The Death Of Materialism & The Rebirth Of The World

The Newtonian-Cartesian paradigm, or world view, of atomistic, dualistic, mechanistic reductionism, is a very recent, 400 year old delusion, a recent blink of the eye, and is now crumbling as an ideology, world view or paradigm. It is also by no means “scientific”. The evidence now refutes it. It is detritus, delusion, dogma, now refuted by quantum physics – and therefore, a thoroughly unscientific, lingering, but slowly dying, quasi-religious pseudo-science, clung to by dogmatic secular fundamentalists. Stop calling it scientific.

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We could say, of course, that the 400 year old paradigm, or way of viewing the world, which is materialist reductionism, did have some degree of validity and usefulness – and that is true, of course. It divided the world, *in our minds*, into myriad, ever smaller pieces, giving rise to an explosion of knowledge about the way natural phenomena arise, change, and pass away. But knowledge is not understanding, much less wisdom. And dividing the world in our minds has ultimately proven disastrous – nay, catastrophic – leading us toward the brink of self-annihilation, while destroying and despoiling life on Earth at ever increasing speeds, and while producing great and increasing conflict, strife, alienation, inner hollowness, a terrible loneliness, sense of meaninglessness, and an insatiable hunger to fill the resulting inner void, leading to endless consumerism, materialism, escapism, addiction, voyeurusm, vicarious living, perpetual restlessness, anxiety, depression, mental illness and compulsive entertainment addiction, thereby accelerating the downward spiral, into further alienation, hollowness, and insanity. Clearly, this must change.

The world view of materialist-reductionism could also be described as a mental map, which all theories, dogmas, paradigms, philosophies and ideologies are. Some are more usrful or more destructive than others. Nazi idrology is incredibly destructive. Materialist reductionism, which is foolishly still referred to as “science”, is only slightly less destructive – and perhaps even more destructive.

Moreover, aside from usefulness versus destructiveness, a mental map, philosophy, paradigm or world view can be assessed based upon its degree of relative accuracy, in its ability to accurately describe the nature of reality. By that measure, as well as being incredibly powerful, in ways that have in some senses been useful and beneficial, and simultaneously, in other ways, being incredibly destructive, the materialist-reductionist paradigm has, of course, some degree of accuracy or validity. We know what molecules and atoms are, how metalurgy works, etc. But its accuracy is severely limited, as a mental construct, lens, map, or way of viewing the world. What we can call this Newtonian-Cartesian paradigm, which is atomistic, mechanistic, dualistic, and materialist-reductionist, is in some measure accurate, useful, and valid. But it also grossly distorts our perception of reality, life, the cosmos, and the nature of being and reality.

Imagine if you wanted to travel the world, and you had to choose between a map made in ancient Greece in 500 BC, and a map made in the 21st century using satellite imagery. Which one would be more accurate and more useful? Clearly the 2,500 year old map had some accuracy, validity and usefulness, but it was extrenely limited, with enormous blind spots, and enormous distortions of the real world. Well, our maps are outdated, once again. And the mental map which is the Newtonian-Cartesian, materialist-reductionist paradigm or world view, is now worse than outdated and obsolete – it must be abandoned, in light of the now mountainous and undeniable evidence, and it must be abandoned now, before our extremely distorted view of the world, destroys us all. Fortunately, this is exactly what is in the process of happening, as we speak.

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A paradigm shift is underway. And the awakening has begun. Now, perhaps, we can begin to combine knowledge with wisdom, thereby saving ourselves from a self-made hell on Earth, and a self-generated final oblivion.

Reality is non-dual. Being is One. And thou art that.

But don’t take anyone’s word on things. Examine things for yourself. See for yourself.

Question everything. This is the path to enlightenment – and to a new renaissance, and a rebirth of our world.

JTR,

February 3, 2024,

Villa Samadhi,

Uruguay

(See Thomas Kuhn, The Structure Of Scientific Revolutions; Joseph Campbell, The Hero With A Thousand Faces; Aldous Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy; Alan Watts, The Book; Joanna Macy, World As Lover, World As Self; and Allan Wallace, Choosing Reality.)

The 21st Century Crisis Of Civilization

This is a reading list, not an article. I cannot repeat myself endlessly! Quality over quantity.

Excellent discussion here in the video below, but the discussion has a glaring avoidance of the political dimension. Such one-sided approaches are frankly doomed to failure, at least now, at this time in history, when radical change can not be left to a multi-generational, slow and gradual transformation.

See also:

The Structure Of Scientific Revolutions

World As Lover, World As Self

Choosing Reality

The Hero With A Thousand Faces

The Perennial Philosophy

Dreamtime and Inner Space

A Short History Of Progress

Peak Everything

When Technology Fails

Ancient Futures

The Wayfinders

Retrotopia

Year 501

Necessary Illusions

The Shock Doctrine

A Game As Old As Empire

Mutual Aid

The Chalice & The Blade

The Ecology Of Freedom

The Discourse On Voluntary Servitude

Walden and On Civil Disobedience

Oneness vs The 1%

And my own books and writings:

Enlightened Democracy

The People vs The Elite

The Failure Of Propaganda

Importing From China

Sinking All Ships

When Liberals & The Left Lose Their Minds

The Worst Of Both Worlds

Why The Left Libertarians Are Right

Flash Drive Revolution

The Collapse Of The West

And

Slavery vs Rebirth,

– Which together, synthesize the core reading list above, and much, much more.

Note also:

The answer to our 21st century crisis of civilization cannot be found in the psychological-philosophical-spiritual-cultural spheres alone. The political-economic sphere must also be directly, and urgently, simultaneously addressed – as my work and Vandana Shiva’s work do, and to a frankly rare degree.

The outer affects the inner, as much as the inner affects the outer. Neglecting the political-economic dimensions can only lead to catastrophe. We need to bridge and unite the two realms, the inner and the outer, and now.

JTR,

Villa Samadhi,

Uruguay,

December 25, 2023

The Global Fascist Coup: Time To Face Reality

We need to stop making the irrational and unfounded, anti-empirical assumption that the corporate and financial elite are stupid – they are demonstrably sociopathic, but they are not stupid, as a class – and it would be stupid of them to not cooperate and coordinate, orchestrate, plan and carry out broad agendas based on their shared, common class interests, despite the obvious fact that they do compete with each other, as well. Of course they have broadly shared class interests, and of course it woulf be stupid of them to refuse to cooperate and coordinate broad agendas based on those shared interests. Therefore it is stupid of us to assume they do not act, in powerful ways, with coordinated, planned agendas, now globally, to further their shared interests. How is this not patently obvious and a matter of simple common sense?

There are only a few hundred power elites dominating most of the world, directing the biggest 1,000 corporations, the IMF, World Bank, WEF, WHO, G7, BIS, ECB, Fed, Big Ag, Big Tech, Big Pharma, Big Oil, the military-industrial-surveillance complex, the NGO-industrial complex, the major media, Blackrock and the big banks, and all major systems and institutions globally, as Peter Phillips showed in his recent book, Giants: The Global Power Elite. A terror and phobia of conducting such sociological, classed-based, systems or institutional analysis, is what has blinded the mainstream, academia, and particularly the left, for a long time now. Enough of that. Yes, the plutocrats have a plan, and no, it is not good for the people and the Earth. In fact, it is genocidal, ecocidal, war-mongering, imperialist, neo-colonialist, and fascist. To avoid all discussion or even thought of that obvious and by now undeniable fact, is simply foolish, and a matter either of a confirmed Stockholm syndrome, or sheer denial. It’s not merely an elephant in the middle of the room, which the public, the academics and above all the left refuse to acknowledge. It’s a mutated giant vampire squid in the middle of the room, so to speak, staring us in the face, though always camoflauged – and it is feeding off humanity and the Earth, and devouring both, along with our freedom, our human rights, our democracy, our future, our world, and with transhumanism, our very humanity itself. It’s time to deal with reality. Stop skirting the central issue of our time. A corporate-fascist coup is underway, and if we don’t admit it, then defeat it, our future will be dystopian and bleak, neo-feudal and horrific, followed by civilizational collapse, and quite possibly, the slow, agonizing death of the human species.

Time to face reality, head on. We can defeat this latest of empires, but only if we choose to deal with reality, by looking it straight in the face.

– J. Todd Ring,
Author of Enlightened Democracy, The People vs The Elite, The Collapse of the West, and Slavery Or Rebirth

Villa Samadhi,

Uruguay,

December 24, 2023

(Btw, Christmases will be merrier when we rip the vampire squid off our face.)

Progressivism As Social Engineering For Elite Control

“Progressivism” as social engineering for billionaire elites’ increased power and control – that is its history and origin, and that continues to be its nature today.

But don’t take anybody’s word on things. Examine things for yourself. Think for yourself. Question everything.

See also, my essay, When Liberals and The Left Lose Their Minds.

And again, bravo Doug Mckenty, my friend, for the brilliant discussion in the video below, which inspired this brief, pithy post!

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And yes, we must unite all forces of opposition to tyranny in any form, be it fascism, communism, technocracy, colonialism, neocolonialism, neoliberalism or neoconservatism, all of which are simply forms of tyranny, empire and authoritarian rule.

That means we must unite the grassroots libertarians, populists and decentralists, of both the left and the right – who represent the sentiments of the growing majority of the people globally.

The spirit of the time is towards freedom, diversity and decentralization. The age of empires is beginning to collapse. Simultaneously, the global awakening and new renaissance has already begun, and will triumph in the end.

That does not mean, however, that we can afford to be complacent. We cannot. The time to slow down, pause, decouple and disconnect, in order to deeply reflect, and thereby be able to truly reconnect – to our deeper selves, one another, nature, our own inner power, and our reality – is now. And likewise, the time for clear-minded, open-hearted action, is now.

A new world is being born, out of the collapsing dystopia of the presently ruling imperial system. We must now become the stewards, catalysts and midwives, to the birth of the new renaissance, and to a better world for all, in the spirit of freedom, compassion, ecology, and peace.

JTR,
December 2, 2023
Villa Samadhi,
Uruguay

Post-Script:

Watch for my newest books:
Slavery Or Rebirth,
And
The Collapse Of
  The West.

My books, interviews, podasts, bibliographies and articles are on Rumble, WordPress, BlogSpot, Substack, Amazon, Barnes & Noble,
Nolan Chart, Youtube, Spotify, Facebook and Twitter.

The origins of progressivism

The Heart Of The Perennial Wisdom

Or,

The Heart Of The Perennial Philosophy

The Crux, Or Core Of The Matter:

What is the nature of good and evil, being and reality?

An open letter to two fine gentlemen, on my favourite philosophy podcast:
Seekers Of Unity

I must say, with great respect, this is an excellent and extremely rare caliber of discussion, which is extraordinarily helpful to our world at this critical, pivotal time of global crisis; but it is a discussion between two individuals who self-evidently have never tasted, or glimpsed, reality.

I speak, by the way, not from theory, nor speculation, but from direct experience, frankly, because it must be said. The world is in too much peril for mincing of words or excessive delicacy.

Humility or non-humility has no bearing on it, once it is directly realized there truly is no self, and no duality of subject and object, self and other, whatsoever. Moreover, false modesty merely sows confusion, when what we need is clarity, above all. If you know how to walk, you do not say, No, I do not know how to walk. If you have seen, then you have seen. It is simply a matter of straight forward fact.

I do not have time to elaborate here, but as to the four critiques of the perennial wisdom, points 1, 3 and 4 are demonstrably false, and easily refuted. Point two is invalid, being a statement which can stem only from ignorance, from a dweller in the cave of shadows, from one who has never opened his eyes, and has not seen.

The central issue, however, is this: theory will never suffice. You can debate to the end of time, and remain forever in ignorance. The point is to deeply examine things for yourself, via a true radical empiricism, yes, and to actually see.

When the direct experience of the non-dual/interdependent nature of being and reality arises, there are no more questions, and no more theories – you know. Only the subtleties of interpretation and refinement of vision remain to be addressed, if even that. Reality becomes self-evident, and undeniable, for the first time. Until then, debate, discuss, and theorize all you like. But keep a true modesty about it, because you are still blind men in a dark cave.

As to the question of evil: universal, unconditional, subjectless, objectless compassion is the natural state of the awakened mind that directly perceives the non-dual nature of being and reality; moreover, it is compassion which itself opens the gates of wisdom, because it is the primary antidote to the ego-grasping which both stems from and also perpetuates the delusion of duality. That is to say, the door to enlightenment is opened solely through the key that is compassion. Compassion is therefore integral to the path, as well as the result. This is the union of the outer and inner, the exoteric and esoteric, the sutrayana path and the vajrayana path, the causal and result vehicles, in other words, or the relative and the absolute.

Furthermore, compassion is enlightened self-interest and basic intelligence, for all things are interconnected and truly one. Like ripples in a pond, whatever we send out, sooner or later echoes back, reverberates and returns to us. This is the nature of interdependence, which is the manifest dance of the non-dual ground of being itself.

The question of evil is therefore answered best, and answered adequately, solely by the perennial wisdom of the non-dual view, and by no other.

Whence evil? Evil is greed and hate, stemming from the delusion of duality, which Socrates and the ancient Greeks called, somewhat euphemistically, ignorance. Cut the root of ignorance, or more precisely, delusion, and evil ceases to arise. Until then, it is temporary, bandaid solutions only that are possible.

Or if we simply wish for freedom, liberation, happiness or peace, either for ourselves, others, or both, then it is likewise either piecemeal, temporary bandaid measures, or it is enlightenment. You take your pick.

Again: Brilliant, important work you are doing, yes; but be aware that there is indeed more to heaven and earth than is contained in your philosophy.

– With much love,
J. Todd Ring,

Villa Samadhi,

Uruguay

November 27, 2023

Here is the original podcast, referred to above – which is, as I say, excellent, though by necessity limited, as was already explained:

For further reflection:

Why The Globalist Technocracy Will Fail

The globalist corporate elite have announced their plans for the world, via the WEF, the World Economic Forum’s publicly released vision for 2030, among other venues. Their plan is most accurately described as a global neo-colonial imperialist project of consolidating and further centralizing all power, all wealth, and all ownership, in their hands.

It is a hybrid global system they are pushing hard to construct now, which fuses Western corporate-fascism with Chinese corporate-communism, technocracy, transumanism and neo-feudalism. To call their vision dystopian would be a radical understatement. But their plan, which has been described as the Third Industrial Revolution by Jeremy Rifkin, the seemingly well-meaning but woefully naive intellectual in residence to the ruling Western power elite, who makes Klaus Swab and Yuval Harari look like the pseudo-intellectual talking poodles that they are; and which has been called The Fourth Industrial Revolution by Klaus Schwab, the lapdog spokesperson for the corporatist power elite; will fail. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, as well as by evil ones. Here is why the technocracy will fail.

1. Global warming and the ecological crisis broadly can only be adequately addressed if small-scale, community-based, regenerative organic agriculture, permaculture, agroecology and holistic management are at the centre of our response. The elitists at the WEF and in Beijing, however, refuse to share power; therefore, this plan, which empowers the people and is radically decentralist, is rejected outright. That leaves the plutocrats of the West and the oligarchs of the East, only one choice remaining, and that is to further back the utterly failed petrochemical-industrial agriculture model, which has already been proven to be an economic, social and ecological disaster.

Pursuing the elite-driven, hyper-centralist plan, with industrial agriculture as its foundation, will only lead to further acceleration in species loss, pollinator die-off, global warming, global toxicity and pollution, aquifer depletion, soil erosion and soil depletion, pesticide and herbicide resistslant super-pests and super-weeds spreading, desertification, crop failure, food shortages, skyrocketing food prices, global famine, social unrest, riots and revolution, and systems collapse. And no amount of “big data”, “connectivity”, AI, lithium batteries, smart phones or surveillance, can possibly save it.

It is a system that is rapidly destroying its own social and ecological foundations. In other words, the power elites’ plan is just another historical example of imperial hubris and imperial over-reach, leading to inevitable collapse.

2. The Davos-WEF/Bejing-CCP plan relies on vast quantities of rare earth minerals, that simply aren’t there – lithium being just one example. Therefore, it is not renewable energy which will save us, but the more humble and courageous approach, of admitting that we have been addicted to materialism and consumerism, and that a voluntary simplicity, combined with decentralization, re-ruralization, re-localization, horizontal rather than vertical power relations, and a radical increase in quality of life, diversity, and freedom, are what are urgently needed now.

Again, the plan of the power elite is based in hubris, and wishful, magical thinking, or else in outright lies, and can only result in systems collapse.

3. The plan of the now deeply intertwined and partnered Western and Eastern power elites, rests upon further heights of complexity, in an already vastly over-complicated modern society. It furthermore centralizes power in an even more extreme manner and degree than already exists. And it further increases the already stratospheric inequality, in both power and in terms of wealth – “You’ll own nothing, and you’ll be happy.” As has been known for a long time, by Tainter, Aristotle, and others, over-complexity, excessive centralization, and excessive inequality, all lead to the collapse of regimes, empires, civilizations and societies. But, as is typical, imperial power elites are driven by egomania, power-lust and greed, and therefore, their hubris becomes their downfall, because imperial over-reach is something they cannot help, but compulsively fall into, every time. No matter how tall the ziggurat is built, it remains a castle made of sand – and the tide is coming in.

4. The financial and economic collapse that is rapidly approaching, which will make the Great Depression look mild, will devastate the ability of the Western and Eastern power elite, both, to carry out any such bold plans, beyond mere coping with matters of survival, as their empires collapse – financially and econonically, and also socially and politically, as revolution and rebellion explode world-wide, in the wake of the combined squeeze on the people – of economic devastation, simultaneous with a growing authoritarianism and staggering inequality.

The harder the oligarchy squeezes the people, the more rapidly the explosive flash point is reached. It is like squeezing plutonium: add enough heat and pressure – and boom. But again, all emperors and all empires do the same thing: imperial hibris breeds imperial over-reach, which brings collapse. So boom it is. Bastille Day is coming, fast.

5. Global oil production peaked several years ago, meaning, the era of cheap, abundant, fossil fuel energy is rapidly coming to an end. Between peak oil, and a peak in nearly everything else, including critically important rare earth minerals, the power of the twinned, Siamese empires of Davos and Beijing, and their ability to project their power, not only globally, but even locally and regionally, is rapidly crumbling beneath their feet. These two leading crime syndicates, which are the twinned, and now deeply intertwined, dominant empires on Earth, may be able to retain control of certain nations, regions, and totalitarian mega-cities for a while yet, but their twilight is approaching – and their collapse is now irreversible, and well underway.

6. Meanwhile, a global awakening, and a new renaissance, is not only emerging, accelerating, and growing fast – by now, it is unstoppable. The ruling power elite are trying to hold onto a dying worldview, paradigm, ideology, and system. But history is against them.

Nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has come. And the pen is indeed mightier than the sword. The idea of freedom, with ecological stewardship, diversity and peace, is simply far more inspiring, and compelling, than an elite-ruled plutocracy, technocracy, or neo-feudal oligarchy, where a handful of people hold total power, and the values of freedom and individuality are said to be quaint relics of the past, “legacy” values, to be abandoned and dispensed with, in the pursuit of an imagined “greater good” – which is itself a lie. The people are waking up. And moreover, they are also waking up to their power.

7. As David Hume, Eitienne de La Boite, Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr. and Thoreau, among many others, have realized, the people always have the greater power. The ruling power elite depend upon, and need the people, but the people do not need the power elite. That means the people always have the greater power. Moreover, we outnumber the ruling power elite by nearly a billion to one. They have no chance.

When the people become fed up with a ruling system, power elite or regime, they will shake it off, like a dog shakes water off its back. And that time is coming soon. The plutocrats know this – which is why they are building bunkers as fast as they can, or else are daydreaming, a la Bezos and Musk, of blasting off into space. But even their bunkers will only forestall the inevitable, and for a very short time at that. Ozymandians of today, take note. Your time in power is nearly up.

Conclusion:

What do we have on offer now, at this most critical juncture in recorded human history, in terms of a vision for the future? Well, we have many voices, but few options.

There are, of course, many who echo Jordan Peterson, in saying that global corporatist neoliberalism is the best of all possible worlds. They can be dismissed at the start, being the Dr. Panglosses of our present day.

Then there is the dark Orwellian technocratic vision of Klaus Schwab and the new Royal Court, the new Palace of Versaille, which is the corporate-state de facto government, as the Financial Times calls it – the World Economic Forum – which aims for a global Borg society, based in transhumanism and technofeudal totalitarianism, in which “You’ll own nothing, and you’ll be happy.” If you like nightmarish dystopianism, this vision may be appealing.

Or we have the equally bleak vision of Yuval Harari, telling us the world is full of “useless eaters”, who are presumably disposable, along with the lucky few, who, like himself, will be willing if not eager Borg slaves, rather than be liquidated.

Yuval and “Dr. Evil” Klaus Schwab are in accord here, of course, both being the talking poodle lapdogs of the ruling corporate oligarchy. Both preach the beatitudes of neo-fascism and technofeudalism. Hell on earth, is what their “vision” amounts to.

Then we have the rosy eco-lah-lah of the tragically naive and blinkered Jeremy Rifkin, with his magically appearing mountains of lithium, with which to power his techno-wonderland, in which the elephant in the room, which is the emerging totalitarian police state, is imagined not to exist, and to be no threat at all. Cue the Pink Floyd, Sheep.

Or, we have several voices bearing imminent sanity, including, frankly, Vandana Shiva and myself, saying that it is now a matter of Oneness vs The 1%, and The People vs The Elite – and what must be done is to embrace our freedom and our power, and to heal our world through a much more thoughtful ecological stewardship, through unity in diversity, through a globally networked and federated decentralization of power, and through a rejection of all empires and oligarchies: to reseed the world and the future of our one human family on Earth, and build a better world for all, through a global renaissance and rebirth – based in the cardinal founding values of freedom, compassion, diversity, mutual aid, ecology and peace.

I think our choice should be clear. It is now a matter of freedom and rebirth, or technocracy and slavery, followed by collapse, and the extinction of the human species itself.

*

It is now a matter of slavery or rebirth. Let the revolution begin. And let it be Gandhian, as it must be, for strategic reasons alone. The empires are falling. The time is now.

J. Todd Ring,

Author of Enlightened Democracy, The People vs The Elite, The Collapse Of The West, and Slavery vs Rebirth.

Villa Samadhi,

Uruguay,

November 17, 2023

The New Renaissance

There is a renaissance emerging now across humanity, as well as a paradigm shift in science; and a spiritual awakening is occurring, along with a political and cultural awakening. How do we best understand this historically pivotal shift?

The trends are toward: 

1. a non-dualist view of the wholeness, unity, interconnectedness, interdependence, and sacredness, of all life and all living beings, nature and the cosmos; 

2. a more inclusive, and less sectarian, more tolerant and pluralistic, cosmopolitan world view, approach to life, approach to scholarship, and approach to spirituality; 

3. an emphasis on experience, radical empiricism, and the mystical or more subtle dimensions of daily life, science, scholarship and spirituality; and what corresponds with it is a more humble and open-minded approach to life, science, scholarship, politics and spirituality; which, paradoxically, allows for, and nourishes and supports: 

4. a rebirth of human dignity, confidence, and mutual empowerment; along with, 

5. a rebirth, renewal, and resurgence of the local, in a spirit of federated, networked, and decentralized unity in diversity. 

I may be forgetting major elements here, but these seem to me to be the core five, in terms of the renaissance that is emerging now across the world.

The primary obstacles to the new renaissance which is unfolding now, are not, generally speaking, coming from dogmatic religious orthodoxy, which is waning, but from two major areas or sociological groups. 

First, it is no longer religion which is the bastion of absolutist dogmatism, but materialist science, and other forms of secular fundamentalism. Religion has begun to reclaim its core, which is experiential, and thus, radically empirical; and has begun to remember the mystery at the heart of being, which is also the heart of all religious doctrine or orthodoxies. (Certainly in the big seven: Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Taoism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and indigenous spirituality.) Mainstream science, however, having been confronted for over a century by an emerging paradigm shift, has dug in its heels, and become fanatically unscientific, even anti-scientific, anti-empirical, quasi-religious and deeply dogmatic, in its strident defense of the dying ideology of materialist reductionism.

To this we can add the other secular fundamentalists, which include the entire economics profession, and most of the political class, who are both stridently and dogmatically committed to the quasi-religious orthodoxy of corporate globalization, technocracy and neoliberalism. And of course, the business elite share this messianic faith, because it serves their interests; since all three of these strands of the new Holy Trinity are summed up in its essence, which is the merger of the business elite and the state – which as Mussolini said, is the definition of corporatism, which itself is the proper term for fascism.

These are the enemies and the roadblocks to the new renaissance which is being born now – not the clergy, but the new secular clergy of the corporate-state empire, and the Big Tech, Big Pharma, Big Oil, Big Agra, and Big Banks who control it; along with the scientists, academics, the medical-industrial complex, the bureaucrats and the technocrats and the media who support it, whether wittingly, or more commonly, unwittingly.

We should remember, however, that nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time is come. And the heart of the new renaissance is a new set of ideas, all constellating around the central realization of, or reawakening to, the basic and fundamental interconnectedness, oneness, and sacredness, of all life and all living beings. That reawakening can be slowed, to some degree, it can be fought against, and it is being fought against, viciously and rabidly, but it cannot be stopped. And it will result, in the end, not just in a greater level and quality of awareness, but in a transformation of our world – including, a rebirth of democracy and freedom, and a sweeping away of the dying age of empires.

Nourish the light. We are winning. Even though things look dark, and will get darker yet before the dawn, the awakening will not be stopped, but will triumph.

J. Todd Ring,

May 26, 2021

Post-Script:

What are the core values of the new renaissance which is emerging now around the planet, and across humanity? To start, I would say that the values presented in the classic children’s film, The Wizard of Oz, are the founding values of a rebirth and a new renaissance of humanity – and they are: 1. courage; 2. compassion – or heart; and 3. presence of mind – or a functioning brain; and equally critically, 4. the valuing of truth over lies and illusions, and the willingness to question authority and question the norm: Do look behind the curtain! But there are other values that are re-emerging as well, and which I believe are fundamental. They include:

Liberty, equality and solidarity – the founding values of the Enlightenment, and of modern democracy, and the founding values of the American and French Revolutions.

Constitutional democracy and human rights – including the inalienable right to sovereignty over one’s own person, body and mind.

Unity in diversity

Decentralization – and a rejection of big government, big business, and increasingly fragile, long supply chains

Holistic health and wellness – the wish to not merely live or get by, but to truly thrive

Adaptability, self-reliance – or better yet, community self-reliance; and resilience.

That makes 15 key values for a new renaissance; and I would argue that these values will serve us well, and should be preserved, nourished, supported, and defended. Our future, in truth, depends upon strong values such as these, more than anything else – certainly more than technology, material wealth, government, billionaires or big business.

Excerpts from two Chinese poems summarize what we most need now – and fortunately, this is exactly what is emerging:

The first poem is titled, The Peasant’s Song. And of course, some people will object, saying, “I don’t want to be a peasant!” But what they do not realize, is that we are already peasants, and are becoming more so every day. John Lennon was right: “You think you’re so clever and classless and free, but you’re still fucking peasants as far as I can see”. At least, if we are to be peasants, we can have freedom, good health, and a good life – if we choose them. That certainly beats being reduced to the level of serfs, or worse, which is the trajectory for most of the 99% now.

But to return to the poems:

“Sunups, we get to work;
sundowns, we get our rest.
Dig wells and drink,
plow fields, to eat:
what has some “emperor”
to do with us?”

“The long and short of it:
from what flows: grasp the best…
Left and right, we pick and choose, the finest.”

Let us forget, or at least set aside, the old notions of left and right, and forget, or at least set on the shelf, for the moment, the old battlegrounds of quarreling ideologies, clannishness and in-fighting. We must unite the people now. We must unite the 99% – or at least that small but dedicated, and growing minority, who hold that the core values of freedom, ecology, good health and peace, are the values that matter most, and are the values that can, and should, and must unite us now.

Decouple from the dying empire, I say, and let the building of a new world, begin in earnest.

JTR,
July 31, 2021

See also, for critical texts and essential reading:

Oneness vs The 1%, by Vandana Shiva

The Ecology of Freedom, by Murray Bookchin

World As Lover, World As Self, by Joanna Macy

And my own writings:

Enlightened Democracy

The People vs The Elite

And coming soon:

All Hell Breaks Loose: Global Geopolitics 1945-2045

What is Enlightenment?

Further Notes On The Dualistic Illusion

(This ought to raise the hackles of the fundamentalists – both secular and religious. But I don’t write for the narrow of mind anyway, so I am not concerned about that.)

Now here is someone who knows what he is talking about: Rabbi David C. Cooper explains what non-dualism is, from the perspective of Kabbalah, which is the Jewish mystical tradition.

(Radio recording of talk is linked below.)

“The idea that we have of God as some being, as some thing, in essence, as a noun that we relate to – it’s me and God, or the creation and the creator – is really not the way mystical Kabbalah looks at the divine. It relates to God in what they term Ein Sof, which can be translated as boundlessness, which has no characteristic and no description, and is constantly present everywhere at all times, and is not some *thing*. So, the closest that we can come to, is describing it as a process, and this is the reason for the idea of God as a verb.”

(Note the similarity and congruence with Whitehead’s concept of the cosmos and all that is within it, and reality itself, as being a *process*, and not an assortment of things. We should look again at Whitehead, and Einstein, and Schrödinger, and Wheeler, and Bohm, because they are each saying something very similar to what the mystics have said for millennia – and are still saying, if any have ears to hear!)

“In the end, the East and West come together in the deepest meditative practices” – Rabbi David Cooper

And what Rabbi David Cooper says, is perfectly in accord with what Meister Eckhart said – and Meister Eckhart is the archetypal Christian mystic:

“There is nothing that I can point to that is not God. God is within me, and God is all around me.” – Meister Eckhart, 13th century Christian Dominican theologian, philosopher, and Germany’s greatest mystic (along with Hildegard of Bingen, who in turn, inspired St. Francis, and Da Vinci, and the Renaissance).

The New Testament Bible also sheds light on the subject, when the story is told of the disciples asking Jesus when the kingdom of heaven would come. (Everyone was expecting it any day.) And Jesus answered:

“It will not come by waiting for it.”

(There is a shocker that should make people stop and think.)

And Jesus continued:

“If the kingdom of heaven was above you the birds would have preceded you. If the kingdom of heaven was beneath you the fish would have preceded you. Rather, the kingdom of heaven is within you.”

Remember, we are created in the image of God. And moreover, how can all-pervasive mean anything other than all-pervasive? All-pervasive means, unless we are deeply neurotic or deeply indoctrinated into mumbo-jumbo double-think, quite simply, non-duality. All-pervasive is all-pervasive. That means there is nothing that is outside of God. God is the very fabric of reality, as the Jewish mystics have said: “God is the only reality.” And that is not a philosophical idealism which is being presented, but a non-dualist view.

How do evil and suffering arise? Evil arises from dualistic illusion – namely, the clinging to the illusion of a separate self, or ego, and all the greed, conflict, anger, lust, possessiveness, hubris and hate that arise out of self-cherishing and egocentricity. Suffering likewise arises out of not knowing who we are or even what is real. Suffering arises from the illusion of duality, the illusion of separateness and lack. This is precisely why the ancient Greeks held the highest maxim to be “Know thyself”, and why the founder of Western philosophy, Socrates, had that maxim written on his tombstone. Know thyself. Become awake. Seek enlightenment. They are saying the same thing. Wake up! Seek and ye shall find. “Let those who have eyes see.”

And in the Old Testament, God spoke, saying, “I AM that I am.” The clear indication was and is that God is beyond all names and forms, and all of our ideas or concepts, utterly transcendent – and the mystics, and Jesus, both avowed, imminent as well as transcendent. And when the sacred is both imminent and transcendent, and is not limited by any specific form, that is non-dualism, by definition.

Which is why Meister Eckhart could describe God as “the ground of being”. This is based in Biblical teachings, as well as his own direct experience as a mystic. Again, the maxim of Socrates and the ancient Greeks now makes perfect sense: know thyself, and all shall be revealed – because the true nature of your own being, is the true nature of Being itself, the Being of beings, as Heidegger tried to get at. Or as Bob Marley said, “Open your eyes, and look within.”

And that non-dualistic view echoes all the great sages, as I have said. In the Upanishads, the sacred texts of India, it is said, echoing Jesus, when it is said in the Bible, “The kingdom of heaven is within you”, and echoing the Old Testament passage, where God says, “I AM”, the Upanishads puts it directly: I am that I am – “And thou art that.”

The central teaching of the yogis is, Tat Tvam Asi, which translates as, Thou art that. Meaning, there is no duality between God and the cosmos, or between you and God.

The dualistic illusion is represented mythologically and allegorically, in the PARABLE, not to be taken literally, of the exile from Eden. We exiled ourselves, by falling into the (false) “knowledge” of duality. We fell into dualistic illusion, and hence, suffer for our illusions, and because of our illusions. We have lost our sense of home, and of paradise, because we have become blind, by way of falling into the spell of illusion – the illusion of duality. But the Book of Genesis has been taken far too literally for 3,000 years – and that is precisely why we are lost.

The Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist and Taoist mystics all have understood this. It is high time we did too.

(See: Joseph Campbell, The Hero With A Thousand Faces; Allan Wallace, Choosing Reality; Joanna Macy, World As Lover, World As Self; Karen Armstrong, A History of God; Rabbit David Cooper, God Is A Verb; and Mathew Fox, Original Blessing, for important, further reading.)

We can be free, and awake, if we choose it. Grace is present. And duality, is an illusion.

As the Dalai Lama said, the universal religion is love. So on the outer level, the level of social and ethical teachings, there is a basic accord between the major religions: love thy neighbour. And when you get to the spiritual depths, to the mystic heart essence of the major religions, there too, you find accord: being and phenomena, reality and the cosmos, are non-dual.

Only the blind quarrel over what stands before them. One blind man says it is like a rope – feeling the elephant’s trunk. One says, no, it is like a pillar, feeling the leg. One says, no, it is like a broom, feeling the tail. One says, no, it is wrinkly – like a crumpled rug! And so they argue, and argue, and argue, and argue…..

As the Quran also says, everywhere you look is the face of Allah. Again, non-dualism is at the heart of the spiritual traditions of the world, as all the greatest religious scholars, such as Joseph Campbell, have also realized. And again, only the novices quibble.

(Meanwhile, the atheist materialists miss the banquet altogether, and stuff themselves on their own hollow dogmas, which never truly satisfy – which is why they tend to be so thorny and full of venom!)

The majority have a pre-school version of religion, and that is perfectly fine, but that is not all there is to spirituality – it goes much deeper than that.

Faith is not belief. There is a critical thing to understand. Faith, if it is sensible, is confident trust. When you put your food in the refrigerator, you have faith it won’t rot. You have confident belief, or confident trust. That is reasonable, sensible faith. Faith is not dogmatism, however. That is idiot faith. That is egotism, false pride, hubris, arrogance, narrowness, parochialism, prejudice, presumption, or smallness of mind.

Faith is confident trust, or confident belief. But when you SEE, you no longer need to rely on mere belief. Belief is the crutch of the blind – use it only until you learn how to see for yourself, and regain your lost sight. Then, belief becomes teaching – not a crutch, but a gift, freely given, to those who still remain sightless and blind, so they too can find their way. But “one who has seen”, does not cling to belief as though belief is salvation. No, belief does not save. Faith saves, and faith is not belief.

Realize who you are, and you will see. Then belief no longer enters into it.
Belief is a raft. When you get to the other shore, you don’t carry the raft on your back. You put it down, and leave it for the next person to cross to the other shore.

The Renaissance caught a glimpse of our true nature, which is a spark of the divine – and it was that glimpse that brought Europe out of the Dark Ages. And that glimpse, and the resulting Renaissance, is exactly what we need again today.

“We are stardust, we are golden,We are caught in a devil’s bargain,And we’ve got to get ourselvesBack to the garden.” – Joni Mitchell, Woodstock

Alan Watts – who was an Anglican priest, but then decided it was too narrow of a space for him to be in, and who did his Masters of Divinity, and studied extensively and in great depth the philosophies and spiritual approaches of both East and West, and is probably the single greatest interpreter of Eastern philosophy for the Western world, and of Western religious philosophy for the Western world, which generally understands its own traditions and their richness not in the slightest – has many brilliant writings and many brilliant witticisms to convey. (He gets a bit gooey at the end, and resorts to what seems to me to be a much too laissez-faire approach, which for most people, simply induces torpor, sloth, self-indulgence, and a dreamy perpetual distraction – and a perpetual waste of time and of life, as a result. But his books which I have referenced here are extremely good, and extremely worthwhile to read. Only a rare few can match them.) In any case, he once said that there are “prickles and goos”. The prickles like to be very precise, or at least like to think of themselves as being very precise. They imagine they are being very scholarly and very scientific, but really, they are in general completely unable to see the forest for the trees. They never get beyond the mere surface of things. This, they bombastically pronounce to be “knowledge” – usually with a capital K. And wisdom, they believe, doesn’t exist. They are pretentious, blind fools, and Jesus and the Buddha would tell them the same.

The goos, on the other hand, like to reduce everything to a rosy vagueness – think, New Age pop psychology – and by doing so, they really do very little other than hang out, trying to look cool.

Precision is needed, in sum, but open-mindedness is needed too. Book learning is useful, but inadequate in itself. Experience trumps theory. Remember that.

Only novices squabble over doctrine. The mystics may engage in debate, may clarify important points, but they don’t attach such a great importance to words and belief, to doctrine and dogma and the written word, as has impaled the Western mind since the Book of Genesis.

We suffer from an idolatry of ideology in the West, and have for three millennia. (I am borrowing that phrase, from my favourite poet-musician, because it fits.) Our neurosis in the West is to think that our pet theories, dogmas and ideologies are THE truth. We are lost, precisely because we cling so tightly to our ideas.

Remember what Thomas Aquinas said after finishing the dictation of his Summa Theologica, his master work, which became the guiding text, along with the Bible (and unfortunately, along with the heresy of Augustine’s dark and jaundiced world-view, which came to overshadow the words and teachings of Christ, tragically). When he was finished, he put his head in his hands and wept, and said, “All that I have written is chaff compared to what I have seen.”

Remember what the very first line of the Tao Te Ching says:

“The Tao that can be spoken is not the true Tao.”

Words and ideas and texts are very useful, but they can never contain the full, complete or ultimate truth. Language and concepts simply fail to capture, much less convey, that which is without bounds.

Shankara, the mystic and philosopher of Advaita Vedanta, from the yogic tradition of India, spelled this out quite clearly, when he says that language and human thought are dualistic by nature: they compare this to that – and inherently dualistic language and thought, therefore, cannot possibly ever capture or convey that which by nature is non-dualistic.

Plato’s Seventh Letter echoes the same essential point: language, concepts and words can never capture or convey the ultimate truth. The same message is related in the Lankavatara Sutra, from the Buddhist teachings, and it is again echoed in the Taoist teachings, which say:

“When the rabbits are caught, the snares are forgotten.When the fish are caught, the nets are forgotten. When the truth is caught, the ideas are forgotten.”

The Tao Te Ching gets straight to heart of things, with one crucial line:

“Naming is the mother of the ten thousand things.”

Peel away the names, the labels, which our mind projects onto reality, imagining or imputing a division which does not exist, and in that open space of perceiving or seeing without dualistic thought projections, the unified field of being becomes self-evident. That realization of the non-dual, inseparable nature of being and reality, is what is called enlightenment. But no theory can deliver it. You must see for yourself. Words cannot convey it, nor can concepts, theory or ideas capture it.

As the Lankavatara Sutra says:

“All of the scriptures are like a finger pointing at the moon. If you mistake the finger for the moon, you will understand nothing.”

This is the problem with fundamentalism. Not only are fundamentalists forever fighting with one another, quarrelling, bickering, engaging in hubris and false pride perennially ad nauseum, sowing war and division and strife. There are deeper problems even than that. Fundamentalists are like people trying to climb a ladder, but they are so in love with the ladder, that they cling to the rungs, and are frozen – not realizing they are not rising at all, but are simply stuck to the ladder, like imbeciles.

The ladder is a tool, a part of the journey – it is not the destination. As Alan Watts said, if you want to go to Paris, you don’t climb the sign post that says, “Paris”. Or as he also put it, in his humourous sort of way, rascally Zen master as he was: “Intellectuals commonly make the mistake of eating the menu instead of the meal.”

Don’t be anti-intellectual. That is not helpful. That is foolish. But don’t fool yourself into thinking that theory is the same thing as experience. And it is experience that matters above all.

A scholar is not necessarily a sage, and usually is not. A pandit is not the same as a rishi, in Indian terms. One has knowledge; one has wisdom – and the two are categorically different.

Second hand information is only useful up to a certain degree. You have to walk the path for yourself. Only you can walk through the door – no one can walk through it for you. Grace is real. Help is available. But you still have to undertake the journey for yourself. No one can walk it for you. You put one foot in front of the other, and you start, naturally, where you are, wherever you happen to be.

“Knock, and the door shall be opened.” But you have to choose to walk through the door once it is opened! Having a fervent belief, or “faith” as it is erroneously called, that this door is a very good door, and maybe the only door, is not enough. No matter how fervently you believe, believing in the holiness of the door is not the same thing as walking through the door!

Study, reflect, actively seek out wisdom teachings, meditate and pray, and discuss (humbly! and with an open mind) – but remember, that which you seek cannot be contained within any limited, finite space – whether that be concepts and ideas, philosophical doctrines, theories, dogmas, ideologies or words. Truth is far bigger than that.

Empty your cup, so that it can be filled. Empty yourself of your self, so that you can be filled. Compassion empties you – and there is the secret. Empty yourself by giving, and by compassion, and the imaginary separate “self” the ego, dissolves into the space of pure Being, whereby, you become naturally filled, without even seeking anything. Compassionate action matters, but it is the emptying process that comes with true compassion which is most liberating. By that emptying of the self of the self, grace enters.

“He who saves himself will lose himself. He who loses himself will find himself.”

Confidence and dignity are virtues, and are useful, even necessary, but so too, is humility, and an open mind and open heart. Meditate on the true nature of being and phenomena, which are impermanent, and meditate on death – not to be morbid, but to really realize that all things are fleeting, and so, become truly open to life. These two meditations, combined with universal compassion, will open the door to the heart, and to wisdom.

Remember that all phenomena are impermanent, and fleeting – and this life is fleeting. Death is a certainty, and the hour of death is totally uncertain. Therefore, there is not a second to waste. This life IS a precious opportunity – to discover the sacred, here and now, in this life, in the midst of the world, or apart from it, for a time, in the heart of your own being.

Do not sprint to win the race, as the Tibetans say, and, “Don’t be sporadic.” Be patient, be persevering, but seek the truth with energy and vigour!

Remember what the Upanishads advise – and urge: “You should seek the truth like a man whose hair is on fire jumps into a lake.”

Enjoy the journey, and try not to be side-tracked or too distracted. Solomon was right: everything in this world is fleeting; therefore, chasing after things of this world is like chasing the wind. Do not do that. That is foolish, and a waste of your precious time. As Solomon advised, love God, and live a simple life. But do seek the truth, and seek it with a passion!

Again, it must be re-affirmed, and it can’t be emphasized enough:

Practice compassion, live with compassion to every extent of your power, and:

“Know thyself.”

“Seek, and ye shall find.”

J. Todd Ring,
March 14, 2021

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxEaMaOumA0

Know Your Enemy

Know your enemy and know yourself, and you will be victorious. – Sun Tzu

*

Never underestimate what a few individuals will do in pursuit of wealth, privilege, or power. The danger of a sociopathic powerful few being able to carry out monstrous acts, because the many refuse to believe such horrible acts are not possible, is an ever present danger.

The price of freedom, as well as democracy, truly is eternal vigilance. And sadly, the war on freedom and democracy is now in endgame in 2020. Inform yourself, and resist. Remember, the people always have the greater power.

And do read, or read again, Brave New World, 1984, Necessary Illusions, Escape From Freedom, The Shock Doctrine, The Ecology Of Freedom, the speeches of Martin Luther King Jr., The Discourse On Voluntary Servitude, and Thoreau’s short essay, On Civil Disobedience.

We need maximum clarity and inspiration now.

JTR,

August 15, 2020

 

Lest we forget (the awful power of denial):

 

Chaim Engel, Sobibor survivor, interview with USHMM, discussing arriving at the death camp:

http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/survivor/chaim%20engel.html

“Well let me say that we hear in Poland what happens with the Jews. They kill Jews and they gas Jews and things like that. 

But we really as young people, we really didn’t believe that something like that is possible. We thought, “Maybe the younger people will be taken to work – maybe only the older people…..” 

You just didn’t want to believe, because it was so incomprehensible, so unbelievable that something like that can happen that you just – even if you had the intelligence, you didn’t believe it.”

http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/people/e/eichmann-adolf/transcripts/Sessions/Session-066-08.html

 

Testimony from the Eichmann trial:

Attorney General: When you came there, did you know what was the place you had arrived at?

Witness Lindwasser: No. I knew it was Treblinka, but we did not know the purpose.

Q. Had you heard about Treblinka in Warsaw?

A. We had heard about Treblinka.

Q. Did you know that Jews were being exterminated at Treblinka?

A. We did not believe it.

Q. You did not believe it. Why?

A. Why? This would, perhaps, be difficult to answer. Possibly, it is an individual matter for each person. One simply could not grasp that such a thing was possible – actual extermination. Rumours reached Warsaw that the Germans were sending people out to work. And simply, it was better to cling to this idea.

Science, “Scientism”, Group-Think, & Radical Healing

 

Like acupuncture, which was pooh-pooh for decades as unscientific bunkum and hocus-pocus, but is now acknowledged by the mainstream conventional Western medical establishment to work – though our crude medical model, which is outdated by a century with the advent of quantum physics, cannot fathom how it works; things like feng shui, t’ai chi, yoga, meditation, or natural grounding of the human bio-electric field, through simply walking barefoot in the garden or on a beach, have been viewed with deep skepticism by the pseudo-scientific crowd who practice scientism, not science; and who practice a kind of medieval dogmatism, scholasticism and group-think, over actual empiricism.

But if we realize that the modern Western “scientific” view of the body, mind, cosmos and reality, is radically mistaken; the Cartesian assumption of dualism, and the Newtonian model of a mechanistic universe, with their attendant materialist reductionism following grimly along behind, are in essence a set of ideologies which are century out of date, and now radically defunct; as quantum physics, ecology, mind-body research, epigenetics, systems theory and chaos theory all confirm; and a non-dualistic view of body and mind, and all phenonmena, as radically interconnected and interdependent – as they are in reality – sheds new light on all these subjects, and many more; and what was once inconceivable, becomes at least potentially possible, if not matter of fact.

A paradigm shift, which is to say, a revolution in science, and in human consciousness, is underway. Such things take time. We have been at it for a mere century. But it is accelerating, and coming to a tipping point – and one that is not a climate disaster (which is also unfolding), but a human cultural rebirth, and a new renaissance.

*

Will yoga, t’ai chi, chi gong, pranayama, meditation, feng shui, or natural grounding of the human bio-electric field, by walking barefoot in the garden, hurt you or anyone else? Not if you do them sensibly – of course not.

Is there reason to believe these practices could be beneficial to human health, mood, or state of mind?

There is overwhelming evidence for all of the above, if we take a broader view of what we consider findings which have been corroborated empirical evidence – such as thousands of years of experience by meditators and yogis, for example. I think that is extremely strong evidence, and certainly enough to give it a try, and investigate these things for yourself, as the Buddha himself recommended.

But, if that is not enough evidence for the prickles, as Alan Watts called them, then yes, even within the artificially more narrow criteria for empirical evidence, the evidence is also compelling, to say the least – if not, in some cases, voluminous.

Benefits from such practices have been shown to include:

Stress reduction

Pain reduction

Inflammation reduction

Improved immune response

Improved cardiovascular health

Improved mood

Increased energy

Improved sleep

And much more.

My view is that if it is reasonably safe, and there is reason to believe it may possibly be of help, then why not try it, or at least investigate it? That was and is my view, and I would recommend such an open-minded, truly empirical attitude for others.

However, these things are not new to me. I can offer my own findings, which have corroborated the findings of thousands of years of practitioners – to the extent that I have been able to plumb them, which, frankly, is to a radical depth.

My own findings are clear to me, and indisputable: these things simply work – and are powerfully healing, peace-giving, regenerating, liberating, and in the case of meditation, truly enlightening.

What have you got to lose, I say? Dive in!

Consider 5 minutes a day, each, of yoga and meditation, and 5 minutes of walking barefoot in your garden, or through the woods, or on a beach or natural shoreline, as a minimal first step, and daily commitment.

Try that for two weeks, and see how you feel. I guarantee you, these things are so powerful, despite their simplicity, that they will be beneficial, whether you notice quick and obvious results or not.

Anyone can do yoga, by the way, unless you are in a coma. Be gentle, go slow, be mindful, breath calmly and deeply and consciously, and do only the postures or exercises that you are able to do without strain. (Start with wrist and ankle rotations if that is all you can do.) Your range of motion will improve with time.

And anyone can meditate. Sit comfortably, back straight, head level, and focus your attention on the sensation of breath at the tip of your nose, or “watch” as your belly rises and falls. Do not try to quiet your mind. Simply breathe.

If you can’t sit still for 5 minutes, then try walking meditation. The point is to be aware of what you are doing, and to focus on that. And yes, such a simple practice has powerful results.

15 minutes a day to feel better, stronger, healthier, happier, more peaceful, more energetic, more alive, and more well? If the benefits can be great, the cost is zero, the risk is zero, and the time commitment is 15 minutes a day, why would anyone choose to ignore the possibilities?

Explore away, I say.

Think for yourself, question everything, keep an open mind – and as the Buddha said, examine things for yourself.
*

The fundamentals of health and healing are, as always:

– Healthy, healing, nourishing food – and not too much or too little. “Let food be thy medicine”, as Hippocrates, the founder of Western medicine, himself said.

– Healthy hydration

– Healthy breathing

– Healthy exercise
(thumb clicking the remote, and index finger scrolling, don’t count)

– Healthy stress management and stress reduction
(Shouting obscenities, silently or aloud, at bad drivers, dumb posts or annoying people, also does not qualify)

– Healthy attitude – including compassion for oneself and others, above all

– Avoid ingesting poison – be it physical, mental or emotional

– Regular detoxification – Dandelion, red clover, burdock, nettle, and milk thistle, singly or together, are very effective; and above all, saunas. Just remember: go slow and gentle, and drink loads of water. Safest practice is to eat lightly while detoxing, and not fast. Fast only if and when your body is strong, and ready for it; and then, go gently, as well. Detox once a month, or at least once a year, at minimum. But daily dandelion, milk thistle, nettle and saunas, is generally best. We have poisoned our world. Until we heal it, we must detoxify regularly, as well as using the best air and water purifiers (Dyson and Berkey), and eating a natural, whole foods, plant-based organic diet as well.

– Utilize nature’s own pharmacy, which is botanical medicine, or herbs, under proper guidance, to supplement the primary healing modalities above.

(Surgery or pharmaceuticals can be useful or even necessary at times. But they should be a last resort, in most cases – of course, depending on the condition; and not a first response. They are invasive and risky, and at present are heavily over-used. Big Pharma may love it, but pharmaceuticals aren’t always the best approach.)

These fundamentals remain the same. To them we can add the more drastic measures of surgery and pharmaceuticals, when and if needed.

But do not underestimate the practices mentioned above. They have more power than most people would dare to imagine.

Above all, trust yourself – and embrace your power. You decide what you will do with your body, your mind, your health, and your life. No one else has the right to make these decisions for you. Only you do. And you are in the driver’s seat.

We are both conditioned and free; but the locus of power is within. Remember that. It is the most critical lesson of all.

Be well, and be free.

J. Todd Ring,
August 1, 2020