This was 2010

Christmas is over and the last days of the year 2010 have come. It is time to look back onto a year which comes to an end and into the future, which will hopefully be better. For some it was a very hard year for some others it was a boring year with no special incidents at all. After all 2010 was no year which will be remembered like many other years before. The big topic of “climate change” or the “financial crisis” are over yet. Stocks are going up again, the economy is stable and growing quiet well, and world trade has reached new levels. It seams that everything went better, than expected a year ago. But good news are seldomly remarked by the majority. Much more our society, driven by the media, is fascinated by bad news – the disease of our times. Well, we had a few this year, like earthquakes in Haiti, Chile and Japan, flood in Pakistan and an ongoing war in Afghanistan.
Terrorism was mild in 2010, only little damage was done to people and property worldwide. There has been no bigger war among nations or civil wars anywhere. All in all it was a quiet peaceful year. China is on the way of becoming economically Nr. 1 in the world, but will definitely no role model for a modern state. The strong support on European Nations which have stepped into big financial troubles, by buying bonds of states, is one sign of China’s rising political influence. On the one hand China is dependent on Europe as an important market for it’s products, on the other hand China is becoming more dominant on the global stage. It is hard to say a this point in history, which one will profit more from the deal: China or Europe? I personally have a strong tendency to believe it will be China. But one thing is for sure: It will be more difficult for European politicians to criticize China (for example for it’s problematic practise considering human rights and democracy). May be we will get a new definition for democracy under the influence of China, at least looking into the future for more than ten years.

The end of a year is also the time, when we make plans for the new year. Will we be successful, will we be happy, will we win or lose? These are fundamental questions which concern us all and many are very fearful of losing what they have. Unfortunately by being afraid of losing we rise our chances to fulfil our negative prophecies. Today I read of a poll made in Europe and America about the expectation for the new year. Most people are slightly optimistic, but a bit less than for the year 2010. It would be interesting to compare the new year polls of many years with the development which really occurred afterwards. Is there a correlation between expectation and what really becomes fact or not? Well if it is so, there are major dominant factors and powers in the world which do not seam to be interested in a prospering world. But that is just a thought of mine.

What about democracy in other regions of the world? We have seen a long period of dictatorship in the Arab world. May be people are rising their voices and can overthrow the one or other dictator in that region of the world – my hottest tip: Egypt.

2010 was a partially boring year. I hope that 2011 will be a glorious, prosperous and happy new year. A year which makes people more conscious about themselves and the world around them, would refresh the weery minds of western people. May everybody be happy and rich! That is my personal wish for the world in 2011!

An unusual way of learning

Learning is one of the most important skills of our times. What we learn and what we have to learn during our lifetime changes where quickly. New inventions, ever changing circumstances demand a growing awareness and flexibility, not only in physical movement but even more in mental abilities. But even when things around us are changing, there are certain stable rocks that change very slowly if ever in our lifetime. One of such stable components is the way we learn. School normally suggests that there is a right way for learning, as well as there is a right way to do things. In effect, pupils and students are forced to accept a certain way of doing things, whether it applies to the individual personality or not. Whoever fits into the educational system will be promoted and probably get successful. But the ones who fail or have learning habits, who are very far away from what is called “normal” will get bigger problems, or in worst case, fail completely and are called dull or mentally underpriviledged. One indicator by which this can be seen, are the school marks. For good marks tell very little about the real abilities of children, but even more about the adaptability to the system. The more you conform, the better your marks will be. Smart pupils always knew that in order to get a good mark, it is not necessary to be enormously intelligent, but to impress the teacher, by telling him what he wants to hear.

This leads me to the question of the style of learning. Many people do not know their own style of learning or thoughts, and believe that it is not really necessary to find one’s way of learning things. School is over (for luck), they think, and the rest is a more or less successful struggle through life. I cannot agree to this and more and more people can’t because they feel the negative consequences of not knowing their one learning habits. So there are people who prefer reading things (reading types) or others, who do best, when they hear, what they have to learn (hearing types). These are the types, who will be most successful in the traditional school system. Then there are others special types of learners, like the one’s who have to read aloud or walk through a room by learning (like a lawyer before court). Some people have all kinds of rituals to promote their mental awareness and creativity. Think of poets like Friedrich v. Schiller (1759-1805) who had always old apples on his desk, while working or many artists who have their muse to inspire their mind to produce their most wonderful works of art.

I am sure that there are many other ways of learning, which are as individual, as there are personalities on earth. My personal way of learning is writing. I never learn better, than when writing about something. This blog is one way of doing so. Whenever I read or hear about something new, I sit down and write a few sentences about the topic. By doing so I recapitulate what I have got to know, I structure the lessons learnt and express myself. It took some time to find out, that this is the optimum of doing so for me. Until a few months ago, I was sure my way of learning would be walking through a room and recitate what I have to learn. It was a very well working way for me, which was successful for many years. But now I have found another and even better path to learn. It is not what will be accepted very well at school. I got to know that Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965), the famous British Prime Minister, did learn exactly the same way. Well if someone winning the Nobel Price for Literature was learning in that way, it may not be the worst choice for me also!

Valentine's Day

Today is Valentine’s Day and I want to use this opportunity to write a few words about love. When you look at the world and listen to what people say and what messages you get bombarded with, you could believe, that love is what is most common in the world. The world has become obsessed with this word. And it seams that everybody knows what it really means. But when it comes to love, the majority of all human beings are not more mature than little children. They have learnt from the blind (normally their parents) und are creating new blind ones (their children) by passing over a false belief from one generation to the next. What do I mean by using such harsh words? Love is a great concept, it is the greatest and most wonderful concept that has ever been brought out of the universe. The real love is what has been taught by great masters of metaphysics like Jesus or Buddha, but ever since then there have been single people who understood und who have practised it to make it visible in the world.

We normally misuse the world love. For example: when we say: “I love to go to the movies” or “I like steak and French Fries” and the like. We have to be more careful by using our language properly, that we don’t soil the holiness of some word. We have to heal the idea of love again. I don’t go into more details what I mean by deconsecrate love, for everybody can make his own judgement by reading the real criteria for love.

So what are they? First of all, love must cover all that is. Love is not something personal, for when you recognize the world as a whole, there is no “You” and no “Me” and it is impossible to say: “I love you”, by not also meaning “I love everything there is”. Real love is never something exclusive, given to a special person; it always must include everybody and everything. The second point to mention is, that real love is unconditional; it does not depend on something or anybody. If you love a person, because he looks good, it is not real love. If you love a person, because he is doing something for you or gives you something, it is not love at all. Love even includes the enemy. Real love is always also love to the people who hurt you, even the ones who would like to kill you. You only owe love to other people, not sympathy. Of course you do not think that a person, who harms you, is someone you have sympathy for. But that does not mean you cannot love him.

But this is not all that is. Love contains four further characteristics. The first one is friendship. The second one is compassion. The third one is Joy. And the fourth one is equanimity. What ever you do, if love is joy for one party but not for the other, it is not love. It is also no real love, when you want to do good things, but you harm another person, because you did not have the rightful understanding. If you give a present to someone for whom the present has no value, because he cannot use it or does not like it, it is not real love. For real love always has to consider both, the heart and the mind. Giving without understanding is not rightful giving, is not rightful understanding. The last one, equanimity, is the one that many people don’t understand. Equanimity is the wisdom of equality. You understand that there is no higher and no lower in the universe, you see that all people and all beings are one. Pride is a sign of not understanding the fundamental truths and one of the many causes of suffering in the world. People who are proud, create a blueprint in their minds, which will let them suffer in the future. So what is pride? Pride is to think you are better or superior to someone else. Pride is also to think you are less or inferior, than someone else (even modern psychology knows that). But pride is also to think you are equal to others. So what is not pride: To see that there are no others.

“I am not better than the others,
I am not worse than the others,
I am not equal to the others,
I am the others!”

If we do not have equanimity in our mind, love is in danger to become a struggle, a struggle over power. One partner tries to “own” the other one, like a piece property, in the worst scenario of course. But more often we see the tendency in relationships and especially in marriages, to limit the freedom of the spouse, to “bind” him or her. That behaviour is not love, it is possessing. We have to see, that if we really love, nobody loses his or her freedom, relationship does not mean to have less freedom than a single person. If it is so, than there is definitely something wrong. And both partners should meditation and contemplate deeply about their real feelings and the mental attachments that are their, that have nothing to do with love, but mimicry themselves are part of love.

If we practise more mindfulness in our lives and especially in our relationships, we can help ourselves and our loved ones to cultivate the fruitful seeds in our mind and not the unfruitful ones. Whenever we see someone getting angry, we should instead of supporting his anger, help him so that the unfruitful seeds, which are about to come up, can disappear fall back into the depths of the mind, where they came from. And we also have to watch ourselves not to cultivate the seed of anger that is within us. It is very ease to be infected by anger of others and getting angry ourselves. Mindfulness is the guardian, which recognizes the danger before it can arise.

A happy Valentine’s Day to everybody!!!

What good times we are living in!

We are really privileged, especially if we have access to the internet and the time to use it wisely. For that is the most important point. We can waste our times away very easily and swiftly, if we do not pay attention to our most precious resource, which is time. But on the other hand, we can train our mind, we can train our brain in a way completely unthinkable for former generations of human beings. If there is a problem in our times concerning that issue, it is not that access to almost any information your need in your life is denied, but how to find the right information in a big heap of what is often a kind of garbage. I think we do not live so much in an era of information but in an era of choice, of making the right selection of what is accessible to us. As much as there may be said about how the media influences the people, even they are blamed to stupidify a whole generation of younger people, and so on. The truth is, influence is what happens automatically, when people communicate with each other. There is nobody to blame for that fact. Every person has to pay attention on his or her own, it is not to the others to do that job for us. Face the fact, if you do not know what is important to you or what is not, you become like wax in the hands of others. And if so, you cannot accuse the world, other people, the media, or even the whole culture for your own lack of awareness.

Recently I was doing some research about different regions all around the globe. Including such remote places such as the Outer Hebrides of Scotland, the inner deserts of Asia, the islands of the South Pacific, southern Italy or the rain forest in Ecuador. Having not visited all this places on my own, I relied on reports of others who have seen them, books and guides and so on. But far apart from the technical data, I could use a lot of pictures of the landscape and especially what makes it more vivid, the use of hundreds of videos downloaded form Youtube.com. It gives you an inspiration and in some way it even touches your emotional system (of course only if you have made a similar experience throughout your life, so that your brain has a starting point to begin). For me, as a writer, this is even more valuable, because it supports me a lot in my daily work of writing. The combination of thinking and feeling with the help oft the world-wide-web is an enormous widening of my rage of action and imagination.

Not only the data material, in the shape of texts, pictures and movies, does a good job, but also the possibilities to connect with people throughout the planet. Sometimes you want to know something only people can know who live at a certain place, and/or at a certain time. And even this information you can get access to through the internet nowadays. Never before in my life, the net has ever been so precious to me. This is one reason, why I believe, we are living in absolutely great times. There are many more reasons of course and I will discuss them later in further posts. But for now, good night and have a nice time!

Welcome

With one day’s delay I now start the English version of my German blog, which’s URL can be found at the sidebar. I want to use this opportunity to say hello to everybody who is interested in what I have to say and in this special case what I am writing. I am very grateful for every constructive feedback, idea and suggestion. So I always can reflex on my own thoughts an work on improving permanently.

The aim of this blog is of great variety. On the one side I want to inform people, share my thoughts with others and inspire them to think independently. On the other side, and that shall by far not be denied, I also wish to provide enjoyment and entertainment to you, my welcomed readers. Many ideas will not go according to what is “mainstream” or concidered ordinary in our society or in any society. I am not wishing to provide soft and charming concepts of what you get in the media, and what your hear on every street corner. The world is full of that, we really don’t run short of such, mostly irrelevant, news. My interest is to open up eyes and also to provoke controversy and even conflict if it is neccessairy. Harmony very often has a too hight price. The emotional and psychological tribute that is paid for cosiness and conformism can be much higher, than one can afford. That does not mean, that I am a nonconformist, not at all. For a noncornformist is as little free as a conformist is. It is no freedom, if you always have to do what is different to the others and the leading opinion. The really free man is independent of both conformism and nonconformism.

That leads me to the central value of this site, wich is freedom. I am everything else than a pessimist and I want to contribute to a more independant thinking and acting of people, as well as to serve the values of self-actualization and self-fulfilment. Individualism and self-actualization are duties of every human being alive, for when we do not find out who we are and what actions give a the biggest sense of being at the right place and that we feel that we are doing exactely what we were born for, we cannot fulfil our ultimate potential and stay far behind of what we could be. There is nothing sader than when a person dies and you have to say: “He could have been a great man, but...”. And by the way we do not contribute to our community in the way it could profit of us also.

The consciousness of the masses nowadays is irritated and misguided by thousands of different things of influence. Particular interests are demanding our whole attention. Every little social group wants its own place in the centre and everybody believes his or her affair is the most relevant one. The media and the politicans want to make us think like them, for it is important for them, not for us, but we are decieved not to see it. But what is most fatal, is that the majority of the news are bad news. The gravitation of negativity wants to pull down everything that is beautiful, true, noble and supreme. Zynism barely hides the truth, wich lies behind it: Fear!

We are all on earth to make it a more constructive and positive place and that can only be done by the individual and its freedom. In the end the individual is everything that counts. Only a person can make experiences of some kind.
What does freedom really mean, concidering all this thoughts? On the one side it is freedom of your gens, of everything that is inhereted within yourself. On the other side it is freedom of the control and influence of society, the state, politicians, economy and any other individual and corporational body, that is not you. In short everything, that is not your true self, your real person. This real person is not your body, your perceptions, your feelings, your thoughts and the contents of your consciousness.

In the language of psychoanalysis one could say: Freedom means being independant of the IT (ES) as well as of the SUPER-EGO (Über-Ich). So that there is no influencing factor than the true self alone. It is what the old Chinese called the “Wu wei”, acting withoug acting, what happens when the Ego has been discovered as a creation of delusion and vanishes like fog on a sunny morning. A person is not living so much, much more he or she is lived, by what could be called the Tao. A human being forms a perfect union with the world, there is no me and no you, no subject and no object. That is one thing I want so show by this blog.

Joyful readings and good thinking.