There is a great difference between the power which removes the invisible causes of disease, and which is Magic, and that which causes merely external effects [to] disappear, and which is Physic, Sorcery, and Quackery.
Paracelsus [Translated by Franz Hartmann]
Monday, December 31, 2007
Quotes by William James Durant
One of the lessons of history is that nothing is often a good thing to do and always a clever thing to say.
Woe to him who teaches men faster than they can learn.
The family is the nucleus of civilization.
It may be true that you can't fool all the people all the time, but you can fool enough of them to rule a large country.
Moral codes adjust themselves to environmental conditions.
-- Quotes by William James Durant
Woe to him who teaches men faster than they can learn.
The family is the nucleus of civilization.
It may be true that you can't fool all the people all the time, but you can fool enough of them to rule a large country.
Moral codes adjust themselves to environmental conditions.
-- Quotes by William James Durant
Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality
The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato. I do not mean the systematic scheme of thought which scholars have doubtfully extracted from his writings. I allude to the wealth of general ideas scattered through them...
Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality, p. 39 [Free Press, 1979];
Manly P. Hall
Every form existing in the diversified sphere of being is symbolic of the divine activity by which it is produced.
Manly P. Hall
Manly P. Hall
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
Darwinism is the doctrine of natural selection and physical evolution. It has been said of Charles Robert Darwin that he determined to banish spirit altogether from the universe and make the infinite and omnipresent Mind itself synonymous with the all-pervading powers of an impersonal Nature.
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
Sir Francis Bacon, Atheism
A little philosophy inclineth a man's mind to atheism; but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion.
Sir Francis Bacon, Atheism
Sir Francis Bacon, Atheism
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
I think only in movies is horror vocal.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
High calls low and low calls high .... The lower you are, the higher your mind will want to soar. It was natural that, bereft and desperate as I was, in the throes of unremitting suffering, I should turn to God.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
What a terrible thing it is to botch a farewell.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
High calls low and low calls high .... The lower you are, the higher your mind will want to soar. It was natural that, bereft and desperate as I was, in the throes of unremitting suffering, I should turn to God.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
What a terrible thing it is to botch a farewell.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
Sunday, December 23, 2007
Freeman, TheFreemanPerspective.Blogspot.com
There is no corporatism without Freemasonry, and they are the head of the fascist state.
Freeman, TheFreemanPerspective.Blogspot.com
Freeman, TheFreemanPerspective.Blogspot.com
Dr. Walter J. Kilner, The Human Atmosphere
HARDLY one person in ten thousand is aware that he or she is enveloped by a haze intimately connected with the body, whether asleep or awake, whether hot or cold, which, although invisible under ordinary circumstances, can be seen when conditions are favourable. This mist, the prototype of the nimbus or halo constantly depicted around saints, has been manifest to certain individuals possessing a specially gifted sight, who in consequence have received the title of "Clairvoyants," and until quite recently to no one else. This cloud or atmosphere, generally termed the AURA, is the subject of this treatise, in so far as it can be perceived by the employment of screens containing a peculiar chemical substance in solution. It may be stated at once that the writer does not make the slightest claim to clairvoyancy; nor is he an occultist; and he specially desires to impress upon his readers that his researches have been entirely physical, and can be repeated by any one who takes sufficient interest in the subject.
Dr. Walter J. Kilner, The Human Atmosphere
Dr. Walter J. Kilner, The Human Atmosphere
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Pythagorus taught that the dot symbolized the power of the number 1, the line the power of the number 2, the surface, the power of the number 3, and the solid the power of the number 4.
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
The first step in obtaining the numerical value of a word is to resolve it back into its original tongue. Only words of Greek or Hebrew derivation can be successfully analyzed by this method, and all words must be spelled in their most ancient and complete forms. Old Testament words and names, therefore, must be translated back into the early Hebrew characters and New Testament words into the Greek.
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Godfrey Higgins, Anacalypsis
The first striking circumstance in which the history of Pythagoras agrees with the history of Jesus is, that they were natives of nearly the same county; the former being born at Sidon, the latter at Bethlehem, both in Sytria. The father of Pythgoras, as well as the father of Jesus, was prophetically informed that his wife should bring forth a son, who should be a benefactor to mankind. They were both born when their mothers were from home on journeys, Joseph and his wife having gone up to Bethlehem to be taxed, and the father of Pythagoras having travelled from Samos, his residence, to Sidon, about his mercantile concerns. Pythais [Pythasis], the mother of Pythagorus, had a connexion with an Apolloniacal spectre, or ghost, of the God Apollo, or God Sol (of course this must have been a holy ghost, and here we have the Holy Ghost) which, afterward appeared to her husband, and told him that he must have no connexion with his wife during her pregancy -- a story evidently the same as that relating to Joseph and Mary. From theses peculiar circumstances, Pythagorus was known by the same title as Jesus, namely, the son of God; and was supposed by the multitutde to be under the influence of Divine inspiration.
Godfrey Higgins, Anacalypsis
Godfrey Higgins, Anacalypsis
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
Paper money makes possible a money supply that can be made to increase at substantally the same rate as the supply of goods and services in the economy increases. Paper money makes possible a money supply that can be made to increase substantially as the Monetary Authority of a country wants it to increase. Paper money (in contrast to gold or silver money) makes "monetary stability" an achievable goal. Paper money is one of the great inventions of all time.
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
It is no more necessary that money have intrinsic alue than it is for a postage stamp, a bus token, or an airplane ticket.
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
Michael Tsarion
The stronger a light shines, the more darkness and dirt it will reveal.
Michael Tsarion
Michael Tsarion
Hugh McCulloch, 1868
I look upon an irredeemable paper currency as an evil .... Gold and silver are the only true money. I have no doubt that these metals were prepared by the Almighty for this very purpose.
Hugh McCulloch, Secretary of the Treasury of the United States. 1868
Hugh McCulloch, Secretary of the Treasury of the United States. 1868
Preable to Bank of Canada Act
The preamble of the Bank of Canada Act establishes its goal:
... to control and protect the external value of the national monetary unit and to mitigate by its influence fluctuations in the general level of production, trade, prices and employment, so far as may be possible within the scope of monetary action.
William Krehm, The Bank of Canada -- A Misused Tool
... to control and protect the external value of the national monetary unit and to mitigate by its influence fluctuations in the general level of production, trade, prices and employment, so far as may be possible within the scope of monetary action.
William Krehm, The Bank of Canada -- A Misused Tool
Friday, December 21, 2007
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
As institutions for the dissemination of ethical culture, the pagan Mysteries were the architects of civilization. Their power and dignity were personified in CHiram Abiff -- the Master builder -- but they eventually fell a victim to the onslaughts of that recurrent trio of state, church, and mob ....
When the mob governs, man is ruled by ignorance; when the church governs, he is ruled by superstition; and when the state governs, he is ruled by fear ....
The perfect government of the earth must be patterned eventually after that divine government by which the un iverse is ordered. In that day when perfect order is reestablished,
with peace universal and good triumphant, men will no longer seek for happiness, for they shall find it welling up within themselves.
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
When the mob governs, man is ruled by ignorance; when the church governs, he is ruled by superstition; and when the state governs, he is ruled by fear ....
The perfect government of the earth must be patterned eventually after that divine government by which the un iverse is ordered. In that day when perfect order is reestablished,
with peace universal and good triumphant, men will no longer seek for happiness, for they shall find it welling up within themselves.
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
Any zookeeper will tell you that a tiger, indeed any cat, will not attack in the face of a direct stare but will wait until the deer or antelope or wild ox has turned its eyes.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
You can get used to anything -- haven't I already said that? Isn't that what all survivors say?
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
You can get used to anything -- haven't I already said that? Isn't that what all survivors say?
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
Thursday, December 13, 2007
Century of the Self
Just beyond the icy gates of winter, lies the open hearth of Christmas cheer ...
Freud and the Subconscious Mind
In the 1920s, Sigmund Freud discovered the subconscious mind. According to Freud it was the seat of man's drives -- essentially, his animal instincts. If men and women were to live together in collective peace, these drives had to be kept heartily in check. The intellectual elite, such as himself, I suppose, would have to devise ways to suppress these dangerous and anti-social drives. A rival of Freud, who died in a jail at the age of 60, Wilhelm Reich, believed in the subconscious; but, unlike Freud, believed that it was the seat of positive emotions, i.e. the essence of what makes us human (love, peace, forgiveness, generousity, etc.). Reich believed that the good instincts of humankind were supressed because the system, the social infrastructure, if you will, itself was very oppresive. Freud and Reich diverged to such an extent that, though Reich was originally a student of Freud's in university (in Austria) they eventually parted ways because of their differences in philosophy.
Bernays and Propaganda
Enter Edward Bernays. Bernays was a nephew of Sigmund Freud who often visited him at his university in Austria. Bernays was keen to understand the psyche of man because he was involved in the propaganda industry. The term propaganda had such a bad name, even in the 1920s that Bernays, in attempting to give the field some legitimacy, renamed it "public relations." Nowadays most governments, including our own, have public relations offices. This is the legacy of Edward Bernays, who, it is said, is "the father of public relations".
Bernays is one of the unsung heroes, or villains, depending on your perspective, of the last century. Not only did Bernays found the public relations office for governments -- used by both good and bad governments -- but he helped the advertising industry gain the stronghold that it has today over our young generations minds. It was he who borrowed his uncle's knowledge of the human psyche -- its subconscious desires -- and used them to manipulate, not individuals, but large groups of people, i.e. the masses.
His most famous coup was the breaking of the taboo of women smoking cigarettes. In the early 20th century many tobacco companies were happy that World War I brought them at least one thing: men returned home from the frontlines addicted to cigarettes -- as these were doled out freely to them in the frontlines. The problem for the tobacco industry was that only half the population was now hooked; what about the women? It was one of Bernays first assignments to get women smoking just like the men. Bernays knew just what to do, he consulted his uncle. But, when Freud was unavailable, he went to several of the most famous psycho-analysts in New York, where he lived. He asked them: "Why don't women smoke cigarettes?" Bernays was told that women don't smoke because it was a social taboo; attack the taboo, and you can get them smoking.
Bernays went to work. He wielded seemingly incredible power, or perhaps he just had unlimited funding from his tobacco employers, that he hired the most famous 'debutants' in New York, and gathered all the major media outlets for publicity stunt at a special parade that was being held in New York. It was important that the parade be about freedom and Bernays called cigarettes, "torches of freedom". Here, he was tapping into the subconscious desire for women to have freedom. It does not need to be stated that women, especially in the early 20th century were and incredibly suppressed demographic. The propaganda stunt worked, and women have been paying for with their lungs ever since; especially teenage women, and especially in countries like Canada.
Convincing, or persuading people, to buy things they don't need was at the heart of Bernays work. It is the hallmark of the consumer society we live in. The consumerist crescendo reaches its peak, appropriately at the end of the year. There is more to learn about the legacy of Bernays in his manipulation of the masses. Check out google video: “The Century of the Self”, but Adam Curtis of BBC Television.
Freud and the Subconscious Mind
In the 1920s, Sigmund Freud discovered the subconscious mind. According to Freud it was the seat of man's drives -- essentially, his animal instincts. If men and women were to live together in collective peace, these drives had to be kept heartily in check. The intellectual elite, such as himself, I suppose, would have to devise ways to suppress these dangerous and anti-social drives. A rival of Freud, who died in a jail at the age of 60, Wilhelm Reich, believed in the subconscious; but, unlike Freud, believed that it was the seat of positive emotions, i.e. the essence of what makes us human (love, peace, forgiveness, generousity, etc.). Reich believed that the good instincts of humankind were supressed because the system, the social infrastructure, if you will, itself was very oppresive. Freud and Reich diverged to such an extent that, though Reich was originally a student of Freud's in university (in Austria) they eventually parted ways because of their differences in philosophy.
Bernays and Propaganda
Enter Edward Bernays. Bernays was a nephew of Sigmund Freud who often visited him at his university in Austria. Bernays was keen to understand the psyche of man because he was involved in the propaganda industry. The term propaganda had such a bad name, even in the 1920s that Bernays, in attempting to give the field some legitimacy, renamed it "public relations." Nowadays most governments, including our own, have public relations offices. This is the legacy of Edward Bernays, who, it is said, is "the father of public relations".
Bernays is one of the unsung heroes, or villains, depending on your perspective, of the last century. Not only did Bernays found the public relations office for governments -- used by both good and bad governments -- but he helped the advertising industry gain the stronghold that it has today over our young generations minds. It was he who borrowed his uncle's knowledge of the human psyche -- its subconscious desires -- and used them to manipulate, not individuals, but large groups of people, i.e. the masses.
His most famous coup was the breaking of the taboo of women smoking cigarettes. In the early 20th century many tobacco companies were happy that World War I brought them at least one thing: men returned home from the frontlines addicted to cigarettes -- as these were doled out freely to them in the frontlines. The problem for the tobacco industry was that only half the population was now hooked; what about the women? It was one of Bernays first assignments to get women smoking just like the men. Bernays knew just what to do, he consulted his uncle. But, when Freud was unavailable, he went to several of the most famous psycho-analysts in New York, where he lived. He asked them: "Why don't women smoke cigarettes?" Bernays was told that women don't smoke because it was a social taboo; attack the taboo, and you can get them smoking.
Bernays went to work. He wielded seemingly incredible power, or perhaps he just had unlimited funding from his tobacco employers, that he hired the most famous 'debutants' in New York, and gathered all the major media outlets for publicity stunt at a special parade that was being held in New York. It was important that the parade be about freedom and Bernays called cigarettes, "torches of freedom". Here, he was tapping into the subconscious desire for women to have freedom. It does not need to be stated that women, especially in the early 20th century were and incredibly suppressed demographic. The propaganda stunt worked, and women have been paying for with their lungs ever since; especially teenage women, and especially in countries like Canada.
Convincing, or persuading people, to buy things they don't need was at the heart of Bernays work. It is the hallmark of the consumer society we live in. The consumerist crescendo reaches its peak, appropriately at the end of the year. There is more to learn about the legacy of Bernays in his manipulation of the masses. Check out google video: “The Century of the Self”, but Adam Curtis of BBC Television.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Mark Twain
"Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect."
Mark Twain
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
According to Sextus Empyricus, the Trojan war was fought over a statue of the moon goddess. For this lunar Helena, and not for a woman, the Greeks and Trojans struggled at the gates of Troy.
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
... the story of Noah and his ark is a cosmic allegory concerning the repopulation of planets at the beginning of each world period ...
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
... the story of Noah and his ark is a cosmic allegory concerning the repopulation of planets at the beginning of each world period ...
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass
"The powers of the world are very strong. Men and women are moved by tides much fiercer than you can imagine, and they sweep us all up into their current. Keep your own counsel."
from Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass
from Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass
Friday, December 07, 2007
The Politics of Being Merry
Just beyond the icy gates of winter, lies the open hearth of Christmas cheer. Or so goes, at least, the age-old lore. There is a vague, but persistent, lament that the great mangler and twister of human tradition -- otherwise known as "progress" -- has transformed the hearth into a stony altar of consumerism, as cold and unforgiving as winter itself. It is upon this altar, continues the lament, that the spiritual essence of the holiday is ritually and mercilessly sacrificed.
Is this lament a universal one? Is it shared by each of us, in the muted voicings of our inner "social critic"? But wait! Before we can answer, the critic makes another parry at the behemoth of collective life. "Do not the ritual sacrifices of modern life (always carried out under the aegis of the High Priest of Progress) extend beyond the consumerist crescendo of Christmas? Almost daily we witness other comparable rituals -- for example, in film and music, we constantly watch art being sacrificed at the altar of entertainment, and in the political realm, we watch our once jealously guarded freedoms being sacrificed at the altar of security."
But, the lament turns into trepidation as our inner social critic asks, "Has our society become more 'cult' than 'culture'?" In spite of the myriad examples in our daily life that provide an affirmative answer to this question, our inner social critic, having turned from lamentation to trepidation, settles on a kind of downtrodden complacency as it braces itself for the onrush of society's year end festivities.
Mass Market Manipulation
In the battlefield of history, the human spirit has been surprisingly resistant to overt displays of force. But, out of the wreckage of human conflict emerged a force more powerful than the iron fists of papal and imperial rule. This is the seductive force of persuasion.
Persuasion is the 'light', the 'heat', the very 'Sun' around which revolve the orbs of society's marketing agencies. Much like the namesakes of the orbs of our solar system, these agencies appear as 'gods' atop the 'mountain' of 'Corporate Olympus', from which high societal perch they intervene daily in the fortunes of us all.
The predominant discourse in our society is not scientific, nor political, nor religious, the predominant, some would say tyrannical, voice of social discourse is advertising. Buy! Buy! We must buy and be merry!
But are we merry? We laugh and realize the laughter does not come from within. We dance and suddenly feel empty. It is at Christmas that we are confronted with this feeling of emptiness in spite of the abundance of the season.
The age of consumerism began in the 1920s when Edward Bernays attempted to sell cigarettes to women -- who up until that time were much too intelligent to take up the habit. Bernays tapped into the subconscious desires of self he heard about from his uncle Sigmund Freud. As a result, women, who simply wouldn't touch cigarettes, couldn't get their fill of "Torches of Freedom" as Bernays renamed them and sold them through celebrity endorsement and mainstream media. The transformation of cigarettes into "torches of freedom" in one blink of the public eye was to form the paradigm for the manipulation of the masses through marketing based on the association of a product or service with subconscious desires.
Author David Kupelian summed up modern marketing as "manipulating the emotions and thereby restructuring the thoughts and beliefs of large numbers of people.” Car companies don't sell cars but status, power and sex; insurance companies don't sell monetary compensation for material losses but "peace of mind"; soft-drink companies, among others, don't sell soft drinks but celebrity; clothing stores don't sell clothes but style. The filling of the voids in ourselves has been called "the pursuit of happiness" -- and it has collectively been agreed upon to be the ultimate objective of life.
The True Hearth of Christmas
How do we overcome this consumerism? How do we get back to being our true selves? The void of longing and desire that we have been socially conditioned -- through advertising -- to believe is our "self" is, in fact, not our true nature. Perhaps this is why, since God first wound nature's clock, most major religions have taught that this type of "self" is an illusion, something that must be overcome if we are to succeed on our journey towards the realization of who we really are.
In fact, buried deep within us is only energy -- hampered by the very walls we build in order to protect it. An energy that each of us -- as we are ever so gradually recruited from birth into the 'survival game' of modern life -- are encouraged to forget. It is an energy of which, in the seemingly boundless vocabulary of the English language, only two words, "love" and "spirit", provide a vague attempt at representation. Perhaps "hope" is a third. It is an energy only vaguely hinted at in the boy-meets-girl romances of movies and novels that we are socially conditioned to believe is love.
It is an energy whose vibrations every writer, every composer, every master of the fine arts has attempted to mimic; it is a primordial and creative energy -- a microcosm of the very Chaos that was the source of all creation; it is an energy that sits as an ocean in the vast basin of our hearts, but wells up into our eyes when we see the good deeds and selfless works of those who are moved by it (the same energy that causes our eyes to smile through those tears); it is an energy that the world's great leaders have tapped into, like so much oil, in the vast reserves of the human heart, and that has served as 'spiritual fuel' for the Golden Age of Man (and Woman), which was perhaps a prologue to history. It is an energy too pure to be sullied by distinctions of race, ethnicity, age, gender, colour, political views. It is an energy that spreads beyond our finger tips and toe tips, above our heads and beneath our feet to form a "spritual internet" that connects us all; it is an energy that creates out of each of us an artist, to paint, with the abundant palette of experience, on the canvas of space and time; it is an energy shared by every individual, of which the 'hearth of Christmas' -- if it burns still -- is but a collective holographic projection.
Is it not one of irony's cruel twists that the epic myths and legends of man (and woman) stand as imitative monuments to this undying energy of love and spirit; while, the social infrastructure of humanity, the 'world system', if you will, stands before each individual as a kind of rampart against the spirit for which a single life of 60, 70, or 80 years seems all too short a time to overcome? Is the human spirit forever plagued to swim against the torrential stream of avarice in the world; and like the salmon, only live long enough, upon reaching the destination, to sow the seeds of the next generation? It appears that the poetic observation of Robert Browning rings as inescapably true in our era of 'technological marvels' as in any other: "Man's reach must exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for."
But, perhaps Christmas is a time for us to peer over the spiritual rampart we have built for ourselves, and to gaze at the 'promised land' -- the final destination of our 'spiritual salmon' -- a land where spirits bask in the glow of their collective light; where the currency of love dwarfs the currency of money; and no one's light is dimmed by the spirit-draining business, or 'busy-ness', of daily life; where words of warmth are exchanged as easily as we exchange words of weather, and the emperor of our world, 'Fear,' stands clotheless, exposed in all his frailty and feebleness.
Just beyond the icy gates of winter, as another year is coaxed to sleep by the lullaby of time, may you catch the gaze of a stranger and share a moment's warmth. May you nestle in the arms of those you love, and have them see the flames of your 'spiritual fire' in the windows of your eyes. And in the warmth, may you remove the protective vestments of cold, hard experience and bask in the much lighter attire of a long-forgotten, but undying, innocence; the kind of innocence only children, our greatest treasure, remain unembarrassed to display.
"[F]or it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than Christmas," writes Dickens in A Christmas Carol, his literary monument to the season, "when its mighty Founder was a child himself."
Finally, cherished reader, let the 'Dollar Almighty' have the rest of the year to rule with its iron, or, rather, 'golden' fist. Christmas is a time for Spirit to reign supreme.
Is this lament a universal one? Is it shared by each of us, in the muted voicings of our inner "social critic"? But wait! Before we can answer, the critic makes another parry at the behemoth of collective life. "Do not the ritual sacrifices of modern life (always carried out under the aegis of the High Priest of Progress) extend beyond the consumerist crescendo of Christmas? Almost daily we witness other comparable rituals -- for example, in film and music, we constantly watch art being sacrificed at the altar of entertainment, and in the political realm, we watch our once jealously guarded freedoms being sacrificed at the altar of security."
But, the lament turns into trepidation as our inner social critic asks, "Has our society become more 'cult' than 'culture'?" In spite of the myriad examples in our daily life that provide an affirmative answer to this question, our inner social critic, having turned from lamentation to trepidation, settles on a kind of downtrodden complacency as it braces itself for the onrush of society's year end festivities.
Mass Market Manipulation
In the battlefield of history, the human spirit has been surprisingly resistant to overt displays of force. But, out of the wreckage of human conflict emerged a force more powerful than the iron fists of papal and imperial rule. This is the seductive force of persuasion.
Persuasion is the 'light', the 'heat', the very 'Sun' around which revolve the orbs of society's marketing agencies. Much like the namesakes of the orbs of our solar system, these agencies appear as 'gods' atop the 'mountain' of 'Corporate Olympus', from which high societal perch they intervene daily in the fortunes of us all.
The predominant discourse in our society is not scientific, nor political, nor religious, the predominant, some would say tyrannical, voice of social discourse is advertising. Buy! Buy! We must buy and be merry!
But are we merry? We laugh and realize the laughter does not come from within. We dance and suddenly feel empty. It is at Christmas that we are confronted with this feeling of emptiness in spite of the abundance of the season.
The age of consumerism began in the 1920s when Edward Bernays attempted to sell cigarettes to women -- who up until that time were much too intelligent to take up the habit. Bernays tapped into the subconscious desires of self he heard about from his uncle Sigmund Freud. As a result, women, who simply wouldn't touch cigarettes, couldn't get their fill of "Torches of Freedom" as Bernays renamed them and sold them through celebrity endorsement and mainstream media. The transformation of cigarettes into "torches of freedom" in one blink of the public eye was to form the paradigm for the manipulation of the masses through marketing based on the association of a product or service with subconscious desires.
Author David Kupelian summed up modern marketing as "manipulating the emotions and thereby restructuring the thoughts and beliefs of large numbers of people.” Car companies don't sell cars but status, power and sex; insurance companies don't sell monetary compensation for material losses but "peace of mind"; soft-drink companies, among others, don't sell soft drinks but celebrity; clothing stores don't sell clothes but style. The filling of the voids in ourselves has been called "the pursuit of happiness" -- and it has collectively been agreed upon to be the ultimate objective of life.
The True Hearth of Christmas
How do we overcome this consumerism? How do we get back to being our true selves? The void of longing and desire that we have been socially conditioned -- through advertising -- to believe is our "self" is, in fact, not our true nature. Perhaps this is why, since God first wound nature's clock, most major religions have taught that this type of "self" is an illusion, something that must be overcome if we are to succeed on our journey towards the realization of who we really are.
In fact, buried deep within us is only energy -- hampered by the very walls we build in order to protect it. An energy that each of us -- as we are ever so gradually recruited from birth into the 'survival game' of modern life -- are encouraged to forget. It is an energy of which, in the seemingly boundless vocabulary of the English language, only two words, "love" and "spirit", provide a vague attempt at representation. Perhaps "hope" is a third. It is an energy only vaguely hinted at in the boy-meets-girl romances of movies and novels that we are socially conditioned to believe is love.
It is an energy whose vibrations every writer, every composer, every master of the fine arts has attempted to mimic; it is a primordial and creative energy -- a microcosm of the very Chaos that was the source of all creation; it is an energy that sits as an ocean in the vast basin of our hearts, but wells up into our eyes when we see the good deeds and selfless works of those who are moved by it (the same energy that causes our eyes to smile through those tears); it is an energy that the world's great leaders have tapped into, like so much oil, in the vast reserves of the human heart, and that has served as 'spiritual fuel' for the Golden Age of Man (and Woman), which was perhaps a prologue to history. It is an energy too pure to be sullied by distinctions of race, ethnicity, age, gender, colour, political views. It is an energy that spreads beyond our finger tips and toe tips, above our heads and beneath our feet to form a "spritual internet" that connects us all; it is an energy that creates out of each of us an artist, to paint, with the abundant palette of experience, on the canvas of space and time; it is an energy shared by every individual, of which the 'hearth of Christmas' -- if it burns still -- is but a collective holographic projection.
Is it not one of irony's cruel twists that the epic myths and legends of man (and woman) stand as imitative monuments to this undying energy of love and spirit; while, the social infrastructure of humanity, the 'world system', if you will, stands before each individual as a kind of rampart against the spirit for which a single life of 60, 70, or 80 years seems all too short a time to overcome? Is the human spirit forever plagued to swim against the torrential stream of avarice in the world; and like the salmon, only live long enough, upon reaching the destination, to sow the seeds of the next generation? It appears that the poetic observation of Robert Browning rings as inescapably true in our era of 'technological marvels' as in any other: "Man's reach must exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for."
But, perhaps Christmas is a time for us to peer over the spiritual rampart we have built for ourselves, and to gaze at the 'promised land' -- the final destination of our 'spiritual salmon' -- a land where spirits bask in the glow of their collective light; where the currency of love dwarfs the currency of money; and no one's light is dimmed by the spirit-draining business, or 'busy-ness', of daily life; where words of warmth are exchanged as easily as we exchange words of weather, and the emperor of our world, 'Fear,' stands clotheless, exposed in all his frailty and feebleness.
Just beyond the icy gates of winter, as another year is coaxed to sleep by the lullaby of time, may you catch the gaze of a stranger and share a moment's warmth. May you nestle in the arms of those you love, and have them see the flames of your 'spiritual fire' in the windows of your eyes. And in the warmth, may you remove the protective vestments of cold, hard experience and bask in the much lighter attire of a long-forgotten, but undying, innocence; the kind of innocence only children, our greatest treasure, remain unembarrassed to display.
"[F]or it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than Christmas," writes Dickens in A Christmas Carol, his literary monument to the season, "when its mighty Founder was a child himself."
Finally, cherished reader, let the 'Dollar Almighty' have the rest of the year to rule with its iron, or, rather, 'golden' fist. Christmas is a time for Spirit to reign supreme.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)