to believe we really can learn from dogs!

Last Friday, I published a post under the title of The healing power of dogs.  This is how that post opened:

How dogs offer us humans health and happiness.

Many months ago, I was contacted by a Peter Bloch offering to write a guest post on the subject of the healing power of dogs.  Peter had read a post that I had published in July last year which prompted the email dialogue between us.

Not going to say much more at this stage except that today I am republishing that post from last July.  On Monday, I will introduce Peter and his guest post.  Then on Tuesday, I will speak of my own experiences both as entrepreneurial mentor and as a ‘customer’ of a wonderful psychotherapist back in Devon during 2007.

So, as promised, here is that guest post from Peter.

oooOOOooo

Fergus, the Healing Dog. A sketch by Mrs. Peter Bloch
Fergus, the Healing Dog. A sketch by Mrs. Peter Bloch

My dog Fergus is a philosopher, and the nature of health and happiness is his area of special expertise. When he learned about Paul’s blog he became very excited because he has always been convinced that dogs have so much to teach humans about life. As much as anything to have a little peace from his continual philosophical musings, I agreed to set out his theories here for the benefit of everyone who loves dogs.

Fergus would like it to be known that when he is free to pursue the activities to which his particular breed is most naturally attracted then, as a dog, he feels happy, energised, purposeful and fulfilled in every way. Fergus has also observed that when he is able to participate as a co-operating member of his ‘pack’, he feels safe and secure, is clear about how to proceed with his life, and at night he sleeps like a dog.

But Fergus says that when these conditions do not apply, he can be quite remarkably miserable. As a Greyhound, he loves to run very fast, and he is not at all interested in things like retrieving balls, or wallowing in water.

Fergus doing what he loves - running very fast!
Fergus doing what he loves – running very fast!

However once he was in the care of someone who Fergus thinks we should just call ‘Sarah’.  Sarah has a Labrador and thinks that all dogs really ought to be like her dog, resulting in Fergus being put under considerable pressure to enjoy activities that he could not understand.

That lead to Sarah telling Fergus’ owners that he was a difficult dog when in fact he was just a misunderstood dog. He was amazed how, in just one day, he went from sleeping ‘like a dog‘ to ‘living in the doghouse‘!

Indeed, within a week he was suffering from digestive problems and skin disorders, despite an identical diet, and was found to be engaging in several bizarre neurotic behaviours. Fortunately, when more congenial conditions were restored, Fergus returned to feeling safe and secure.

Fergus often expresses surprise that people often do not understand that the freedom to be himself, the true dog that he is, including living in unifying solidarity with his pack, is a fundamental requirement for his health; in all meanings of the word.

For instance, Fergus noticed that Sarah has a son called Henry, who really wanted to be a designer. But his mother thought that it would be better for him to be a lawyer. In fact, Sarah was so certain that in the end Henry became a lawyer. Fergus observes that Henry is always suffering from digestive problems and skin disorders and sometimes behaves a little strangely.  Doctors have not been able to find out what is wrong with him, despite all sorts of diets and medicines being tried.

But here’s the rub. When Henry goes out for a walk with Fergus, Fergus always runs as fast as he can and his resulting happiness always makes Henry feel so much better.

Henry is convinced that Fergus is a healer! Who could argue with that?

Fergus, the healing dog.
Fergus, the healing dog.

oooOOOooo

Trust me, when I’m feeling a little down the dogs all know.  All of them allow me to come and bury my face in their fur, or rest my face alongside their face.  Perhaps one of the most powerful gifts from our dogs is their wonderful, unconditional love for us funny humans.

I have no connection with Peter other than being delighted to have this guest post from him (or was it from Fergus??).  Peter offered this brief summary of his work, which I am pleased to include:

Peter Bloch has developed a form of existential and person-centred psychotherapy through touch. In this therapeutic model, health is defined as the ability to be true to oneself and open to genuine relationships with others – qualities that he finds in abundance in his dog.

The healing power of dogs.

How dogs offer us humans health and happiness.

Many months ago, I was contacted by a Peter Bloch offering to write a guest post on the subject of the healing power of dogs.  Peter had read a post that I had published in July last year which prompted the email dialogue between us.

Not going to say much more at this stage except that today I am republishing that post from last July.  On Monday, I will introduce Peter and his guest post.  Then on Tuesday, I will speak of my own experiences both as entrepreneurial mentor and as a ‘customer’ of a wonderful psychotherapist back in Devon during 2007.  Hope that works for you.

So here’s that Learning from Dogs post.

000OOOooo

The bond between dogs and humans

Such a beautiful and mutually-important relationship.

I didn’t plan to write more about this subject thinking that my last two posts, Woof at the Door and Prof. Pat Shipman, more than covered the theme; indeed much more.

But then a flurry of other articles conspired to pass my desk.

In no particular order there was an article on the Big Think website, Do Dogs Speak Human?  As the article opened,

What’s the Big Idea?

Perhaps the better question is, do humans speak dog? Either way, the debate over whether language is unique to humans, or a faculty also possessed by wild and domestic animals from dogs to apes to dolphins, is an interesting one. The answer depends on exactly how we define “language,” and who’s doing the talking, says David Bellos, the Booker prize-winning translator.

The article includes this three-minute video,

and concludes,

Broadly, a language is a mode of expression. “The argument that only human language is language and that animal communication systems, however sophisticated they are — and some of them are quite sophisticated — are not languages because they consist of discrete signals is a circular argument,” he argues. “It’s a self-fulfilling thing. And I think we should be a little bit more interested in the complexity and the variability of animal communication systems and less rigid about this distinction between what is a language and what is not a language.”

For now, we’re happy with this:

The June 30th edition of The Economist had an article entitled, Can dogs really show empathy towards humans? (You may have to register (free) to view this.)  That report ends, as follows,

As they report in Animal Cognition, “person-oriented behaviour” did sometimes take place when either the stranger or the owner hummed, but it was more than twice as likely to occur if someone was crying. This indicated that dogs were differentiating between odd behaviour and crying. And of the 15 dogs in the experiment that showed person-oriented responses when the stranger cried, all of them directed their attention towards the stranger rather than their owner.

These discoveries suggest that dogs do have the ability to express empathetic concern. But although the results are clear enough, Dr Custance argues that more work needs to be done to be sure that such behaviour is true empathy. It is possible, she points out, that the dogs were drawing on previous experiences in which they were rewarded for approaching distressed human companions. Dog-owners, however, are unlikely to need any more convincing.

It was then an easy follow-up to that Animal Cognition article which is available online here; here’s the abstract,

Empathy covers a range of phenomena from cognitive empathy involving metarepresentation to emotional contagion stemming from automatically triggered reflexes.

An experimental protocol first used with human infants was adapted to investigate empathy in domestic dogs. Dogs oriented toward their owner or a stranger more often when the person was pretending to cry than when they were talking or humming. Observers, unaware of experimental hypotheses and the condition under which dogs were responding, more often categorized dogs’ approaches as submissive as opposed to alert, playful or calm during the crying condition. When the stranger pretended to cry, rather than approaching their usual source of comfort, their owner, dogs sniffed, nuzzled and licked the stranger instead.

The dogs’ pattern of response was behaviorally consistent with an expression of empathic concern, but is most parsimoniously interpreted as emotional contagion coupled with a previous learning history in which they have been rewarded for approaching distressed human companions.

It doesn’t get closer than this.

Future uncertainties!

“Prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future.“ Niels Bohr

I love this saying from Mr. Bohr and often repeat it, albeit at times with my own twist to it.  I was reminded of this uncertainty of the future from some comments to a recent post over at Lack of Environment.  The particular post was called Can technology save us? and was a reflection of Martin Lack, the blog’s author, watching a recent BBC Horizon special called Tomorrow’s World.  (There’s the YouTube of the broadcast at the end of this post.) Martin opened his post by saying:

I happened to stumble across a BBC TV Horizon special, entitled ‘Tomorrow’s World’ last Thursday.  It begins with a fascinating review of humankind’s history of – and propensity for – invention. It also explains some truly fascinating – and inspiring – developments in the spheres of space exploration, nanotechnology, biotechnology, and power generation.

In the introduction, the programme presenter and narrator Liz Bronnin explains how, after 100’s of thousands of years of technological stagnation, the fast-moving world of technological innovation is very definitely a modern invention.

Then a little later Martin goes on to say:

After about 32 minutes, Bronnin introduces the power of the Internet to promote innovation – crowd-sourcing research funding and the concept of open-source technology – the complete abrogation of intellectual copyright… It is a fundamental challenge to globalised Capitalism; but it may well be the solution to many of our problems…

However, to me, the final third of the programme is by far the most fascinating… It looks at the challenges of finding a replacement for fossil fuels. It provides a very clear message that this is a technological challenge driven by the reality of physics – not by ideology.

But, overall, Martin lets us know his perspective with his final paragraphs:

Re-engineering nature for our benefit will, without doubt, be very very useful. However, I still think the optimism of the comment at the very end of the programme “…I never worry about the future of the human race, because I think we are totally capable of solving problems…” is very unwise. This is because anthropogenic climate disruption is a problem that is getting harder to solve the longer we fail to address it effectively.

Bronnin concludes by saying that, “it is an exciting time to be alive…” However, I remain very nervous. This is because, as Professor Peter Styles of Keele University – a strong supporter of the hydraulic fracturing industry – recently acknowledged, it will be impossible for carbon capture and storage to remove enough CO2 from the atmosphere to prevent very significant changes to our climate. This is because of the collective hypnosis that deludes most people into seeing perpetual economic growth as the solution to all our problems.

In short, I am certain that technology alone cannot save us. In order to avoid the ecological catastrophe that all but the most ideologically-prejudiced and wilfully-blind can see developing all around us… we need to modify our behaviour: This primarily means that we need to acknowledge the injustice of a “use it up and wear it out” mentality and, as individuals, all learn to use an awful lot less energy.

Climate change “sceptics” have picked a fight with history and science – primarily with the concept of Entropy – and they will lose. The only question that remains is this: Are we going to let them put us all in (what xraymike79 recently called) ‘the dustbin of failed evolutionary experiments’.

Now Jean and I also watched the Horizon special and, to be perfectly frank, found it both uplifting and inspiring.  It seemed a great counter to the overwhelming volume of commentary these days along the lines of ‘The end of the world is nigh!‘ some of that coming from yours truly! That’s not to make light of the huge hurdles ahead.

But it was a couple of comments on Martin’s post from Patrice Ayme that got me thinking.  Here’s the exchange that went between Patrice and Martin following on from a comment from Thomas Foster.

Considering that it is technology which has enabled us to “conquer” nature and thus the degradation of the environment which is a consequence of that it seems most unlikely to this writer that the cause will also bring about a cure. Thomas Foster

—–

The genus Homo has been technological for 5 million years. Give or take two million. Homo is the cure for life. Patrice Ayme

—-

If we Homo Sapiens have been technological for 5 million years, we have spent most of that time being very unsuccessful; and have spent the rest being far too successful. Is there no scope for just living in harmony with our environment (as opposed to being at war with it)? Martin Lack

—-

Hominids have been masters of the environment for at least three million years. By a million years ago, only Homo was left (but for places like Flores). Dozens of megafauna species got annihilated. Homo’s technology has extended to the entire Earth for at least a million years. The Earth itself was turned into a tool. A tool we are not at war with, but that we use. Patrice Ayme

—-

A utilitarian attitude to Nature is one that does not recognise its inherent value (i.e. which it would have even if we did not exist). Seeing ourselves as superior to Nature rather than as part of it has resulted in our not living in harmony with it. This is, by definition, equivalent to being at war with Nature. QED. Refer: Nature is not your enemy. Martin Lack

—-

Call it what you want, Martin. Man manipulates nature, and that nature one calls nature has not been “natural” for more than a million years. Except if one views man as part of nature! Patrice Ayme

Patrice is a very clear thinker even if, at times, pretty hard-hitting.  But this exchange confirmed in my mind that clearly looking out to the future must always be hard.  Most certainly in this period of mankind’s evolution predicting the future is especially difficult.  Hence my contribution to Martin’s post:

Jean and I watched the Horizon special a couple of evenings ago. To be honest, I’m not entirely sure what my overall thoughts are in response to your post, Martin. What does come to mind is that old saying, “Never underestimate the power of unintended consequences.”

So it may be that we are at a particular point in time, or more likely an era, where seeing clearly into the future is challenging.

The one aspect of modern life that is a game-changer is what we are doing now. Sharing ideas and thoughts across a far-flung net. Not only as the Horizon programme illustrated but as ordinary people trying to make sense of the world.

These are incredibly uncertain times.  Undoubtedly not the first in man’s long history as an historian will explain (cue to Alex!).   But to all of us alive today, these are the most uncertain times we have ever experienced!

No wonder so many of us feel lost at times in today’s world.

Here’s that BBC Horizon, courtesy of YouTube.

I will close with this thought from one masterly ‘wordsmith’, William Wordsworth.

“Life is divided into three terms – that which was, which is, and which will be. Let us learn from the past to profit by the present, and from the present, to live better in the future.”

Lust, laughter and loyalty!

 

Something else we really can learn from dogs.

I’m not sure that I should admit that my dearest Jeannie is my 4th wife!  Long story that goes back to when I had just turned 12 years-old, back in 1956. I suffered an event that I interpreted as emotional rejection and promptly buried that deep into my subconscious where it stayed for over 50 years.

Then brought to the surface in 2007 (thanks Jon) after the failure of marriage number 3.  I met Jean some 6 months later, in December 2007, and we were married in Payson, AZ in November, 2010.  Being with Jean has been the happiest days of my life!

Jean, Father Dan and yours truly. St Paul's Episcopal Church, Payson, AZ. November 20th, 2010.
Jean, Father Dan and yours truly. St Paul’s Episcopal Church, Payson, AZ. November 20th, 2010.

Inevitably, while being married to Jean seems such a natural relationship, one is curious about what makes for a happy, lifelong relationship. Let’s face it, divorce is not uncommon.  In fact, the Divorce Rate website reveals that in 2012, the divorce rate was 3.4 couples per 1,000 population in the USA; the sixth highest in the world.

So it was fascinating to listen to a recent radio programme broadcast under the BBC’s Point of View series.  Just 10 minutes long, this particular programme was a talk by Adam Gopnik: The secret of a happy marriage 29th March 2013.  (Adam Gopnik is an American commentator and writes for The New Yorker.)

You should be able to listen to the programme by going here.  Or you can download the programme by going here, and following the instructions.  (Not sure how long the programme will be available to listen/download, so don’t delay.)

The programme was also featured on the BBC News Magazine Website. From which I quote:

A Point of View: Is there a secret to a happy marriage?

Nobody can explain the secret to a happy marriage, says Adam Gopnik, but it doesn’t stop people trying.

Anyone who tells you their rules for a happy marriage doesn’t have one. There’s a truth universally acknowledged, or one that ought to be anyway.

Just as the people who write books about good sex are never people you would want to sleep with, and the academics who write articles about the disappearance of civility always sound ferociously angry, the people who write about the way to sustain a good marriage are usually on their third.

Nonetheless (you knew there was a nonetheless on its way) although I don’t have rules, I do have an observation after many years of marriage (I’ve promised not to say exactly how many, though the name “Jimmy Carter” might hold a clue).

Later, Adam Gopnik speaks about Charles Darwin whose marriage to Emma he describes “as something close to an ideal marriage.”

So what is it we learn from dogs?

So, marriages are made of lust, laughter and loyalty – but the three have to be kept in constant passage, transitively, back and forth, so that as one subsides for a time, the others rise.

Now Adam writes about the special form of loyalty that dogs offer us:

Be lit by lust, enlightened by laughter, settle into loyalty, and if loyalty seems too mired, return to lust by way of laughter.

I have had this formula worked out – and repeated it, waggishly, to friends, producing for some reason an ever more one-sided smile on the face of my beautiful wife.

Until, not long ago, I realised that there was a flaw in this idea. And that was that I had underestimated the reason that loyalty had such magnetic power, drawing all else towards it.

For I had been describing loyalty in marriage as though it were a neutral passive state – a kind of rest state, a final, fixed state at the end of the road of life.

And then, against our better wishes, and our own inner version of our marriage vows, at our daughter’s insistence we got a dog. And this is what changed my view.

“The expense and anxiety of children” indeed. Our daughter’s small Havanese dog, Butterscotch, has instructed us on many things, but above all on the energy that being loyal really implies.

Dogs teach us many things – but above all they teach us how frisky a state loyalty can be.

Dogs, after all – particularly spayed city dogs that have been denied their lusts – have loyalty as an overriding emotion. Ours will wait for hours for one of its family, and then patiently sit right alongside while there is work to be done.

Loyalty is what a dog provides. The ancient joke-name for a dog, Fido, is in truth the most perfect of all dog names – I am faithful. I am loyal. I remain.

Dogs are there to remind us that loyalty is a jumpy, fizzy emotion. Loyalty leaps up at the door and barks with joy at your return – and then immediately goes to sleep at your side. Simple fidelity is the youngest emotion we possess.

The loyalty of a dog. No more to be said.

The love and loyalty of Hazel.
The love and loyalty of Hazel.

It really is a very simple message!

Repeat after me: We are of this planet!  It’s really very simple!

There are times when I look back at my writings on Learning from Dogs, now well over 1,500 posts (1,633 as of today, to be anal about it!) and ponder if the fundamental message behind the name of the blog often gets overlooked.  The Welcome page states:

As man’s companion, protector and helper, history suggests that dogs were critically important in man achieving success as a hunter-gatherer. Dogs ‘teaching’ man to be so successful a hunter enabled evolution, some 20,000 years later, to farming, thence the long journey to modern man. But in the last, say 100 years, that farming spirit has become corrupted to the point where we see the planet’s plant and mineral resources as infinite. Mankind is close to the edge of extinction, literally and spiritually.

Dogs know better, much better! Time again for man to learn from dogs!

Elsewhere on the blog, I underpin that proposition by listing the attributes of dogs:

Dogs:

  • are integrous ( a score of 210) according to Dr David Hawkins
  • don’t cheat or lie
  • don’t have hidden agendas
  • are loyal and faithful
  • forgive
  • love unconditionally
  • value and cherish the ‘present’ in a way that humans can only dream of achieving
  • are, by eons of time, a more successful species than man.

Now this is all fine and dandy but of what relevance is this to the mess that homo sapiens now finds itself in? Two parts to that answer come to mind.

The first part is that watching a dog out in the open countryside quickly brings home the fact that these animals are part of nature and, if push comes to shove, can live in the wild and fend for themselves.  Not saying that a domestic dog would enjoy the experience but that their wild dog and grey wolf roots still rest somewhere in a dog’s consciousness.

The second part of the answer is that all animals instinctively live in harmony, in balance, with their surroundings; with their environment.

For the incredibly obvious reason that dogs, as with all other animal species, are an evolutionary consequence of the natural history of Planet Earth.  That evolutionary journey from the Grey Wolf (Canis lupus) part of the Canidae family, a family including wolves, coyotes and foxes, thought to have evolved 60 million years ago.  That journey all the way to the domestic dog (Canis lupus familiaris).

That ancient journey where the African wild dog (Lycaon pictus – painted dog) came together with early man. No one knows when but the African wild dog was certainly around when man developed speech and set out from Africa, about 50,000 years ago!

Two vastly different natural species, dog and man, evolving compatibly with each other for so many thousands of years.

Back to the attributes of dogs, in particular a dog’s ability to cherish the present.  Earlier this week I was chatting with Kevin Dick, friend from Payson, AZ days, about the ‘interesting’ times we are living in.  Kevin thought there was a significant difference between the generations born in the 1940’s and 1950’s and those born in later times.  Most people over the age of, say 55, were brought up to save for ‘a rainy day’ and, possibly, be able to leave a legacy to their offspring.  Kevin then went on to reflect that more recent generations exhibit a ‘buy today, don’t delay’ mentality.

A by-product of this materialistic instant gratification approach is that the whole damn consumer machine has created a total disconnect with the fact that we humans are of this planet.

“The earth is the mother of all people..“

(Chief Joseph 1840 – 1904, leader of the Wallowa band, a Native American tribe

indigenous to the Wallowa Valley in northeastern Oregon)

Humans today fail to comprehend this fundamental fact: Our ability to harm the planet and think that it won’t affect our species is complete madness!  If only we could learn how to cherish the present in the way that our dogs do!

I’m now going to offer an essay from John Hurlburt.  I knew John had written this essay but didn’t get round to reading it properly until I had finished the introduction above.  I’m blown away by the resonance between the two but, as always, John’s words are so much more eloquent.

Inside Out

Climate change, religion, economics, government, politics and social issues are topics which create strong personal opinions and cultural divisions. We have difficulty accepting ideas which may conflict with our personal understandings. As usual, it’s an ego thing. The arrogance of our species is inclusive. We all suffer the consequences.

To counter our ego, we know that everything fits together. We exist in a unified cosmos with fluctuations and diversities that emerge around and through us.

Our present transformative state is as a biological form of energy and matter which possesses a conscious awareness of the natural order. We choose to ignore or deny the essential nature of our being at our own peril. Do we live only for the moment or do we live to insure our species future? That’s our fundamental choice.

“Seek the truth and identify the common good.” Zoroaster [also known as Zarathustra, Ed.]

We are a consciously aware component of a living world in an isolated corner of a remote galaxy. Everything within and on the earth has an extraterrestrial origin. We live on an incubator we call the earth. We rarely truly communicate with or fully understand the energy of nature in our lives. Our critical thinking ability has become enveloped by an electronic cloud.

We generally agree that the actions of many religions and most politics are based upon short term human interests rather than upon the long term well being of our planet and its disappearing life forms. The fact is that we only began to emerge as a species about 100,000 years ago. Hubble telescope observations have dated our universal origin to roughly 13,002,000,000 years ago.

Could it be that we only imagine ourselves as independent beings? Could it be that beyond the mind games we play there is a vast reality greater that we can understand with our limited sensory apparatus and our finite minds?

Life is a transformative experience. All species, tribes, races and genders are united by the nature of life. We pass through a period of being selfish and ambitious during our journey. Many of us choose to move into these familiar ruts and furnish them. We do not always walk the way we talk.

Nature favors species which adapt to constant change in an emerging universe.

If we agree that our intelligence is judged by choices we make, there is some question about intelligent human life on earth. A recent Harvard University study of species in relation to change estimates that the life span of the human species is approximately 100,000 years. Sound familiar?

The wisdom of our brief human history tells us that we are on a careless and needless path to self destruction. All that’s necessary to verify this assertion is to turn on the news of the day. The systemic paradigm that has been imprinted on our psyches is in constant flux. As we live and learn, we realize that our purpose is to leave life better than we found it.

A delicate balance is necessary to maintain an even strain of faith in the natural process rather than dwelling upon our self centered fears of losing something we imagine we own or not attaining something we believe we want. The earth heals itself from the inside out. We can do the same as a species. Today is the tomorrow we dreamed of yesterday. What have we done to fulfill the true purpose of our lives?

an old lamplighter

So, yes, we have much to learn from dogs.

I will close as I started. We are of this planet!  It’s really very simple!

Welcome Home

Sharing the truth of who each of us really is!

I subscribe to Christine’s blog 350 or bust.  As the home page declares, Christine is “a mother, an educator, and a former registered nurse, concerned about climate change.”

Being a follower of Christine’s blog I automatically received an email on Tuesday about her latest post.  This is what that email said,

It’s TED Talk Tuesday on 350orbust. Here’s a fascinating TEDx talk by South African trainer and speaker Bruce Muzik whose “passion is having people experience unprecedented freedom and happiness, through being Authentic.“

To be perfectly honest, it didn’t strike me as something that I would watch anytime soon.  However, fate decided to intervene!

Because yesterday, Wednesday, I went up to Portland for an interview today to convince the authorities that I was safe to have my US Residency renewed (aka Green Card).  So last Tuesday, when I was writing these words, I thought I would just grab something quickly for today’s post.  Christine’s TED talk seemed an easy answer.

I started to watch the video and within just a few minutes was overwhelmed with Bruce Muzik’s story.  At the 7 minute mark I paused the video and wrote these words.  The title of today’s post comes from the video just a moment after the 7 minute point.

While the video is about Bruce confronting his inner fears over his racial prejudices, and is no less moving for doing that, there was another message surfacing in parallel in my consciousness.

As I wrote not so long ago under the title of Going beyond the self, “the human psyche lives in a bubble of delusion.”  In the same way that Bruce had to cast aside his delusions and embrace the reality of black people, we have to cast aside our delusions about the way the world is heading.  Which is why Christine’s title How Our Secrets Steal Our Lives was just perfect.

So without further ado, here is that speech by Bruce Muzik. Twenty minutes of pure, gorgeous inspiration.

Want more? Bruce has a blog here.

E Pluribus Unum

From Many, One.

There were a great number of ‘Likes’ for John Hurlburt’s writings which were published most recently on the 1st March, Making sense of life? and on the 25th February, Fear versus Faith.

So it is with very great pleasure that I pass the baton for today’s post once more across to John.

oooOOOooo

E Pluribus Unum

We know we’re in trouble when we no longer pay serious attention to the weather, the foundations of our economy are imaginary, our pumps don’t work because our wells are running dry.  Then how we distract ourselves and loudly complain more often than we make a honest effort to maintain our balance and understand our inclusive situation.

We know we’re in trouble when we’ve moved into the rut of a manufactured illusion and furnished it, when we consume more than we produce, when equality has become a dirty word, when we believe that more guns reduce gun violence, when contempt of Congress has become a national pastime and when our supreme court has become a corporate political tool.

We know we’re in trouble when we fund both sides of a global oil war and neglect the needs of our war veterans, when we believe that we can adapt to change by standing still, when we’ve taken the culture out of agriculture, when we wage cyber war against our planetary neighbors, when an obsessive focus on money systemically corrupts our world and when democracy has a price tag.

We know we’re in trouble when there is virulent opposition to change, when a corporate backed element of our civilization insists upon obfuscation denial and obstruction, when ignorance has become more common than common sense, when a global religious faith and a major university are fractured by inappropriate physical conduct with children in the name of God and sports respectively, and when our primary purpose appears to be to consume our planet as cost effectively as practicable.

We know we’re in trouble when our rivers run dry, when our food is laced with pesticide residues, when our air is contaminated by fuel and chemical waste products, when living species are becoming extinct from the bottom of the food chain and up at a rapidly increasing rate, when we chose to ignore the realities of our natural condition as transitory inhabitants of a living planet and when we arrogantly choose to believe that we own planet earth either as a species or as individual members of a species.

We know that we’re in trouble when free speech is thought to include an unbalanced right to be aggressively ignorant, intolerant and uncompassionate despite all facts to the contrary, when we no longer believe in simple science and arithmetic and when we concentrate on undoing social issues which have been resolved in our lifetimes rather than honestly facing the confluence of problems we all share.

We know we’re in trouble when our politics are more about posturing than policy, when prisons have become a growth industry, when levels of state secrecy exceed open disclosure, when justice has a price tag, when bigotry is stronger than progress, when education is based upon opinion rather than fact and when one nation under God, with liberty and justice for all, has become a fractured nation with a dysfunctional government.

We know we’re in trouble when our legislatures have been purchased, when faith in our financial system has been willfully damaged, when political leaders engage in childish tantrums to get their way regardless of anything or anyone else, when awareness of moral reality has become meaningless and when we fail to appreciate the depths of a looming abyss. What do we gain by purposefully destabilizing our economy, reopening settled social issues and blatantly risking our inclusive future as a species for a mess of pottage?  Who do we think we are?

We know we’re on the right track when nature is more important to us than profit, when open mindedness is stronger than private interests, when media reports facts rather than conjecture and when freedom of speech is not taken to wretched excess as a psychological tool of cultural management employed for the exclusive benefit of an affluent minority.

We know we’re on the right track when our faith in power greater than our species is more significant than short-term profit, when we create equitable employment which benefits our environment, when we repair our crumbling infrastructure, when we make an effort to improve our inclusive quality of life, when war is no longer a first remedy for misunderstanding or disagreement and when we make an effort to reverse our established patterns of self destruction.

We know we’re on the right track when we tax our world stock markets because of our need for revenue based upon the fact that market trades are the only major form of financial transaction that remains untaxed, when we cultivate our cities and towns based on biological needs for clean air, water, food, and energy and when we begin to recognize the massive burden which world population growth places on our planet and take steps to balance our birth rate accordingly.

We know we’re on the right track when we realize that algae based bio-fuel will run every diesel engine in the world without modification, when we realize that our future must be beyond the earth and when we take further steps beyond our garden cradle on a journey of exploration to the stuff of the stars from which our life on earth emerges.

Change is a constant. Today is the tomorrow we dreamed of yesterday. We know we’re growing as a consciously aware life form when our faith is stronger than our fear, when we trust each other to do the next right thing and when the nature of the energy of our spiritual being is more important to us than the immediate comforts of our transitory material being. One day at a time. In God we trust.

Happy trails,

an old lamplighter

Going beyond the self.

Further reflections on reality and delusion.

I closed yesterday’s post with this quotation from Carl Sagan, “It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.“

So easy to write.  Nay, a thousand times more easy to trot out than to embrace.  Even that word embrace is too warm and fuzzy.

I’m sure that the human psyche lives in a bubble of delusion.  Clearly, if the level of delusion is abnormal then we can’t function properly as social animals.  Just take a moment or two to muse over the ways that you ‘shelter’ from reality.  Trust me I don’t exclude myself.

However, there are times when reality with a capital ‘R’ smacks us in the face.  Death of a loved one, unanticipated break-up of one’s marriage are two that come to mind.  Undoubtedly, there are others.

In yesterday’s post where I wrote of my experiences from reading Guy McPherson’s book, Walking Away from Empire, I freely admitted the struggle of embracing the truth, the Reality of where we are; ‘we’ as in industrialised man.

Aristotle
Aristotle (384 BC – 322 BC)

Reflect on the relationship that hope has with reality.  Aristotle wrote, “Hope is a waking dream” and that comes from over 2,300 years ago!

More recently, the aforementioned Professor wrote of hope:

With respect to the question, I spoke and wrote about hope way back in August 2007, when this website was launched. In that long essay — the bloated, unedited, transcript of a presentation I had delivered a few days earlier — I described hope as follows:

I view hope as the left-brain product of love, analogous to democracy as the product of freedom, or liberty. Notably, Patrick Henry did not say, “Give me democracy or give me death.” Like the rest of the founding fathers, Henry knew that freedom was primary to democracy; without the guiding light of freedom, or liberty, democracy breaks up on the shoals. Love keeps our left brain in check — that’s the message of the world’s religions. But our right-brain love creates the foundation for hope: love for nature, love for our children and grandchildren, love for each other. Without love to light the way, hope breaks up on the shoals.

Staying with Guy McPherson for a tad longer, over on Transition Voice there was an essay from him under the title of Sadly, extinction is no laughing matter.

Picking up on the Carl Sagan quote again (“It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.“) McPherson writes:

Many people disagree with Sagan, choosing delusion over reality, believing we can have infinite growth on a finite planet with no consequences for people or other creatures, other life forms, other organisms. The people in this latter group seek hope, and many of them disparage me and my actions for inducing despair.

Finally, though, I’ve concluded that hope is hopeless. As Friedrich Nietzsche pointed out, “Hope is the most evil of evils, because it prolongs man’s torment.”

To put Ed Abbey’s spin on it, “Action is the antidote to despair.” So, even though I no longer think my actions matter for humans, I’ll take action.

A worthy pity party

Near-term human extinction is a difficult pill to swallow, as is economic collapse. But ignoring ugly truths does not make them any less true. Despair is an expected and appropriate response to this information. Recognizing, accepting, and moving beyond despair are important subsequent steps.

But first, let’s despair.

Ed Abbey’s idea that action is the antidote to fear reminds me of a recent essay from Alex Jones over at The Liberated Way.  (If you haven’t previously come across Alex’s writings trust me you will be inspired!)

That essay was How to change the world published on the 28th February last.  Here’s how it opens:

Changes to self acts as ripples of change to the world.

Throw a rock into a pool it creates ripples, eventually the pool grows still again.  Like the pool nature will move to a state of harmony if given the chance.

We all know that humanity and this planet suffer many challenges.  Many feel they need to change or improve the world.  Those people fail to realise that nature knows where the state of harmony is, and is attempting to get to that state of harmony, therefore one has no need to change or improve the world.

The reason those words jumped off the page at me (OK, screen!) was the key message that letting go of what man feels compelled to do and allowing the natural forces on this planet to reign supreme is the answer.  The message that we have to go back to the natural way of doing things.  Right back to the harmony that early man had with the planet before farming corrupted our values.

Alex’s essay continues:

The problem with the desire to change the world is it becomes a form of control, attempting to force others to do something they have no desire to do. One of the problems of humanity is control, everyone trying to control each other, self and nature, which ends in conflict where nobody but the strongest wins. The problem with control is choice, liberty and creativity is taken away from those being controlled, and there is no opportunity to gain wisdom from mistakes.

I have spent too many years of my life trying to change or improve the world. I won some battles, I lost others. Worse, I became sometimes no better than those I fought against. Often control made the situation worse. I am reminded of the Greek legend of King Sisyphus who was condemned to roll a boulder up a steep hill only to see it roll down again, an activity he was condemned to repeat for all of eternity. Trying to change or improve the world was my equivalent of King Sisyphus.

The answer is to be a ripple of change to the world by doing our own thing. By changing ourselves, by living our dreams, setting an example, we emanate ripples of change into the world. We transform the world by transforming ourselves. Remember that stone that splashed into the pool? We are the stone, our activities in making ourselves happy, healthy and abundant becomes the ripples of change into the world. We force nobody to do anything, since all our efforts are focused on ourselves, we show by example which others may copy. People will follow our example since they see what we do works.

It is hard to let go, but let go we must. Change is inside rippling outwards.

It’s the old adage about change.  It first has to start from within.  As I warned in yesterday’s post, “When you read this book brace yourself for what you see staring out of the mirror back at you. There will be no room left for delusion.”

Ironically for a post that carries the title of ‘Going beyond the self” going out of oneself is the only way to see reality, to brush away delusion.  From which place one can then allow change from within to occur.

I shall close with a quote from one of my favourite authors Aldous Huxley:

“Experience is not what happens to you; it’s what you do with what happens to you.”

letgo1

Change is never easy ….

… but change is also the one constant in life.

For every one of us there is no escaping change.  It’s always been been that way; always will be.

Today, however, there’s an additional unsettling element.  I’m speaking of the growing realisation that humanity could be facing the perfect storm.  The ultimate storm of runaway climate change and the collapse of our global economy.

Therefore, when one comes across the wind of common-sense it needs to be promoted.  My reason for promoting the opening speech by Jennifer Granholm at the TED2013 conference.

Because if we are to find a way of avoiding this storm, we have to do it through innovative ways of thinking and behaving.  Each and every one of us deciding to work for a better future. (And see my P.S.)

P.S.

Back in the days of dogs living as coherent packs, one of the key roles of the alpha dog was to decide a change of territory.  Then she, because the alpha dog was always a female, would lead the pack to a better place.

So we should learn from our ancient furry friends and take personal responsibility to find a ‘better’ place for ourselves and all our loved ones.

Fear versus Faith

“Fear comes from uncertainty. When we are absolutely certain, whether of our worth or worthlessness, we are almost impervious to fear.”  William Congreve, English playwright and poet.

It’s Sunday (i.e. yesterday).  I woke around 6am to a cold morning (28 deg F/-2.2 deg C), the result of a clear, moonlit night.

Then as the night sky lightened with the coming dawn, the green, forest-cloaked valleys, visible to the East through the bedroom windows filled with a white, morning mist.  In a metaphorical sense that descending mist matched a mood of gloom that was trying to descend on me.

Early morning mist, Merlin, Oregon
Early morning mist, taken 7:15 am Sunday, 24th Feb.

As I lay back against the headboard of the bed, Jean still sleeping close to me, dogs Cleo, Hazel and Sweeny snoozing on and around me, I pondered on my mood.  It came to me that I might be picking up the growing sense of anxiety, of uncertainty, that seems to be ‘in the air’.  Me reading too many blog articles about global warming, climate change, et al.  Being three-quarters through Professor Guy McPherson’s book Walking Away from Empire: A Personal Journey wasn’t helping either!

Then I recalled a recent conversation with dear friend and colleague from our Payson, AZ. days, John Hurlburt, who said that fear is the absence of faith.  That if we trust what will be will be, then we can counter the fear of the unknown and embrace the present day, one day at a time.  Living in the now as, you’ve guessed it, that dogs do so supremely well.  Something else to learn from dogs!

I made a decision to take a stroll in the forest, emotionally speaking, for this week, so far as Learning from Dogs is concerned.  Enjoy the beauty of the world around me and offer a few essays on the meaning of life. No blog posts at all about anything that engenders fear from any quarter!

And if that doesn’t slash the readership figures, I don’t know what will! So there! You have been warned.

So let me start by offering this essay from John.  John is one of those rare people who has been through more than his fair share of ‘challenges’ over the years, yet has grown from those experiences.

Here’s John – I’m turning over and going back to sleep!

oooOOOooo

Education, Formation and Transformation

Most Americans remain comfortably complacent despite world economic brinksmanship, the escalating deterioration of our planetary environment and raging world discontent. Although we may be caring and compassionate in our personal lives, we are often reluctant to take any risk of reducing our personal comfort.

Education is a process. A process of learning how to think life through in order to become aware of whom we are, what we are, where we are, and why we exist. Education has always been the human gateway to a better future.

Knowledge does not guarantee wisdom. Education, formation and transformation are an integrated process which includes studying to gain knowledge, making natural connections based on the best information available, and experiencing the higher levels of conscious awareness we recognize as wisdom. The educational process works best when it is open minded, factual and sustained. We learn best when we learn together.

The human wisdom tradition is rich in myth, mysticism, symbols, imagination and creativity. It tells a common story of emergence through centuries of sacred writings stretching back through time to the earliest human cave scratchings roughly 17,000 years ago, and the beauty of the prayers of the Rig-Veda 12,000 years ago which all begin with an homage to the natural energy of the Sun.

We’re conscious components of a living planet. We’re surface dwellers with exposure to universal and planetary energies. Our species is only 200,000 years old. The universe is roughly 13 billion years old. Our planet is deteriorating and we’ve lost our collective moral compass. What can we do to make a local difference?

We only recently learned to hunt woolly mammoths in packs using bows, arrows and spears as tools. A perception of God in relation to our responsibility to each other and creation exists as the foundation of a human wisdom tradition which, relatively speaking, has just began.

In many ways, nothing seems to have changed as we have passed through successive cyclic waves of emergence and contraction. It becomes simultaneously increasingly more complex and exquisitely simple to understand. That is as we begin to realize how our metanexus emerges, contracts and turns inside out without breaking … like a pulse.

The next ten years are more important than the next several thousand years in respect to the choices we make about our biosphere.

There seems to be little doubt that our world problems are steadily increasing. What’s the next right thing to do?  It’s time to grow our conscious connection in God. It’s time to share the spring of human wisdom from the ground up. It’s time to develop a world economy which is gentle to the earth.

The Clearing Rests in Song and Shade

The clearing rests in song and shade.
It is a creature made
By old light held in soul and leaf.
By humans joy and grief,
By human work,
Fidelity of sight and stroke,
By rain, by water on
The parent stone.
We join our work to Heaven’s gift,
Our hope to what is left,
That field and woods at last agree
In an economy
Of widest worth.
High Heaven’s Kingdom come on earth,
Imagine Paradise
O dust, arise!

Wendell Berry; 1909

oooOOOooo

“The illiterate of the future will not be the person who cannot read. It will be the person who does not know how to learn.” Alvin Toffler