Etcetera
Miscellaneous Thoughts and Things
If people everywhere are not allowed to strive for the happiness they instinctively want,
Then they will be dissatisfied and will make problems for everyone.
...............................................................................................................The Dalai Lama
Everybody needs beauty as well as bread,
Places to play in and pray in,
Where Nature may heal and cheer
And give strength to body and soul alike.
........................................John Muir 1838 - 1914
Ego is our greatest enemy.
Definitions:
I recently heard a good explanation of the difference between
patriotism and nationalism.
Patriotism: One loves one's country and respects other countries.
Nationalism: One loves ones country but has a
complete disregard, even hostility, towards other countries.
The salvation of the state is watchfulness in the citizen.
Commit Random Acts of Kindness
Do something nice for someone,
but don't tell, and don't expect to be rewarded. The reward
should be in the pleasure of the doing.
"But when you give to the poor,
do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing,
so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who
sees what is done in secret, will reward you."
..................................Matthew 6:3
"There is a man who gives a charity
and he conceals it so much so that his left hand does not
know what his right hand spends."
..............................Hadith of Bukhari
Some Thoughts
Love cannot remain
by itself,
It has no meaning
Love has to be put into action
And that action is service
Whatever form we are,
Able or disabled,
Rich or poor
It is not how much we do,
but how much love
we put in the doing;
A lifelong sharing of love
with others.
............................Mother Teresa
"A human being is a part of the whole, called by us, "Universe," a part limited in time and space.
He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest -- a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness.
This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us.
Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.
Nobody is able to achieve this completely, but the striving for such achievement is in itself a part of the liberation and a foundation for inner security."
............Albert Einstein - (1879-1955)
Physicist and Professor, Nobel Prize 1921
A human being is part of a whole, called by us the 'Universe,' a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest--a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.
............Albert Einstein
The price of apathy towards public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.
........................................ Plato
"It's not a matter of what is true that counts but a matter of what is perceived to be true."
.........................Henry Kissinger
In order to rally people, governments need enemies. They want us to be afraid, to hate, so we will rally behind them. And if they do not have a real enemy, they will invent one in order to mobilize us.
.......
Thich Nhat Hanh - Vietnamese monk, activist and writer.
...THE ONLY THING WE HAVE TO FEAR IS FEAR ITSELF...
.......
From the first Inaugural Address of Franklin D. Roosevelt, March 4, 1933
Ethical Behavior is:
Doing the Right thing, even if you are not being watched.
Hate is an expression of fear and weakness.
................................Whitney Young
"Patriotism is supporting your country all the time and your government when it deserves it."
...............................Mark Twain
"Injustice is always wrong!"
................................Coretta Scott King
"When the emperor has no clothes, you have to have the presence of mind and the courage to stand up and say, 'The emperor has no clothes'."
...Ray McGovern (27 year CIA analyst)
The goal of life is to make your heartbeat match the beat of the universe, to match your nature with Nature
"An unconscious people, an indoctrinated people, a people fed only partisan information and opinion that confirm their own bias, a people made morbidly obese in mind and spirit by the junk food of propaganda is less inclined to put up a fight...
ASK QUESTIONS and BE SKEPTICAL."
Bill Moyers at St. Louis conference on media reform 2005
The Roots of Violence:
Wealth without work, Pleasure without conscience, Knowledge without character, Commerce without morality, Science without humanity, Worship without sacrifice, Politics without principles.
........... Mahatma Gandhi 1869-1948
Knowledge
consists in understanding the evidence that establishes the facts.
Not in the belief that it is the fact.
They could be made to accept the most flagrant violations of reality, because they never fully grasped the enormity of what was demanded of them, and were not sufficiently interested in public events to notice what was happening.
......................... George Orwell
Political language. . . is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.
.........................George Orwell
The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them.
..........................George Orwell
The propagandist's purpose is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human: Aldous Huxley
Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people: Black L. Hugo, U.S. Supreme Court Justice (1937 - 1971)
The cry has been that when war is declared, all opposition should therefore be hushed. A sentiment more unworthy of a free country could hardly be propagated. If the doctrine be admitted, rulers have only to declare war and they are screened at once from scrutiny: William Ellery Channing
I know what I believe. I will continue to articulate what I believe and what I believe-I believe what I believe is right.
.......
George W. Bush: 43rd President of the United States
The War Prayer
By Mark Twain
"O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle --
be Thou near them!
With them -- in spirit -- we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe.
O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it --
For our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet!
We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.
See right sidebar for link to the short story by Mark Twain that this prayer is from.
The Wolf and the Lamb
Wolf, meeting with a Lamb astray from the fold, resolved not to lay violent hands on him, but to find some plea to justify to the Lamb the Wolf's right to eat him.
He thus addressed him: "Dear Lamb, last year you grossly insulted me."
"Indeed," bleated the Lamb in a mournful tone of voice, "I was not then born."
Then said the Wolf, "You feed in my pasture."
"No, good sir," replied the Lamb, "I have not yet tasted grass."
Again said the Wolf, "You drink of my well."
"No," exclaimed the Lamb, "I never yet drank water, for as yet my mother's milk is both food and drink to me."
Upon which the Wolf seized him and ate him up, saying,
"Well! I won't remain supperless, even though you refute every one of my imputations."
The tyrant will always find
a pretext for his tyranny.
Heros and Heroines
Shirley Chisholm
Nov. 30, 1924 - Jan. 2, 2005.
She was the first black woman elected to Congress and the first black person to seek a major party's nomination for the U.S. presidency.
She was a champion for WOMEN'S Rights. It was frustrating to hear women talk about how great it was when some blond woman, I forgot her name, was running for president when Shirly was so much greater and did it first.
Shirly Chisholm ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1972, a campaign that was viewed as more symbolic (by some people, especially men) than practical. She won 152 delegates before withdrawing from the race.
Her platform was more practical and logical than any of the other candidates. She was just up against a lot of stupid, narrow-minded people who shouted that "the time was not right" for a Woman to be president.
She wrote books, "The Good Fight" and "Unbought and Unbossed".
"She was a mouthpiece for the underdog, the poor, underprivileged people, the people who did not have much of a chance," said her 88-year-old x-husband Conrad Chisholm.
Discussing what her legacy might be, Shirley Chisholm once said, "I'd like them to say that Shirley Chisholm had guts. That's how I'd like to be remembered."
Clara Kinsey
Born 1899. Died 1982 at age 83.
Clara Kinsey was my Girl Scout camp leader, my Red Cross swimming teacher from the swimmer level, then Junior Lifesaving through Water Safety Instructor.
She knew everything about Nature and I learned about many wild flowers, trees, reptiles and amphibians, insects and animals from Mrs. Kinsey. I earned many of my nature Girl Scout Badges from her while at summer camp. She had a great effect upon how I look at Nature and the world.
Now there is a movie about her husband, Alfred Kinsey, who did important research at Indiana University on human sexuality. I have not seen the movie, but I suspect it does not tell the world what a great woman she was.
Diaspora of Kind People
There are people everywhere who form a Fourth World, or a diaspora of their own.
They are the lordly ones.
They come in all colours.
They can be Christians or Hindus or Muslims or Jews or pagans or atheists.
They can be young or old, men or women, soldiers or pacifists, rich or poor.
They may be patriots, but they are never chauvinists.
They share with each other, across all the nations, common values of humour and understanding.
When you are among them you know you will not be mocked or resented because they will not care about your race, your faith, your sex or your nationality, and they suffer fools if not gladly, at least sympathetically.
They laugh easily.
They are easily grateful.
They are never mean.
They are not inhibited by fashion, public opinion or political correctness.
They are exiles in their own comminities, because they are always in a minority, but they form a mighty nation, if they only knew it.
It is the nation of nowhere, and I have come to think that its natural capital is Trieste.
............................................Jan Morris
From: "Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere"
To worship is:
...to stand in awe under a heaven of stars, before a flower, a leafein sunlight, or a grain of sand.
...to be silent, receptive, before a tree astir with the wiind, or the passing shadow of a cloud.
...to work with dedicatioin and with skill; it is to pause from work and listen to a strain of music.
...to sing with the singing beauty of the Earth; it is to listen through a storm to the still small voice within.
...a lonelieness seeking communion; it is a thirsty land crying out for rain.
...kindred fire within our hearts; it moves through deeds of kindness and through acts of love.
...the mystery within us reaching out to the mystery beyond.
It is an inarticulate silence yearning to speak; it is the window of the moment open to the sky of the eternal.
....................................Jacob Trapp
He does not believe who does not live according to his belief: Thomas Fuller
