The Decision to Leave Came in an Instant [The Abundance of Less]

Chapter two of The Abundance of Less is centered around Osamu Nakamura. One of my favorite excerpts reads:

"The decision to actually leave," he continues, "happened in an instant. I looked at my life, and I knew that I didn't want to wake up one day and find myself an old man filled with regret that I hadn't seen the things of the world...Of course, there are two kinds of regret I could have faced: I knew it was quite possible that I might end up stranded in some foreign country, miserable, without a

ny money, and knowing that I had given up my job. But when I compared that possible regret against retiring at sixty-five years old, having known nothing except working at my job -- that was when I knew. The decision, as I said, came in an instant."

Couturier, soon after the above passage, notes that "In the world system of increasingly discrete labor...the act of disentangling oneself from the whole might, in hindsight, appear quite radical." So, it really is a heroic act to live a truly individual life as disconnected from the invisible social pressures that are all around us.

I've written a thread on r/MindBodySpirit about this book which you can find here. Please comment if you can.

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Chris Ryan - Hypersensitivity and Hippies

Authenticity comes in many forms. Part of fascism is blindly subscribing to uniformity, including choice of fashion (ahem...uniforms), music, and social opinions. Many hippies do just this. Part of this, in my opinion, is youth, and it's not something to hold too strongly against a young person who is trying to figure out who he really is deep down under the the skin color, the gender, the society, the conditioning, etc... People grow, but they need their community (now wider and ever more connected than ever) to nurture them and trim off the dead leaves and unfruitful branches taking up valuable energy.

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Psychedelic Without Drugs... Not An Oxymoron

Living in Japan has its plusses: an interesting, refined culture, mountains, seas, kind and generous people, safety, low unemployment, generous social services, and a physically healthy lifestyle. It has its minuses too: a rigid, maladaptive culture, overworking citizens, ethnocentrism, and harsh drug laws.

In a nation that encourages overindulgence of alcohol, tobacco, and caffeine, it is unwittingly draconian in its punishments of illicit drugs which include marijuana and non-addictive psychedelics such as psilocybin, LSD, and MDMA. Hemp, like in many places around the world, was widely used until post-war Japan. Magic Mushrooms were legal until just after the year 2000. They could be bought in vending machines. Currently, in a reaction to the strict laws, there is a surge in the popularity of designer, synthetic drugs known as "legal herb" in Japanese, or Spice in the U.S. Unregulated and unpredictable in effect, I now stay away from these loophole drugs.

Tobacco's been out for years now.

And alcohol feels more and more like a death curse as Father Time does his worst to me.

All of that said, I'm not particularly mad about the conditions of my life in Japan, but with a family and a career, I don't take my chances with illegal substances in Japan.

I still identify with the ethos of psychedelia, however. Transcendence, the soup of consciousness, lifting the veil, brushing away the mist, these metaphors grip me strongly. I see them as stepping stones across the river of man's evolution, though we keep slipping and getting our feet wet, forced to dry off and try again (often without proper reflection, making the same mistakes over and over and over again).

This gets me to my main point: the English language needs a term for this. We need a word to describe those of us who are psychedelic/transcendent, but who do not want the pharmacological or religious labels and connotations that come along with those aforementioned monikers.

If you have any good ideas, please let me know in the comments section.

There are a few ways you can be a hero and support AJ. Free things are: try Audible or AmazonPrime for 30 days, link us to a social network like Twitter, Facebook or Reddit, or download and rate the podcast in iTunes. If you have a little spare money you can send a Paypal donation to ajsnookauthor@gmail.com, buy one of AJ's Kindle eBooks, or buy anything on Amazon by going through the Amazon links on the site. Thanks so much for your support, AJ

Gabor Mate in Seeing the Truth

The truth is that we are all in this thing together. We suffer, rejoice, trip and fall, and stand in awe as one. Not only are we responsible for our species, but we're responsible for life itself. This does not put us on a pedestal at the top of a hierarch. On the contrary, it demands of us humility. We have the know-how and the wherewithall to describe the energy of life through all the beautiful mediums of art -- prose, poetry, film, painting, animation, athletics, dance -- and science, but we also have the responsibility to preserve and extend life, to transport it to faraway planets, to record it accurately as historians, to remember how to cherish it like our ancestors did and all the living indigenous peoples do so well still.

Save the nihilism and live instead. Turn down the dial of depression. Run down the clock of scarcity. Laugh in the face of fear. Be full now. Be rich knowing that we are alive. Gabor Mate gets this. Most of us get this. Spread the word and don't forget to act.


There are a few ways you can be a hero and support AJ. Free things are: try Audible or AmazonPrime for 30 days, link us to a social network like Twitter, Facebook or Reddit, or download and rate the podcast in iTunes. If you have a little spare money you can send a Paypal donation to ajsnookauthor@gmail.com, buy one of AJ's Kindle eBooks, or buy anything on Amazon by going through the Amazon links on the site. Thanks so much for your support, AJ

The Bandwidth That Powers Mandkind

I heard an interesting quote on the radio recently. I'd love to know who the author of the quote is, so if you know, get in touch. The man said, "As we expand bandwidth between each other, we dissolve our differences."

What he meant by "bandwidth" is up for interpretation, but I think he meant a combination of a few things. If he simply meant "communication" or "empathy" he would have said as much. He chose the bandwidth analogy because bandwidth is dependent on a few factors in order for it to be dispersed at a high rate. A few of the key factors are as follows:

1. High-technology, which is a product of generations of teaching, learning, and application of knowledge.

2. A peaceful environment. In order for education and its application to go on unfettered, there need be a scarcity of conflict and danger.

3. Freedom to experiment. Culture needs to be elastic enough to allow innovative thinkers and risk-takers.

Therefore, the right environment, education, and infrastructure need to be in place in order for humans to expand the bandwidth between each other, dissolve our differences, and march forward in our social evolution. Technologies like the Occulus Rift or the Kinect (the internet 2.0 as people have been calling them) are
a good start. Empathy-building tools in the form of Big Education platforms like Khan Academy or TED are also steps in the right direction.

But something is missing. The next step remains to be seen.

What do you see in our future? The "re-wilding" of our species, an "archaic revival" of sorts, is a piece that I see fitting into the puzzle somewhere. A human is changed when she walks in the woods. She recalls bits of her essence, her true self, when she connects with nature. If, on some esoteric level, artificiality is embodied with an intelligence, then it would serve that entity well to reduce us organic entities down to mere slaves of the inorganic, to men and women locked into screens all day, to children in the same room as their parents, but also light years away, lost in a game or a video or the next best App.

This has all been said before, but we need to be more self-critical with our use of technology. We need to use our gadgets as human enhancers: for learning, for storytelling, for empathy, for self-realization.

Reflection is lost in the developed world, for it is moving too fast to stop and look back, and it is too judgmental to allow us to pause and be here, now.

There are a few ways you can be a hero and support AJ. Free things are: try Audible or AmazonPrime for 30 days, link us to a social network like Twitter, Facebook or Reddit, or download and rate the podcast in iTunes. If you have a little spare money you can send a Paypal donation to ajsnookauthor@gmail.com, buy one of AJ's Kindle eBooks, or buy anything on Amazon by going through the Amazon links on the site. Thanks so much for your support, AJ

A Beginner's Perspective of Bitcoin

Wikimedia Commons

Something is great about this experience. Alternative currency, as it's known, has way too much potential to be disregarded as a fad or a geek's hobby.

1) There are no/few fees. Transactions are mostly free. Remittances are too. If you find that they aren't, then you certainly can find a different vendor to provide free services. Just like anything, it takes a bit of Googling.

2) It's almost entirely anonymous. Aside from loan seekers who wish to improve their status by revealing their name, income, or a reference from a friend, transactions are based off of numbered accounts that, for as much as I know, are untraceable.

3) It's free to get started. There are numerous "Bitcoin faucets" (Google it) that disperse small amounts of the currency to those who are patient enough to click on links day and night.

4) You can grow your money. There seem to be two ways besides faucets: 1) Bitcoin mining 2) Investing in Bitcoin loans

5) You can tip Bitcoins on social networks such as Twitter, Youtube, Reddit, Google+ and Facebook

6) You can convert your Bitcoins into governmental currency if you so choose

That said, you are also welcome to ask for Bitcoin loans, too. Of course, the system is already so refined that risk consumer ratings are calculated to weed out bad borrowers.

It's a brave new world in terms of finance. Below you'll find a variety of links related to various ways of getting involved in the Bitcoin world listed above.

- An online Bitcoin wallet that's easy to setup: https://blockchain.info

- Two faucets that pay as they say: http://www.bitvisitor.com/ & https://freebitco.in

- A place to invest your Bitcoins in personal loans and earn interest: https://btcjam.com/

- A service to tip Bitcoins on all major social networks: https://www.changetip.com

What I take from this is that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, the dark and mucky tunnel that is corporate society. There just might be a way to survive in this world by creating original content and sharing it with the world in a real and honest way. I can't recommend getting into Bitcoin more. There is freedom hidden in those algorithms. There is an escape. Good luck friends.

Edit: If you're so inclined to donate a few satoshi, my Bitcoin address is: 13aqRwR2ZHMxbXjvPwd7ma7VQj4HGDDRhY

There are a few ways you can be a hero and support AJ. Free things are: try Audible or AmazonPrime for 30 days, link us to a social network like Twitter, Facebook or Reddit, or download and rate the podcast in iTunes. If you have a little spare money you can send a Paypal donation to ajsnookauthor@gmail.com, buy one of AJ's Kindle eBooks, or buy anything on Amazon by going through the Amazon links on the site. Thanks so much for your support, AJ

Giving Birth Is A Psychedelic, Boundary-Dissolving Experience

Women, apart from the myriad ways you are discriminated against -- in the workplace, at home, in politics, in the media, in schools, in religious institutions, and on and on -- you do have one thing good going on in this war-on-drugs day and age, this 21st Century of repression where plants are illegal by the dozens.

 

"Several times in your life you're going to be melted down into this situation. And it's a very deep imprinting."

As long as everything is healthy with the old plumbing, you ladies have a psychedelic birthright, which is, uh, giving birth! According to old Terence (and from what I have been lucky enough to have witnessed once, and hope to once more) the childbearing experience is a boundary-dissolving as experiences come. I saw my wife enter the hospital a vastly different person than the woman who walked out five days later (no, it didn't take that long to give birth -- this is Japan where mothers aren't shoved back through the revolving door from which they came).

All Seeing Eye/Creative Commons

"In the absence of psychedelic plants or drugs, a male can go from birth to the grave and never have this experience."

So, in this seemingly male-dominated sub-genre of life that is psychedelic culture (authors, speakers, musicians, and figureheads of all varieties tend to be men), let the male psychonauts out there remember that they are outnumbered by all of the mothers of the world, and let the men influencing this culture also remember that the mothers and sisters of the world deserve a little more time voicing their interpretation and understanding of the state of being of Gaia and the signals she sends us. Be our interpreters, dear women of earth. Lead the way. Connect us all back to our one true mother.

There are a few ways you can be a hero and support AJ. Free things are: try Audible or AmazonPrime for 30 days, link us to a social network like Twitter, Facebook or Reddit, or download and rate the podcast in iTunes. If you have a little spare money you can send a Paypal donation to ajsnookauthor@gmail.com, buy one of AJ's Kindle eBooks, or buy anything on Amazon by going through the Amazon links on the site. Thanks so much for your support, AJ

Duncan Trussell, Anti-Consumerist

This part of the Duncan Trussell Family Hour Podcast was just too funny to not edit together into a Youtube video. If I haven't mentioned it very much lately, I'm one who practices fairly extreme frugality, not spending money, aside from housing, internet, phone and basic utilities, commuting and groceries, on much more each month than a meal or two out and a couple cases of beer for the house. It's a goal of mine to experience life as purely as possibly, to find happiness through intrinsic simplicity of being, creative expression, and human interaction rather than extrinsic striving. Sounds simple enough, I guess. Hope Duncan inspires someone else to live in a similar fashion. Peace.

There are a few ways you can be a hero and support AJ. Free things are: try Audible or AmazonPrime for 30 days, link us to a social network like Twitter, Facebook or Reddit, or download and rate the podcast in iTunes. If you have a little spare money you can send a Paypal donation to ajsnookauthor@gmail.com, buy one of AJ's Kindle eBooks, or buy anything on Amazon by going through the Amazon links on the site. Thanks so much for your support, AJ

Life Remedy: Add One Hour of Good Habits to Your Day

Photo: Adrian Alvarez (Creative Commons)

Life is a series of routines, a repetition of patterns that come to define who we are. For most of us who are tied to a job or to school, does one week really look all that different from the next. Sure, there are crunch times, times when we are really expected to rev up our engines and perform, but those periods come and go like storms. The day-to-day for many of us, is about cruise control and stability, about becoming one the rhythm of the waves, nothing more. If that's the day-to-day, then would it be outrageous to define those patterns, that adapting, with such grandiose vocabulary as "identity" or "worth"?

For us creative types it is common to fight the urge to be systematic, to kick and scream against formulas for living, against timelines and trajectories, against recipes for vitality. We know that a rich life lies within us all. We know that fulfillment occurs outside the box and from within the kindled spirit. We know that too much lulling with the tide makes us soft, stale. It is vividly clear to us that a choppy dose of salt and foam right to the kisser is an experience that can jut us off the rails and onto a newly discovered path.

We know these things, so why would we want to develop more habits, more ways of cruising down a nerfed bike path, destination death?

Why? Because some habits can break us away from thought patterns that are linked to the parts of our identity that may be bland, tired, and in need of an upgrade. Why? Because some routines may jolt our bodies awake, grounding us to the present moment a bit more consistently, tapping that vein that mainlines to the Spirit itself.

I propose a re-examination of our behavior patterns.

How many hours of your day are spent mindlessly scanning through the internet like a Roomba over a vast floor of graham cracker crumbs? How many hours have you heard the same podcaster ramble on about the same drawn-out points, but offering no solutions? How many hours have you turned off completely only to dwell on the past or the future, in turn shooting your self in the foot for not taking ownership of your own personal growth, a growth that can impact the lives of the people around you?

These are the questions that I've grappled with over the past few years, and for the longest time I was searching for a giant answer, a course of action akin to the elixir of life. Little did I know how much of a left turn I had taken when I first started searching. And although I have a long way to go, I am beginning to steer my vessel in the right direction, to alter my course to seas that are rough, yes, but manageable, and good teachers to boot.

Let's Get Practical.

One way to steer your life off into more aware and present-minded waters is to determine the routines that you have which are thoughtless and scrub them off the graffiti wall of your life, replacing them with habit that are thoughtful and present. For me, I found two times of day to attend to. First, I was sleeping longer than necessary. I now wake up at 5:15 every day and do 20 minutes of floor exercises or yoga (I can send you some great Youtube links if you're interested) followed by 10 minutes of breath meditation. Second, I found that the podcasts I listened to each morning were becoming harder and harder to focus on. If anything, they were more a way to block out the commuters around me than a way to learn and be inspired. So, for the 30 minute commute I decided to start reading a book instead, which has turned into about 100 pages per week that I wasn't reading before (that's 1 to 2 more books per month than before, 12 to 24 more per year, so much fuel to fuel the Muse's fire!). Third, instead of complaining abou
t the lack of time to edit part 2 of my novel, I spend the train ride home editing by hand.

Sorry Duncan, Joe, Jad and Robert, Ira, Chris, Danielli, and Lorenzo. I have less time for your shows, but life is better than, well, maybe ever.

There are a few ways you can be a hero and support AJ. Free things are: try Audible or AmazonPrime for 30 days, link us to a social network like Twitter, Facebook or Reddit, or download and rate the podcast in iTunes. If you have a little spare money you can send a Paypal donation to ajsnookauthor@gmail.com, buy one of AJ's Kindle eBooks, or buy anything on Amazon by going through the Amazon links on the site. Thanks so much for your support, AJ

Why Aren't More of Us Choosing Alternative/Intentional Living?

A student of mine gave an anti-skin cancer presentation today. The motivation behind the assignment was rooted in our study of the the French Enlightenment. They were to start a movement based on the ideas of either Rousseau (man is born free in nature and it is civilization corrupts him), Locke (man can thrive in society as long as he is granted the right to life, liberty and property), or Hobbes (man is inherently bad and needs to form a social contract with government in order to keep him in check).

Although it's my philosophy as a teacher to try to let kids make up their own minds, in this instance I couldn't help but let my bias steer the students to either a Rousseauian or Lockeian perspective. Many did.

The student who presented on anti-skin cancer shared this anti-smoking ad as an example of how his movement's ad campaign might look. I thought it was very moving and a symbol of how idyllic we can be in mind, but how hypocritical we can be in body, action or practice.

This led me to ask a few questions: "What happens to us as we grow up that makes us change into people so far from our childhood ideals?" followed by "Is this change gradual, unnoticeable?" then "Is this change a product of the grind our institutions put us through?" and "If so, then what would a world with another path to choose from look like?"

I can see in my mind's eye a world that still has cities for rat racers and career climbers, yes, but also for artists and intellectuals, spaces dedicated to progress and the exchange of ideas. But I can also see spaces with sustainable forest villages of 150 people or less. I can see houseboat harbors filled with fishing families. I can see more mountain cabins and man-made desert caves that run on the sun.

I can't see why these alternative/intentional communities aren't taking off more than they already are. In general, people seem to be more aware of the ills of the world around them: consumerism as a value structure, superficiality, and a plethora of distractions that add little or no value to our lives. So, does anyone have any clue why more people aren't putting their feet down, shouting "I'm made as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!" from the rooftops, and dropping out?

My theory is that unless you get involved in one such communities from a very young age, say late teens to early 20s, your social base, significant other, and family will already be imbedded in a much more established, larger community. And it's hard for many to leave the people they love (and just as hard to convince them to leave with you). I'd love to hear your thoughts on alternative/intentional living, as well as on the change that happens upon reaching adulthood.

There are a few ways you can be a hero and support AJ. Free things are: try Audible or AmazonPrime for 30 days, link us to a social network like Twitter, Facebook or Reddit, or download and rate the podcast in iTunes. If you have a little spare money you can send a Paypal donation to ajsnookauthor@gmail.com, buy one of AJ's Kindle eBooks, or buy anything on Amazon by going through the Amazon links on the site. Thanks so much for your support, AJ

The Seasonal Metaphor

Somewhere in late spring to early summer is when we are meant to achieve greatness. Sometime when the sun is hot but the nights still offer respite, separation, and a time for reflection. It's no big conspiracy that the holidays of hope for better fall around the winter solstice, a time when the light, in that magical reversal, outweighs the dark for the very first time, but we often fail to point out that the holidays of social achievement -- the Fourth of July, Bastille Day, Golden Week, May Day, Juneteenth, Youth Day -- occur when the sky is a crisp blue and the sweat wipes away clean and accompanied with pride, unlike the whimpers heard during the dog days.

So, as a global society, where are we on the metaphorical calendar? Could be in clear-headed fall, full of relief that we made it through the grueling hot summer of recession and war against immovable foes called Terror, Drugs, and Communism -- a brief moment of rest after the harvesting of knowledge and wisdom and the error of our ways. Or is it dreary winter, still before the season of hope? Grey and immobilizing, our only defenses stoicism and willful ignorance as we accept that those in power -- Presidents, Prime Ministers, CEOs -- have our best interests and our freedom in mind. Or maybe we're in our own August, slow to action, full of emotion-laden decisions, absent of logic. Heated and in danger of an irreconcilable decision.

We should make it late spring. After the rains. When all is possible. Time to get things situated just right before the scorch arrives. Right before the flies decide to bite at our hides.

Will we prepared to quell their attacks one measly buzz at a time? Or will be unprepared and wait for them to swarm, only to flail violently and inaccurately? To shoot at and trip over our own feet. To bring the innocents around us down too.

When it's all said and done, it's up to us to decide the season, and to flavor it accordingly. Each day is a new world. Each moment a chance to make that world perfect, to storm the castle, to flip the coin, to sand the edges, to spike the DNA with medicine of rich compassion as if it were the punch at an 1st Estate ball.

There are a few ways you can be a hero and support AJ. Free things are: try Audible or AmazonPrime for 30 days, link us to a social network like Twitter, Facebook or Reddit, or download and rate the podcast in iTunes. If you have a little spare money you can send a Paypal donation to ajsnookauthor@gmail.com, buy one of AJ's Kindle eBooks, or buy anything on Amazon by going through the Amazon links on the site. Thanks so much for your support, AJ

Silence is a Mirror: In Defense of Meditation

Silence is a mirror. So faithful, and yet so unexpected, is the reflection it can throw back at men that they will go to almost any length to avoid seeing themselves in it, and if ever its duplicating surface is temporarily wiped clean of modern life's ubiquitous hubbub, they will hasten to fog it over with such desperate personal noise devices as polite conversation, humming, whistling, imaginary dialogue, schizophrenic babble, etc...

This is how Tom Robbins praises meditation in his novel Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates. A recent Mindrolling podcast with guest Joseph Goldstein emphasizes this point by saying that the only way to know the mind is turn inward and observe it, and that it takes not effort but courage to do so. It's all semantics really, as words mean different things to different people, but to many of us effort implies striving for me, myself and I, while courage implies encountering the unknown with an open mind and an open heart, being reborn in every passing moment, opening one's metaphoric doors to let the rush of beauty that is existence come flowing in like long overdue deluge. Challenging for all of us, yes, but worth a try.

Robbins continues:

Only in sleep is silence tolerated, and even there, most dreams have soundtracks. Since meditation is a deliberate descent into deep internal hush, a muted stare into the ultimate looking glass, it is regarded with suspicion by the nattering masses; with hostility by business interests (people sitting in silent serenity are seldom consuming goods); and with spite by a clergy whose windy authority it is seen to undermine and whose bombastic livelihood it is perceived to threaten.

In short, meditation slows us all down and allows us to understand each other better. In a society that is largely still built on a hierarchy, bureaucracy, and an individual mindset that pits itself against 7 billion others along with Mother Earth herself, it easy to see how meditation gets shot down in social circles as wishy-washy or escapist. That said, it will take courage to defend it, to stand up to the nay sayers and refuse to allow others to remove this revolutionary practice from the intricate puzzle that is social evolution. Make it a corner piece. Make it obvious for all to see its value. This take courage. I think that Bertrand Russell said it best on how to have the courage to stand up to those that point fingers, to defend life's best practices against those holding us all back with a snide remark and a belly laugh. The following are his Ten Commandments of teaching. Pay particularly close attention to numbers 7 and 8, though all can really apply to this cause:

1. Do not feel absolutely certain of anything.
2. Do not think it worth while to proceed by concealing evidence, for the evidence is sure to come to light.
3. Never try to discourage thinking for you are sure to succeed.
4. When you meet with opposition, even if it should be from your husband or your children, endeavor to overcome it by argument and not by authority, for a victory dependent upon authority is unreal and illusory.
5. Have no respect for the authority of others, for there are always contrary authorities to be found.
6. Do not use power to suppress opinions you think pernicious, for if you do the opinions will suppress you.
7. Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.
8. Find more pleasure in intelligent dissent than in passive agreement, for, if you value intelligence as you should, the former implies a deeper agreement than the latter.
9. Be scrupulously truthful, even if the truth is inconvenient, for it is more inconvenient when you try to conceal it.
10. Do not feel envious of the happiness of those who live in a fool’s paradise, for only a fool will think that it is happiness.

There are a few ways you can be a hero and support AJ. Free things are: try Audible or AmazonPrime for 30 days, link us to a social network like Twitter, Facebook or Reddit, or download and rate the podcast in iTunes. If you have a little spare money you can send a Paypal donation to ajsnookauthor@gmail.com, buy one of AJ's Kindle eBooks, or buy anything on Amazon by going through the Amazon links on the site. Thanks so much for your support, AJ

Daniel Suelo: The Man Without Money

I couldn't find this on Youtube and really didn't want to forget to watch this again and again. So, since I couldn't save it to a playlist there, I thought I'd just post it to my blog for everyone to see. This way I won't lose it. Thanks to Jaedinwolf on The Duncan Trussell Family Hour Forum for posting this in a recent thread. His ideas are really common sense, but they always seem to slip away from us. A constant reminder is needed (at least in my case) until this idea of not living with a debt mentality can be a thing of the past. Also, here is Daniel Suelo's blog if you're interested. Read his biography here.

There are a few ways you can be a hero and support AJ. Free things are: try Audible or AmazonPrime for 30 days, link to us a social network like Twitter, Facebook or Reddit, or download and rate the podcast in iTunes. If you have a little spare money you can send a Paypal donation to ajsnookauthor@gmail.com, buy one of AJ's Kindle eBooks, or buy anything on Amazon by going through the site. Thanks so much for your support, AJ

The Cause For Empathy

I was listening to the latest Joe Rogan Experience podcast and heard a common theme arise: empathy. His guest, Stefan Molyneux, a political philosopher and blogger, stated that the two biggest ways to deviate a kid from the capacity for empathy is 1) to take away his father and 2) to take away his freedom to play.

He didn't cite a source but as a teacher I find it easy to believe his claim. Parents out there, do what he called the best solution: sacrifice your time for your kids. Live a simple life while your kids are young. Do as little work as possible without ruining your career. Be home for more than dinner and a bath. A book at night is nice, but it doesn't cut it. It's important to remember that kids need interaction. Kids need role models and role models do more than dictate words on a page. Role models need to show what they're made of. They need to move their bodies, display attitudes and actions to be replicated, and express opinions.

I'm getting a bit off subject, but empathy is at the core of my heart lately. It's at the core of my book, too. Today at work I displayed anger publicly for the first time in at least a year, maybe more. Actually, I can't remember the last time I got angry in public. I'm a bit embarrassed about it and want to blame it on my lapse in meditation lately, but there's something more to it. I failed to empathize with the person that my anger was directed toward. My mind became simple. My mind became small.

But then I realized without regret something that I heard recently from Jim Carrey of all people. He said, "Every moment is pregnant with the next moment of your life." We have to move on and we have to move on with clear heads.

He was talking about creativity and how we are all born creators, intellectually evolving through our own efforts. What that really means to me is that when we have a down moment (like we all do), the sooner we can both learn from that bummer and move on, the better we are setting ourselves up for the future. We need to both remember and forget simultaneously in order to live our dreams. We need to take chances. We need to dream big. And we need to assume that everyone else is dreaming big too. We need to assume that they are all going through ups and downs.

So, basically, those of us with the worst short-term memories and the best long-term ones will have the best chance at shaping the future that we want. To have the empathy needed to get through tough situations -- to realize that the people causing our anger might be hurting more than we are -- is the best way for us to keep our eyes on the prize of creation and stepping into the next moment of reality with clear and focused minds.
 
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