Archive for January, 2010
January 9th, 2010 by Brooke Warner
In this interesting interview with BloombergUTV, Deepak Chopra talks about the necessary shift in our society from capitalism to conscious capitalism.
Chopra stated that we’ve been part of an economy that has “$2.9 trillion circulating in world markets every day” and that “less than 2% [has been going] to providing meaningful services or products.”
Meaningful services or products is pretty subjective, but his comments in this interview certainly point to the growing trend of people wanting meaningful personal experiences that contribute to connection and growth over accumulation of things.
Chopra says:
The number one trend in the world right now is well-being. Not just physically, but emotionally, ecologically . . . the well-being of business after all the disasters on the Wall Street. So, we need to have a very credible story that tells us the real meaning of well-being. For that, we need to write a new story, even in business.
It’s up to businesses and consumers alike to write this new story. Over at Heart of Business, Mark Silver teaches business owners how to make a difference (and still make a profit). Maybe if all the world’s businesses were focused on well-being, we’d just be too damn healthy, but I for one believe that those who work in businesses that provide a service or product that really inform people, help people, or contribute to general well-being are also much happier people.
It can sometimes take a pretty serious wake-up call for people to realize their priorities. We’re still in the wake of a global economic crisis, but the upside of crisis is that it asks us to take stock of what matters. Hard times can provide us a lens to see and appreciate what we have. I believe the trend toward well-being stems at least in part from consciousness. We’re witnessing the human desire to be present, and to feel well and connected during this ride that is life.
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| Tags: Deepak Chopra, Heart of Business
January 8th, 2010 by Mark Nepo
I have lost my way, but have found the small fire
which can never go out, though we are terrified it will.
When I first came, I passed you by. I passed the sap oozing from the maple as I passed the truth seeping from the quiet ones. Now birds out of view cry and I know they speak for spirits long gone from the earth. Now when strangers bump and ask, I hesitate, not holding back, but unsure which way to climb into their lives. I keep searching through the things of the world for one to carve into some form of hope—the kind that pulls us closer to the living. When I first came, I couldn’t make things out. But now, as the eyes dull down out here, it’s less a loss and more a turning inward to the canyons of soul where one glimpse of God sears the ego like a cataract. And we put down our complaints and finally be.
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January 4th, 2010 by Mark Nepo
The Givers
Once the doctors broke their huddle,
her uncle leaned in, “What would you like?”
The little girl beamed, “A white piano!”
It took him three weeks but he had
one waiting in her room. She played
it every day like the medicine it was.
And the guitar player stopping for water
on his way through Virginia, hearing the
gas station owner on the phone, “I got no
choice. I gotta put ’em down.” The young
man keeps telling everyone, “I don’t know
why, but I had to take them.” Now the
old dog and three pups live in his car.
And the old nurse who dreams of her
grandma sitting in the backseat on long
trips warming her hands. And this one,
in awe of her sister who after ten years of
meditating gave it up to care for orphans.
Not ’cause she was done with it, but ’cause
what she found there was now everywhere.
And the speech therapist who when sad
opens the memory of her grandfather like
a thin napkin holding a pressed flower. A
country doctor, he took chickens instead of
money. She was thirteen when he died. A
week after the funeral, her father and uncle
were going through his things. In a burst of
anger, her uncle dumped his books in the
field by the burning barrel and dragged the
bookcase home. It began to rain and the
books, like broken doves, softened and
enlarged. She took the older ones and
keeps them close. She opens them
when it rains and he talks to her.
And how about the son of a heroin addict
who serves soup in a shelter? Since the givers
seldom know what they give, it’s the pour of
the ladle that ties us together. Now you tell
me of your old aunt who lives on an island
off the coast. Going blind, she’s tying ropes
from house to tree to water bucket;
feeling her way through all that
is familiar and strangely liking it.
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January 2nd, 2010 by Brooke Warner
Across the blogosphere you can read about Avatar being a Hindu myth, rich in Biblical symbols, and a long apologia for pantheism. That James Cameron was drawing from Hindu themes is evidenced throughout the movie: from the greeting “I see you,” which is very much like Namaste (“I salute the God within you”), to the word Avatar itself, which is Sanskrit for “descent (of a deity)”, to the fact that the Na’vi people (the indigenous population of Pandora) believe in rebirth (and James Sully is ultimately reborn into his Avatar body).
But it’s also arguably anything you want it to be, so rich is the movie in symbols and spiritual undertones. And though the critics may rush to want to answer the question of whose spirituality Avatar mirrors, the beauty of the movie lies in the celebration of a world whose people truly treat it as sacred, and in which all living beings are not only interconnected, but also honored by the people of the planet, who thrive as a result of that interconnectedness. The official Avatar website says, “Some believe that this interconnectedness, which on Earth is merely a spiritual concept, exists in a physical and tangible way on Pandora, in the form of a strange, collective psionic consciousness embedded in the planet, drawn from all Pandoran life.”
I love this sentiment, that on Earth this level of interconnectedness is merely a spiritual concept. Maybe it’s merely a concept because we don’t know how to listen. Through much of the movie, Neytri (the princess of the Omaticaya Clan) attempts to teach Jake Sully how to see, how to listen at an entirely different level. In many spiritual circles, this is the practice: dropping down enough, being still enough, silent enough to be able to see and listen to what’s underneath the chatter and chaos that not only surrounds us, but lives inside us as well.
The Na’vi people are certainly not an entirely enlightened people. After all, they dominate and kill the beasts on their planet (despite honoring them after a kill, or bonding with them on a level that humans can certainly relate to; we might feel a similar heartfelt connection to our dogs, cats, or horses). They are individualistic and there’s a clear hierarchy among them. They hold resentments and grudges; it’s Jake Sully who unites them with the other clans during a time of great unrest. They’re flawed in many of the same ways human beings are flawed. They want to protect what’s theirs and they are resistant to outside influences. But their deep-felt connection and appreciation for their planet, as well as a strong understanding of energetic connectedness, is at the heart of their existence. Neytri teaches Jake that if the Na’vi people take energy they must give it back. There’s a giving and a taking, and an honoring in the taking that’s not particularly celebrated in Western culture, where too many are not wholly conscious of how much we take and how little we give.
In response to the above-mentioned New York Times op-ed that called “Avatar” pantheistic, Christianity Today wrote that it’s better described as panentheistic. Panentheism, as defined by Wikipedia, is a belief system which posits that God exists and interpenetrates every part of nature, and timelessly extends beyond as well. Pantheism, on the other hand, holds that God is synonymous with the material universe.
“Avatar” is this, but much more, too. Panentheism may well describe the belief system of the Na’vi people, but their intention to honor life and to attune to energy is rooted in a spiritual understanding that shouldn’t be overlooked by commentators. I hope this movie opens up more possibilities for spiritual fiction (as one blogger called “Avatar”) to find its place in mainstream pop culture.
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| Tags: "Avatar", pop culture
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