.JPG "Earthen Spirituality")
Living within a living, loving planet
Musings
Airline’s act of kindness astounds family
May 5th
Here is what can and has been done! Notice this happened well before the recent spate of inconsideration and violence to passengers. I always book with Southwest whenever I visit relatives in the US. They are amazingly punctual and I’ve never had or have seen a problem
Airline’s act of kindness astounds family — and deserves all the praise in the world
N BY NEWSNER 30 AUGUST 2016
“Peggy had barely taken in the shocking news before a staffer explained that the airline had re-ticketed her on the next direct flight to Denver and arranged all of the other practical details. For free, of course!
‘They offered a private waiting area, rerouted my luggage, allowed me to board first, and packed a lunch for when I got off the plane in Denver. My luggage was delivered to where I was staying, and I even received a call from Southwest asking how my son was doing,’ Peggy Uhle told BoardingArea.com.”
Delta Air Lines kicks US family off flight after row over toddler
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-39814586
“When he responds that there is nowhere for his family, including two infants, to go and no more flights, the crew member can be heard saying: ‘You guys are on your own.’”
Living in Concept
Dec 6th
Albert Camus on Happiness, Unhappiness, and Our Self-Imposed Prisons
“Those who prefer their principles over their happiness, they refuse to be happy outside the conditions they seem to have attached to their happiness.”
“For what gives value to travel is fear. It breaks down a kind of inner structure we have. One can no longer cheat — hide behind the hours spent at the office or at the plant (those hours we protest so loudly, which protect us so well from the pain of being alone). I have always wanted to write novels in which my heroes would say: ‘What would I do without the office?’ or again: ‘My wife has died, but fortunately I have all these orders to fill for tomorrow.’ Travel robs us of such refuge.”
I relate strongly to these insights. As I grow older, I realise how attached I am becoming to my routines; they become habits that I cling to and begin to cherish. They tend to cement me to the familiar where I wallow in a trough of certainty and complacency. Why is this a problem? Seeing only the familiar often results in not seeing or hearing at all what’s actually there. We live in concept, we see what we know is there and hear what we know is being spoken or brought forth. As this article says, we build walls and encase ourselves in a “self-Imposed prison.”
Let us promote positive news
May 16th
16 May 2014
Three friends return $40,000 found stuffed in couch
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-27429911
“Reese Werkhoven, Cally Guasti and Lara Russo bought the furniture from a charity shop for $20 and found the cash in several envelopes.”
Reflections on John Michael Greer’s latest blog post
Jun 9th
“The difficulty with a morphological approach to history is precisely that a sample size of more than one turns up patterns that next to nobody in the modern industrial world wants to think about.” [Pertaining to the study of an organized system or form.]
“By placing past civilizations side by side with that of the modern industrial West, Spengler found that all the great historical changes that our society sees as uniquely its own have exact equivalents in older societies.”
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 05, 2013
The Scheduled Death of God
John Michael Greer
http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.co.uk/
In my not so humble opinion, John Michael again brings us essential insights into, as I like to put it, “how to make sense of our reality, or what’s really going on here” This latest post shines a light on one of my early ideas – one that I could never develop clarity enough to feel that I understood it.
I am a history major because I found in history courses license to study several aspects of whatever I found interesting. Most probably, I favoured a morphological approach without having any idea at all what that meant. The first quote reminds me of my poorly understood opinion as to why people subscribe and hold on so tightly to structures that are illogical and moreover do not serve them. My vague understanding here emerges as a feeling that people tend to jump onto ideas that support their prejudices and views that justify how they want to be rather than how they actually are. Correspondingly, people also tend to hold firmly to ideas and concepts that support the lifestyle and morality that has brought them emotional and financial gains. As John Michael seems to me to be saying in the first quote above, many people refuse to go where the result of their reasoning might reveal gaping holes in the justifications necessary for their continued comfort achieved in behaving as they do. I’ve often said “Lies I can deal with but the truth hurts.”
Slow Travel
May 17th
Air Passenger Travel
1 May 2013
Iata: Air travel rises by 5.9% worldwide
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22369230
“The International Air Transport Association (Iata) says air passenger travel grew by 5.9% in March compared with a year earlier, boosted by emerging markets.”
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“I was intrigued to read earlier this month a thoughtful essay by leading British climate scientist Kevin Anderson arguing, in terms that will sound very familiar to regular readers of The Archdruid Report, that the failure of climate change activism to make any headway in changing people’s behavior may have more than a little to do with the fact that the people who are urging such changes aren’t making them themselves.”
John Michael Greer’s blog: WEDNESDAY, MAY 15, 2013 http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.co.uk/
Comment by Sky McCain
Although I am aware that air travel and air shipping is on the increase, I felt I needed to gather some facts, the latest if possible. We could guess that air travel was not on the wane nor diminished through at least two indicators. One, noting the huge success of an air show in the UK last year and a recent article on the increased profits of EADS who own Airbus, a successful competitor of Boeing Aerospace. Middle Eastern and Far Eastern countries are buying up aircraft like they were so many corn chips. So are people taking climate change seriously and switching to Rail? By no means. Following is an indication and perhaps a reason why not. People fly because it is cheap and convenient. Some of the more popular holiday spots are on islands that take a lot of time and money to reach by ferry. There are no cut-rate ferry lines like Easyjet, JetBlue, Flybe or RyanAir.
Let us compare prices for a round-trip from London to Heraklion, Crete
London Heathrow round-trip to Heraklion, Crete 122.99 plus £62.17 leaving at midnight! £115 leaving at 2PM. Lowest price £185.16
Flying Easyjet you only have to get to Heathrow.
To go by Train and Ferry, however is a vastly different story. These are round trip estimates.
1st Eurostar London to Paris £150
2nd Paris sleeper [1 berth] to Venice £424
3rd Ferry to Patras £424
4th Bus to Pireaus approx. £25
5th Ferry Pireaus round-trip Heraklion, Crete £224.77
So you see, we have a 3 day journey cost, not including meals totalling £1,023 That’s easily 5 times the cost for your flight holiday in Heraklion
We go a little cheaper by visiting off-season but pay at least 4 times more for staying out of the air. Not many people feel that strongly about staying out of the air unless to visit overseas close family.
Some statistics
There have been continual increases in travel & freight. For instance,
“From 1992 to 2005, passenger kilometers increased 5.2% per year, even with the disruptions of 9/11 and two significant wars. During the first three quarters of 2010, air travel markets expanded at an annualized rate approaching 10%. This is similar to the rate seen in the rapid expansion prior to the recession.”
“In a 2008 presentation[6] and paper [20] Professor Kevin Anderson of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research showed how continued aviation growth in the UK threatens the ability of that nation to meet CO2 emission reduction goals necessary to contain the century-end temperature increase to even 4 or 6C° …at the UK’s historic annual emission growth rate of 7%. Beyond 2012 if the growth rate were reduced to 3% yearly, carbon emissions in 2030 would be 28 MT, which is 70% of the UK’s entire carbon emissions budget that year for all sectors of society.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_aviation
Who you Spend Time With
Mar 24th
It was 3 months tomorrow that I fell into a deep sadness; a profound disappointment. Disappointment from the words of another, yes, but more the onset of a deeper, more penetrating disappointment in my ability to cope, to accept, to understand, to live with. I closed my heart with the familiar and time-worn response that sustained me in my youth – “You can’t treat me like this.” I’m better now, but still in shock about just how long it has taken me to, almost, recover.
I am almost there with acceptance but the disappointment has turned into sadness. I’m sad for the loss of an intangible; a broken bond – an intangible previous ability “be with” an unpleasant situation; a “be withness” that I have lost, perhaps forever.
I’ve found two items that in some ways capture my new state. See below:
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=447009095381804&set=a.435629199853127.99616.197995260283190&type=1&ref=nf
“If a friend stops speaking with you because they believed gossip about you without even asking you “your side,” then you didn’t really lose a friend.
You only lost a person who didn’t trust or believe in you…and that’s not really a loss at all.
It hurts because it feels unfair, and you would not have treated them the same way. But if that’s the choice they’ve made, you can really only accept it and let them go.
Even if you convince them this time, the absence of trust will not have changed, and will continue to hurt you in every future circumstance.”
Doe Zantamata
http://www.QuotesAboutliving.com
“Who you spend time with and who you believe is a major factor that will determine whether you are successful or not. Our aim should be to hang with people who are loving, who believe in us, who challenge us to go to the next level and who inspire us. Life is far too short to hang with people who are always negative and who want you to stay bitter and pissed off like them. It takes a lot of humility to admit when we’re wrong and to grow past our limiting beliefs. Let’s surround ourselves with people who support our growth, not necessarily the way we want, but most certainly the way we need.”
WHO YOU SPEND TIME WITH IS WHO YOU BECOME
June 27, 2011 by Mastin Kipp
http://thedailylove.com/who-you-spend-time-with-is-who-you-become/
Food for Thought
Feb 8th
I’ve been reading about some very interesting and accomplished persons such as Ramana Maharshi and Yogananda. In another article I read:
“The famed sage, Sri Ramana Maharshi, when asked about Jesus’ power to perform miracles, substantiates what Faqir Chand had taught for over forty years: “Was Jesus aware at the time that he was curing men of their diseases. He could not have been conscious of his powers. “Such manifestations are as real as your own reality. In other words, when you identify yourself with the body as in jagrat, you see gross objects; when in subtle body or in mental plane as in svapna , you see objects equally subtle; in absence of identification as in Sushupti, you see nothing. The objects seen bear relation to the state of the seer. The same applies to visions of God (Talks With Sri Ramana Maharshi, Volume I, II, and III. Tiruvannamalai: Sri Ramanasramam, 1972, pages 17 and 355).” http://www.integralworld.net/lane46.html
“The objects seen bear relation to the state of the seer.”
This statement may bring up several connections. As Vadim Zeland has said “The World is the mirror of your attitude towards it.” One of the main themes of the disincarnate voice of Seth through Jane Roberts was “You create your Reality.” It took me years to figure out that he wasn’t implying that I create the physical world or that we are not grounded in human beingness. Here is a quote:
“Your beliefs form reality. Your individual beliefs and your joint beliefs. Now the intensity of a belief is extremely important…
And, if you believe, in very simple terms, that people mean you well, and will treat you kindly, they will. And, if you believe that the world is against you, then so it will be in your experience. And, if you believe…IF YOU BELIEVE THAT YOU WILL BEGIN TO DETERIORATE AT 22, then so you shall.
And, if you believe that you are poor, and always will be, then so your experience will so prove to you. Your beliefs meet you in the face when you look in the mirror. They form your image. You cannot escape your beliefs. They are, however, the method by which you create your experience.
It is important that you here realize that you are not at the mercy of the unexplainable, that you are not at the mercy of events over which you have no control whether those events are psychological events or physical ones, in your terms.
As I have told you, there is little difference if you believe that your present life is caused by incidents in your early infancy or by past lives over which equally you feel you have no control. Your events, your lives, your experiences, are caused by your present beliefs. Change the beliefs and your life changes.” –Seth
How you see the world, what the world is “like” for each of us depends on our basic belief structures. They provide the forms that hold our reality and shape what we experience. Most of us would agree that we tend to see what we know is there. We exclude what we are not interested in. We typecast people and make them this way or that way depending on our image of who we think they are.
Years ago I read a story about a young man who yearned to know how to perform magic. He dedicated his life to acquiring magical powers. However, as he approached success, he began to lose the drive to perform and gradually spent his time tending to the poor and needy and lived a simple obscure life.
Moving on in this vein. This may connect with the well-known idea that if we want a better world, start within. Work on yourself first and you may then see that the “world” is perfect just as it is. How could it be otherwise? We may not be able to control the events that happen to us – although I am sure that I draw to me those things that I cannot accept and am judgemental about- we certainly are free to choose exactly how we react to them. So, perhaps there is some truth to a statement such as: If you want a better world then be a better person.
I’ve just remembered Richard, my past running buddy who helped me along the way. We cruised at an almost identical pace but he was always stronger near the finish line. He used to say: “Be who you is and not who you ain’t.”