Srikumar Rao: Plug into your hard-wired happiness | Video on TED.com

This is a great TED talk that challenges the way we approach life while chasing the "American Dream." The presenter does a brilliant job of articulating how focusing on the process of achieving, instead of the end goal that is desired, results in a very different experience with life. When we focus on the process of our lives we can actually be present and receive fulfillment from the process itself. This perspective is very counter-culture to the American way of achieving through the process of a means to an end.

Srikumar Rao: Plug into your hard-wired happiness | Video on TED.com

The Pursuit of Happiness

One of the fundamental definitions of "insanity" is to repeat an action, over and over, with the idea that the result will somehow change. When one applies this definition (as simple and over-generalized as it is) of mental wellbeing to the American pursuit of happiness, one can easily see that this society is suffering from some type of group psychosis. Our materialistic society that functions through a never-ending cycle of consuming and up-grading, is not designed to ever create some state of satisfaction or true happiness. Through the process of "buying into" this consumer culture we are giving up a fundamental law of human psychological wellbeing - the locus of control (for one's emotional state and therefore mental wellbeing) must reside within the individual. This is to say, there is a positive association between taking the primary responsibility of one's emotions (realizing that they are mostly internally manifested) and a high level of subjective wellbeing. Happiness does not come from the outside, it comes from an internal process. There is an ancient Eastern philosophical mantra that is very appropriate here - there is no way to happiness, rather, happiness is the way.

I encourage you to watch the TED Talk that is provided through the link below. This is a short presentation from a well respected psychologist named Dan Gilbert, whom studies happiness. I think you will find what he has discovered to be very challenging to the American ideal of "the pursuit of happiness." Our societies problems (economical, political, medical, etc.) will never be solved through more regulations, or less regulation for that matter, the solution to all of our problems lay within the very paradigm that they were created through. I see a fundamental starting point for the needed change in paradigm is to honestly challenge what we think will make us happy. How can we make the familiar seem strange?

http://youtu.be/LTO_dZUvbJA

Bringing the Power of Nature to the Urban Void

I am obviously biased when it comes to my opinion about the importance of spending time with Nature. Nevertheless, I do believe that there is great healing power within Nature that is available to anyone that is open to it. Throughout my lifetime I have not spent a great amount of time within the highly built-up urban centers of our world. However, for the most part I have enjoyed the time that I have spent in large cities, but there was something missing within these urban realms - the sacredness of Nature. Considering that the majority of the worlds population lives in urban centers, and this trend is on the rise, there is an important question to be asked - What will happen when the majority of humans on this planet have little or know connection and experience with Nature? From my perspective, nothing good will come of this separation from Nature. How are people going to value something that they do not know?

You may be surprised to hear that over the years I have consistently had multiple guests on river trips that did not understand how rivers work; they did not understand that rivers do not go around in a circle like an amusement park ride! I am not kidding, and I really wish I were. I believe that there are many people in this highly "civilized" society that do not truly understand how the water cycle works on this planet, the very mechanism that supports all life on earth. We cannot afford to forget what allows us to live on this planet; Nature is the giver of all life on earth. Regardless of one's religious beliefs, one cannot deny that humans are interdependent with the natural ecosystems of this planet. This undeniable fact of the source of our lives is exactly why I think we should consider creating Open Spaces that are Sacred Spaces. Please check out the below link and see how some visionaries are bringing the power of Nature into the void of sacredness that lies within the growing urban centers of our world.

http://www.opensacred.org/

The Natural Solution

Here is another mechanism to social change that is so simple and so obvious that it is easy to overlook. My personal experience and observations with working as a guide, teacher, and rescuer in the out of doors is very much in line with what this article is pointing towards. I am planning on focusing a significant amount of my attention towards this topic - the importance of having a personal connection to nature and how it affects an individual's well-being. In short, this article deals with the decreasing time that children are spending in the outdoors and how scientific research is actually revealing how detrimental this "nature-deficit disorder" truly is to the well-being of humans. For anyone that has spent a fair amount of time in the out of doors this will not be a surprise.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/people-in-nature/200901/no-more-nature-deficit-disorder

Ron Gutman: The hidden power of smiling | Video on TED.com

Ron Gutman: The hidden power of smiling | Video on TED.com

Some aspects of the needed social change are very simple and reside within each and every one of us.

Violence and Hatred are a Black Bottomless Hole: The Real Enemy is Fear and Intolerance

I was very disturbed by the celebration of the death of our "enemy." This is a dark moment in our society and in our world that will only lead to further darkness. There is no light of peace within violence or hatred. America is not well, it is not well at many levels!

I am not a relativist, however, being a student of anthropology I do respect relativism as a tool. Being a student of psychology, I also value objectivity as a tool, but realize that objectivity is more of a human construct than an actually attainable state, especially when it comes to the volatile cocktail of mixing religion and politics. Considering that each and every one of us creates our reality through a subjective filter of our interpretive lens, I think that it is primarily idealistic to claim any objectivity within humanity. Not to say that it is not a valuable pursuit, but we must use reflexivity to keep our selves honest and thus, be able to account for our biases. Our local Rabbi (Ashland, OR.) recently spoke at a presentation at the university on religions of the world, and stated how dangerous and misguided religions can be when "God gets an army." Rabbi David is a wise man.

How one deals with death is very revealing of how one thinks, believes, and lives. How one deals with the death of an enemy speaks to even deeper depths of where one is at along the development of being human. Children are taught to be "good sports," to not gloat over their victory and be respectful to the loosing team. If this humility in victory is important on the playing field, then why are we not leading by example within our society with the recent "victory" of the slaying of Osama Bin Laden? The celebration of the killing of a fellow human, no matter what the individual's behavioral track record is, should not be seen as a joyous event. It should be viewed as the failure that it truly is, a failure of the abilities that supposedly separates us from the "animal world" the ability to reason, negotiate, and compromise. Is it easier to celebrate the death of "the enemy" than to look into the mirror and see the real enemy, which is fear and intolerance? This war, and all wars are marketed to the nation as a fight between good and evil; however, the worst type of evil is the kind that hides behind what is passed off to be "good." The politicians of the American War Machine are using this slogan of the battle between good and evil like a cheap whore. The worst type of violence and hatred is the justified kind, the kind that blinds the one whom wields it as to its true consequences - more violence and hatred that is transgenerational. Violence and hatred are a black bottomless hole and when one commits to entering into it one will be searching in vain for the light of peace of which one believes one is looking for. There is no light in violence, only darkness. The celebration of the death of an "enemy" that I witnessed in this warring nation that is America was a very dark moment for our society. Our society has been living in an unhealthy state of fear ever since 9/11 and its negative accumulative effects are expressing themselves through this form of negative maladapted behavior. America is not well, it is not well at many levels and this celebration of the death of Osama Bin Laden is another strong symptom of a degrading society. True warriors mourn the death of their enemy, because they know that ultimately it is a failure, a failure of humanity.

Stepping back from the American experience, and using as much objectivity as we can, one could ask - Does the American way of life of over consuming and polluting through our convenient reality that is brought to us by globalization, which directly affects hundreds of millions of people in negative ways, not constitute being evil? Just as "good" and "evil" must be taken within their cultural, political, and historical contexts to fully understand, "morals" should also be evaluated within their context. 

"So, let us be alert - alert in a twofold sense:
Since Auschwitz we know what man is capable of.
And since Hiroshima we know what is at stake." Viktor E. Frankl 

Thoughts on Cultural Rights

The following piece was written as a final paper for a course in anthropology covering "Cultural Rights." This course was one of the most challenging courses that I have ever taken because it truly made me look at how I think the world ought to be as compared to how it truly is. If you are interested in this area of humantiy I recommend reading the work of Arjun Appadurai, he has the most dynamic perspective on globalization and its effects on human culture. The area of "cultural rights" is very applicable to the study of social change and in many ways is fundamental to understanding how societies "make" the choices that they do.

Entering “Down The Rabbit Hole” of Cultural Rights

What are cultural rights, and do they really exist? This two-fold question is a logical starting point to reflect back on this journey through the study of cultural rights. One can view cultural rights as a highly dynamic and moving target, not only one that moves, one that also changes shape. I am coming at the topic of cultural rights from the processual perspective that sees humanity as a fluid body of relations that is in a constant state of flux, and definitely not in a static state of existence. The influence and importance of the context of a particular cultural right must be recognized; just as when water is poured from one shape of a vessel to another, the shape of the water appears to be different, but fundamentally the water is the same. This analogy of water is very helpful when studying cultural rights because it gives recognition to the plastic nature of culture within humanity, and shows how important the cultural context is to how a cultural right may appear from the etic perspective. So, with all this said, I do believe there are cultural rights. However, it all depends on how one views the concept of culture, but let us save that for the end of this essay. For now let us run with the assumption that culture does have a solid grounding within the human experience and is a fundamental component of humanity. “People and groups have a generic right to realize their capacity for culture, and to produce, reproduce and change the conditions and forms of their physical, personal and social existence, so long as such activities do not diminish the same capacities of others.” This statement from the 1999 American Anthropological Association’s Declaration on Anthropological and Human Rights, speaks to the component of culture as a critical element of the right to be human, it speaks to culture as a part of human rights. Is there a difference between human rights and cultural rights? I do believe there is a difference between these universal rights of humanity. My interpretation of what the AAA is declaring within this statement is – the right to practice and develop culture is a fundamental right of being human. This is to say that, cultural rights are embedded within human rights. If cultural rights are embedded within some kind of human rights, where did they come from? Who is to say what exactly constitutes a cultural right as being valid or legitimate?

The Sources of Cultural Rights

I view the core source of cultural rights as being the voice of the participants’ within a particular cultural context, the voice of self-determination. Throughout many of the case studies that we examined, there was a theme of the importance of self-determination – the right of people to choose their path through the journey that is the human experience. The role and importance of self-determination is extremely obvious when one looks at the examples of the oppression of the indigenous people, the world over. The story is often the same when it comes to the conflict between indigenous cultures and the nation-state of the dominant culture – the self-determination of the indigenous peoples' is crushed by the agenda of the nation-state and its dominant culture. The conflict is usually over the use and control of resources, and the motivation is fueled by ethnocentrism. At a fundamental level, cultural rights are grounded in the belief that all humans should have a voice in how they live their lives, and not be forced to live under the oppression of the desires of others'. Cultural rights appear to rise out of the space between the stakeholders of a conflict, out of a process of creative tension. Rights in general can be viewed as a response to some type of omission or commission, this is to say that, there is a belief that all humans should be viewed as equal and thus receive equal treatment. If all humans were treated in a just and fair manner across humanity, there would be no need for cultural rights. However, since the world that we live in is neither just nor fair, cultural rights have emerged from a place of need. The need for a peoples to successfully negotiate their identities, express their beliefs, and continue to practice, produce and reproduce their culture. This space of creative tension that cultural rights appear to rise from within, can be viewed as the “-“ between the element of humanity that is the nation-state. One cannot, or should not, address the topic of cultural rights and their sources of grounding and manifestation, without looking into the world of politics and political agendas. It is the very political reality of the nation-state that creates the required environment that allows for the need of cultural rights to exist, to flourish. Turning the attention back to the many examples of indigenous people being culturally oppressed by the nation-state, one can see it is the political agenda of creative maintenance by the state, which is required to continue the nation building process, and is at the heart of the cultural oppression. This political agenda of maintaining the nation-state, of building a nation, is accomplished by the destruction of other nations (e.g., the cultural communities of indigenous peoples) by the state sponsored slogan of – assimilate or die! If cultural rights at their core come out of a need for self-determination by the people and can be viewed as a product of the creative tension between the nation and state, does that simply mean that they are universal rights of all humans and that all cultural rights should be treated and viewed in the same way? If it were only that simple, we would be done here.

Universality Vs. Relativity

At another level, cultural rights are the result of the tension between the two realms of ethnocentrism and relativism. Cultural rights should not be viewed as universal with respect to their content, but universal in their existence; at this level, cultural rights mirror the existence of the cultural diversity within humanity. The issue of cultural rights should not be a question as to the legitimacy of the multitude of different cultures within humanity; it should be the recognition of the necessity of the diversity of culture within the unity of humanity. Just as the human genome requires a certain level of diversity to continue its successful reproduction, so does human culture. If cultural rights were truly universal at the content level, they would contribute to the homogenization of human culture, and potentially to the extinction of the human genome, of humanity itself. If we can establish the need to work from a point that respects and values the right of self-determination, then we can use a framework of cultural relativity to allow for the members of a cultural community to establish what it is that should, and should not, be protected within their specific context. The members of the community, and its neighboring communities, which practices and invents the particular cultural context, should establish the content of their cultural rights. It is the emic perspective that truly understands what is authentic, what is traditional, and what is significant within a cultural context. I have included the neighboring communities in order to give credit to the co-creation of cultural identity and the cross-cultural influence that all cultures in this world of modernity experience. The identity of a member of a particular cultural community is in part validated by the non-membership of the community members of the “other.” One only needs to look at the work of Appadurai’s to see how the increasingly global world of humanity results in a macro-level cultural context that all cultures co-create and co-inhabit. I see this newly forming world that Appadurai’s work is pointing towards as leading to a cultural context environment where the balance between ethnocentrism and relativism is made more powerful, but at the same time more of an implicitly experienced phenomenon. The global cultural economy that Appadurai speaks of is a complex world of relations that embodies the processual perspective on human culture. Just as the continued development of human culture is a fluid process, the content of cultural rights must be viewed and established with the same respect for the flow of the constant state of flux within humanity. If the content of cultural rights is context dependent, then are the duties and responsibilities that accompany the rights context dependent as well? What are the duties and responsibilities of being human?

Rights Equate Into Duties and Responsibilities

Cultural rights do imply some sort of social duties and responsibilities that must accompany them. If a member of a cultural community is going to exercise their cultural rights, then they should also be willing to adhere to the connected duties and responsibilities. Cultural rights should be viewed as privileges and not as entitlements; this is to say that a right of any type is exercised through a social agreement between the individual and the communities that are involved with the right. The particular cultural context, which the cultural right is exercised within, has established social norms that can be viewed as the parameters of this social agreement. Keeping with the theme of indigenous people, and in particular Native American peoples, one could look at the cultural right to practice traditional religion and its accompanying duties and responsibilities. For example, if a Native American religious practice includes the use of a powerful substance like peyote, which is seen as an illegal controlled substance outside of the particular Native American cultural context, the members of the community must practice the use of peyote in accordance with their communities’ traditions. It is up to the particular Native American community to establish what is appropriate use, and what is abuse, of peyote within their cultural religious beliefs. This particular example shows how the Native American community must negotiate their duties and responsibilities, which are associated with the use of peyote, with the neighboring cultural communities through the nation-state of the United States of America. In order to maintain a cultural right it is the duty of the cultural community to establish the set responsibilities of its members with respect to the exercising of their cultural rights. The primary locus of control over the duties and responsibilities of a cultural right should be from within the emic perspective. However, no single culture exists within a vacuum, and therefore, must also consider the influences of their neighboring cultural communities when establishing the duties and responsibilities that are connected to their cultural rights. As the AAA stated with their declaration on human rights, “so long as such activities do not diminish the same capacities of others”, therefore it is important for a cultural community to consider how their actions are impacting the cultural rights of their neighbors, and the larger community of humanity. Just as the content of a cultural right is dependent on the particular context that it is within, the associated duties and responsibilities will also need to be culturally appropriate to the particular context. However, I do see a universal aspect to the duties and responsibilities that accompany all cultural rights. There must be a social agreement that is implicitly made between every human being and the community that is humanity. Therefore, it is the duty of the community of humanity to establish the set responsibility that every human must adhere to. For this responsibility to fit into a cross-cultural structure it would have to be rooted in acceptance and empathy for other humans, for the differences of the “other,” but also grounded in the balance of ethnocentrism and relativism of what it is to be a human being. With self-determination in mind, I believe that an important part of this universal responsibility of all cultural rights is to honor every community member’s choice to either be a part of the community that they were born into or join another cultural community that they choose.

The Concept of Culture – The Cornerstone

It is easy to write about cultural rights under the assumption that culture is a well known and agreed upon concept. However, I see this assumption as being a fundamental error in judgment that will lead to critical miscommunications surrounding this complex issue of cultural rights. As I have stated early on in this essay, I see culture through the lens of the processual perspective that acknowledges its fluid and plastic properties. However, I do not totally discredit the essentialist perspective for it does point out some of the solid cultural structures that are fundamental with the process of cultural evolution. I am using the term “evolution” to recognize the constant state of flux that human culture goes through, and not to suggest that the change is always for the better or represents some kind of hierarchical state of superiority. This potentially paradoxical reality of the existence of the processual and essentialist perspectives can be likened to the relationship between ethnocentrism and relativism. This is to say, the essentialist perspective may be used in a complementary way to ground the processual perspective into the more rigid aspects of cultural traditions, which leads to the recognition of the plastic qualities of human culture. With respect to cultural rights, I believe that using any one perspective or theory in its totality is a fundamental error. For example, if one peers through the lens of the essentialist perspective that is overlaid with a relativist filter, one may see cultural rights as a completely context specific concept that is dependent solely on the way things used to bewithin the particular context and does not take into account for the influence of the surrounding world of change. If we swap out the lens and filter to include the processualist and ethnocentric, respectively, one may see cultural rights as a concept that is in constant flux and being blown by the winds of how things ought to be within an increasingly global cultural landscape. My hope was that in using these two somewhat extreme examples shows how the concept of culture fundamentally changes how cultural rights are viewed and thus constructed. One potential danger I see within the studies of culture is a tendency to objectify it, to almost view it as separate from its origin, to view it separate from humanity. This observation, maybe a result of my personal bias towards viewing culture as a truly organic manifestation of the body of humanity, and my not being a relativist at heart.

Feeling Around with a Little Light in The Darkness

In the spirit of being a processualist, I see my understanding of culture, and thus cultural rights, as being in the early stages of a never-ending process. I feel like I am deep within the rabbit hole with just enough light to barely see what is in my hands; in fact, I can feel what it is more than I can see what I am holding. I feel that human rights can be viewed as an umbrella that is intended to protect and shelter the most vulnerable members of the human community, and cultural rights are the center post of the understructure of this umbrella of human rights. I feel that cultural rights require a new level of global understanding that can be viewed as a form of meta-cognition of one’s role within the larger and newly forming global cultural economy (Appadurai 1990). Our individual roles within cultural rights require each of us to accept the duties and responsibilities that are directly connected to retaining the privilege of exercising the rights within a cultural context and within the community of humanity. Can we view cultural rights as a “natural” process of human culture that could be likened to that of natural selection? Are cultural rights a manifestation of the deep-seated desire of humanity to survive through its most powerful tool of adaptation, through its culture? There appears to be an implicit balance of creation within the process of cultural rights that is between what is innately valued within humanity and the fears associated with the conflict over resources. One should not enter into the dark hole of cultural rights without the stomach to confront the sociopolitical structures of the world, for it is the state who has been given the power to simultaneously polices and commit crimes against, cultural rights. It is within the voice of self-determination that the basis of cultural rights truly lays, and the costs and benefits of all the stakeholders must be heard around the table of cultural rights. At the heart of this cost-benefit analysis, the true question for all humans is – What is cultural diversity truly worth, and what is truly at stake? 

Race to Nowhere | Share

Race to Nowhere

This film does justice to the real issues within the failing educational system of the U.S.A. One cannot have a real dialogue about the "problems" of our educational system, without addressing our larger society and its dysfunctional state. Our educational system functions within our society and is a direct part of it. There is a co-creation relationship between a society and its educational system, it is a fallacy to look at one without the other.

Paul Root Wolpe: It's time to question bio-engineering | Video on TED.com

Paul Root Wolpe: It's time to question bio-engineering | Video on TED.com

It could be argued that our society is "drunk on technology." This presentation should be alarming to anyone that respects the "natural" laws of life. The continued use of the ideology that we can out-smart Nature, will in the end, be our demise.

Chade-Meng Tan: Everyday compassion at Google | Video on TED.com

Chade-Meng Tan: Everyday compassion at Google | Video on TED.com

This short video presentation speaks to the power of Compassion! In my observations, the one human characteristic that could transform our society is compassion. Please check out this presentation and share it with someone else, thank you!

#TED launches exciting new educational initiative! Educators, students, & creatives, learn more here: http://bit.ly/ggUKNN @TED_ED

It could be said that all our problems and their solutions lay within the realm of education. One cannot talk about a society's educational system as if it exists outside and separate from the society. There is a relationship of co-creation between a society and its educational system, one creates the other. With that said, the current state of our society should not come as a surprise to anyone that has questioned not only the process of our educational system but the very content that it produces. I see a great need for a revolution in how we see learning, knowledge, and wisdom. There is also a great need for reeducation for many of the "older" students of our society, because teachers cannot teach what they do not have within them.

#TED launches exciting new educational initiative! Educators, students, & creatives, learn more here: http://bit.ly/ggUKNN @TED_ED

Being Aware of Our Affects and Effects

One of my most respected teachers, Gandhi, was a believer in "buying and producing locally." He encouraged the making of one's own clothes. To many of us that are so used to existing solely in a cash based society, this level of self reliance seems quite extreme. However, it is only in recent years, using the Big Picture Perspective, that we have existed in this realm of extreme dependence on large scale systems of production and distribution.

I have been reflecting on this aspect of Gandhi's teachings and how the current trend to buy locally grown food, at its ideal, is modeled after what Gandhi had realized. By not supporting the corporate food industry, one helps to diffuse the concentration of social power that Gandhi fought against. The institution that Gandhi worked so hard against, may have gone by another name, but at its core, is still very much alive today. Back in Gandhi's day it was the British Colonial Empire, today it is the Transnational Corporate Colonial Empire.

Are you aware that food products purchased from a large corporate food supplier are symbolically made of oil? For every 1 calorie that is in the food products that are purchased from these large stores, it takes 9 calories of oil to produce and distribute them. There is a long line of petroleum products that are transformed into the very food that is sold in many of the stores of today. I do not think that I need to lay out why Big Oil Companies need to be relieved of some of their social power! Do I?

I could go on and on about the ill effects that supporting industries such as petroleum and non-organic farming have on all of us, but in honor of the amazing little man that Gandhi was, I will suggest the affirmative - be the change that you want to see in the world. Many of us want change, big change, in our lives! It is very hard to know what specific changes will lead to the desired result. For that matter, what is the desired result?

The concept of "social power" is looked at closely within some of the anthropological studies of contemporary human issues. A good example of a large amount of concentrated social power is a company like WalMart. When WalMart makes decisions the ripple effect, affects many layers of societies' around the world. The allure of inexpensive goods brings in the WalMart shoppers in the hordes. However, when one steps back and looks at the real cost of these "inexpensive" goods, the price becomes much higher than is listed on the shelf. In short, the real cost is paid by all of us, or our descendants, in the long run. I often hear people say "I cannot afford to buy organic food." in return, I try to explain how they cannot afford not to buy organic food. Maybe a more truthful statement would be, "I cannot afford to maintain this American lifestyle and at the same time pay the real cost of many of the goods I like to enjoy." However, I do think that this inconvenient reality that I am pointing towards is more of a product of ignorance, than spite.

If you are interested in this topic I encourage you to educate yourself about the products that you buy. Do you buy clothes that are made from non-organic farmed cotton? What are the real costs, to the environment, from cotton farming that is not done in a sustainable organic manner? Why do we support a federal government that continues to reward farmers (through subsidies) that grow in such unsustainable means?

We live in an extremely complex society where the mere scale of the socioeconomic and sociopolitical structures appear to be unruly giants. It is hard to know where to begin. From my perspective, one very effective means to diffuse some of the highly concentrated social power that some of these giant corporate beasts have acquired, is to slowly starve them by not giving them so much cash! By becoming more aware of the money trails that we are a part of, we can cast our vote for the type of world that we want to live in. Experimenting with growing some of your own food, at any level, can help out with this "new diet" for the corporate beast. Most important, is to ask questions, lots of questions!

Michael Pawlyn: Using nature's genius in architecture | Video on TED.com

The concept of "waste" is foreign to Planet Earth. We humans are the only species to create "waste." All other life on Earth reuses all other life on Earth. The concept of creating "waste" like pollution, does not fit with the closed system reality that we actually are living here on Earth. Please take a moment to listen to what Michael Pawlyn has to say with respect to how we could learn a lot from studying the embedded naturally sustainable design of Nature. If we are truly the smartest species on Earth, we should probably start behaving in a manner that supports this claim of superior intelligence.

Michael Pawlyn: Using nature's genius in architecture | Video on TED.com

Information Is Powerful - The Power Of Sharing

In recent days I have put a lot of time into sharing some of the information that has come to me through my studies over the last couple of years. I have reorganized the structure and content of many of the pages of this blog. Some of the information within these pages is very personal to me and my life experiences. From a casual observation some of these literature explorations may seem a little on the side of "confessional." I encourage you to allow that observation to pass, and try to look deeper into these stories and analytical essays for the lessons being offered. I also recommend reading the "Method to The Madness" page, it may help with the context of interpretation.

Information is powerful; much of the information, should be shared. I view much of my life experiences as gifts and feel strongly that it is my responsibility to you, as a fellow human, to share these gifts with you. Through my eyes, one of Gandhi's more profound teachings was that - having more of anything that you truly need is a form of stealing. This very simple principle of sharing in the common good can be applied to information and knowledge in a very interest way.

Education, Ignorance, and The State of Our Society

There is a lot of talk around our educational system in this society, primarily about how dysfunctional it is. From the perspective that sees a society as a large web of interconnected relationships, this current state of dysfunction does not seem abnormal considering the societal context. Through the perspective that sees the web of relations between historical beginnings, cultural beliefs, societal behaviors, political agendas, and economic goals (to name a few), one can see a bigger picture of the complexity of this society's educational system.

Some of my professional training and practice comes from the biomedical (Western medicine) model of wellness. Through this model of medicine it is common to use the signs and symptoms of "the patient" to tract down what needs fixing. I think if we view the current state of the educational system as a collection of signs and symptoms of our society's "body" that it is not well and needs some fixing, the solutions may turn out to be entirely different than what most would expect.

From my perspective I see our educational system needing nothing short of a revolution in its design and goals. This is easier said than done when you acknowledge the web of relations that spreads to and from the educational system and the society as a whole. I believe that we as a society need to rethink how we define what it is to be educated.

How do you define education?

On the other side of the analytical coin, resides the oh so ugly word of "ignorance." I do not think that we can have a dialogue about what it means to be educated without looking deeply into how this society views the state of ignorance. There is an Eastern philosophy saying that - The expert's mind is limited and the beginner's mind is limitless. I think this gets at one of America's dysfunctional beliefs with respect to ignorance. Have we put so much value on "knowing" that we have lost the power of questioning? If you listen to any of the great scientific of philosophical minds of the past or present, you may just here a sincere level of humility that is rooted in the acknowledgment of not knowing, rather than knowing. This state of inquiring into the mysteries of life can also be viewed as valuing critical thinking as a posed to memorizing information.

I recently participated in a poetry workshop and would like to share a poem that came out of that experience. There is actually a revival of using poetry within the discipline of anthropology to diversify not only the medium of communication but the very thinking that we approach the study of humanity. The poem is an ode to ignorance.

Ode to Ignorance

Oh ignorance, you have been made out to be such the criminal, the villain, and the source of all evil.

I am here to appeal this unjust sentence that has been handed down to you.

The judges, your condemners, are merely confused educated fools.

Please forgive them for they have merely forgotten what a sincere childhood friend you were to them.

What I love about you, old ignorance, is your peaceful nature, your smiling face, your blissful laughter.

Your state of residence is pure potentiality, you are the seed of everything.

Knowledge is so limiting, so confining with its strictly enforced borders, its cold walls of knowing.

All the beginners know how wonderful you truly are, but they are shamed into believing that you are the enemy.

I love you, old ignorance, for you are the field of peace and true love.

It has all been one big misunderstanding.

I hope this post has stirred within you questions that you may not have looked at before, or maybe could look at again differently. I personally see education as the field where all the problems and their solution are to be found. This paradoxical way of looking at education is why the definition of what it is to be educated is so important to truly look at our educational system with some level of objectivity.

How do you view and feel about ignorance?

In Honor of Dr. King and Gandhi

The following is a version of an op-ed of mine that the Ashland Daily Tidings published back on January 21, 2009. I would like to share it with you here, now.

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, and I wanted to share some thoughts with you all. It is amazing to think that it was less than 45 years ago that segregation was still a legal part of the culture in the U.S. I have so much respect for what Gandhi and Dr. King both stood for and were willing to give.

Gandhi may not come to the top of the mind when one thinks of the Civil Rights movement in the U.S., but he very much was a part of it. It was Gandhi who had inspired Dr. King to use nonviolence to confront the fearful power of separate thinking. The courage and conviction that these men displayed is, unfortunately, a very rare thing. The battles that these individuals were willing to choose are still very much alive today. I hope and pray that we all can embrace the idea and practice of nonviolence in our lives.

I believe it was Gandhi who said that "there is very little difference between thoughts and deeds." I think this directly applies to violence. Often we think of violence as just physical acts, but it is so much more than that. Violence is a way of thinking, and most of it is not physical at all. It comes in many shapes and forms, from the passive aggressive jabs and jokes that are exchanged between friends and family to the honking of one's horn in anger against the person who is irresponsibly talking on their phone while driving.

Violence is a feeling, that feeling when someone has hurt or wronged you and you want the same for them. An eye for an eye is an act of violence. Killing that fly, that is bothering you by merely being a fly, is violent.

Violence is ruling our world, through the governments and its economics, through the power of fear. It is at the very base and foundation of our culture, and it is time for all of us to see it for what it is. The feeling of superiority is violent thinking, because anything superior must be defended against that which is inferior. Think about it, when we say that the U.S. is the best country in the world, what are we really saying?

Please look at a picture of the world today, taken from outer space, and ponder how unnatural the lines in the sand that we have drawn, really are. In a sad way it is humorous, quite childish, like children fighting over a sandbox. We must find the courage to talk about it for what it is. Violence is rooted in self-loathing, a lack of self-respect and the belief in separatism. How could any of us be violent, if we truly loved and respected ourselves and felt the oneness of all humanity?

I truly believe that this issue is the biggest threat to all of us. This is much bigger than an economic depression and bigger than global warming. I believe this because it is not talked about on the news, there isn't a cool documentary about it, because we, as a whole, are in denial about what violence really is. It is the sleeping dragon that is within all of us.

I am making a vow of nonviolence, or "ahimsa," today, and I hope and pray that you all will do the same, for all of our sake. I have hope and faith in humanity because I know the amazing healing power of truth and love. These powerful tools that we all have within us, truth and love, don't work on their own but require effort and commitment. I have faith in us all. Deep love and sincere gratitude to all of you, wherever you are.

Lack of Trust = High Anxiety

Looking at the state of our society and its political environment, a deep lack of trust comes to mind. Within the studies of American culture there is an observation that points to the fastest growing class of Americans being that of the anxious class. This growing class of American society spans all races and many tax brackets; it is an equal opportunity class of society where all that is required is a subtle feeling of fear that comes from a lack of trust.

I have had the privilege of working in extremely stressful settings, both as a white water river guide and a ski patroller. The unforgiving environments of a raging river or a steep frozen mountain side, pose excellent case studies for observing fearful people. An observant river guide or ski patroller can learn volumes about human behavior with respect to anxiety, fear, and trust. To summarize what I personally have learned from this experience is this - people that have high levels of anxiety suffer from low levels of trust. This is obviously a generalization of a very wide breadth of individuals, but nonetheless the pattern is there. I will also say that this observation comes from working close with other guides and rescuers, and from observing myself.

Applying what I have learned from the extremes of some recreational realms of our society to the broader society, I think it is interesting to look at how the lack of trust is affecting our society. All human interactions and relationships can be tract back to the core intrapersonal relationship, which we all have with our self. Just as we cannot separate the well-being of an individual from the well-being of their society, we cannot separate the state of trust within our society from the state of trust within each of us.

Where did the trust go?

If you couple this post with the earlier post titled "The Real American Deficit - Compassion" you may just see some connections that were not as obvious as before. What do you think?

Are "You" Your Beliefs?

The tragic violent event that took place in Arizona yesterday, causes me to reflect on identity and identification and specific beliefs structures. For many of us, our identity is who we are and is taken completely for granted. If this statement makes you stop and think of what else an identity could be other than "who" we are, maybe you have taken it for granted. Within anthropology the studying of identity is a fascinating and challenging perspective. One basic anthropological concept is in order here - our identities are the result of social agreements. That is, an individual cannot choose to be someone that no one else recognizes. We are who we say and think we are because of those around us. If this is challenging your version of reality and how you fit within it, good, because that is my intention.

When we couple the phenomenon of social identity and the individual's identification with a particular identity, with the role of separate realities, we start to appreciate an aspect of societal dynamics that are extremely complex. The danger that I see in not realizing the nature of identity is that when we get fully identified with a set of companion ideologies, we become delusional. In my opinion, the single biggest threat to any society is the intolerance of bigotry, especially when it spreads to the masses - the tyranny of the majority. The threat that this type of intolerance presents to the stability of a just society, should not be underestimated. Especially when the intolerance is being wielded by those that believe that they have a monopoly and sole source to the "truth." Anyone that believes that they are in possession of the truth, rather than in the pursuit of the truth, is nothing more than a delusional fool. We all have the right to be a fool, but in the age of atomic weapons and high tech personal firearms, this right becomes extremely dangerous to our survival.

I ask you this - can you separate yourself from your beliefs? Have we become so identified with our social identities that we are blinded by the belief systems that are ingrained within them?

The Reality of Our True Well-Being

On the theme of separate realities and the power of our minds, I would like to explore how our social relationships affect our biology, and thus our well-being. It is common knowledge that living life with high levels of stress, especially chronic stress, is linked to disease. What is not commonly known is that our social relationships, even those with people that we do not know, have direct affects on our health.

There is a growing body of evidence that is challenging the concept that genetics equates into biology. The body that you have and the level of well-being that you experience are products of much more than simply your genetic code. If one reads books like "The Bell Curve" and listens to the pharmaceutical industry, one could be lead to believe that much of one's fate is predetermined before birth. This is not true!

New research into racial health disparities is revealing how dynamic our bodies and states of well-being truly are. Through the integration of anthropological research and relatively new fields such as genomics, a perspective that views our biology and sociocultural world as being interrelated, is taking form. This new perspective challenges many levels of our society, but primarily materialism and social inequality. The belief that we are primarily material beings that are born with either good genes or bad ones, is about half true. Our society that is hooked on the material world wants to believe that our problems can be solved by technology, by taking a pill. This premiss that supports the pop-a-pill culture, would be even more convenient if it were only true. The scary truth behind this new perspective is that we are a lot more responsible for our health and well-being than many of us want to a realize! This potentially self-empowering reality is scary to many, but hopeful to those that have the courage to live a self-responsible and truly accountable lifestyle.

Our black president Barack Obama, represent a country that has come along way on the issue of race. However, the ongoing racial health disparities of our society, tells a very different story. This new research that I am referring to, sheds light on how the chronic stress of racism is linked to the lower levels of well-being and general health statistics of our minorities. There is still a very strong presence of what is referred to as - institutional racism - within our society. These racial health disparities are a sign of a struggling and ill social structure, but at the same time they are evidence of the cure to many of our diseases. The cure to many of these common disease (e.g., cardiovascular disease, diabetes, low birth weights, stroke, some cancers, etc...) lies within how we treat each other. The main problem with this simple cure to these disease is - compassion, empathy, and respect can not be trade marked and sold within this free market society.

Have you ever been in a close relationship that felt toxic? Well, dysfunctional or disrespectful relationships are toxic, literally! Whether these dis-eased relationships are on the personal or the societal level they are not serving our state of well-being very well.

The below address is one example of the type of research that I am using. I have added a "links" option where you can find a direct link to this research paper. If you are interested in this type of cutting edge research I can supply more references.

http://www.rslocum.com/Gravelee%20how%20race%20becomes%20biology.pdf

The Real American Deficit - Compassion

Where does compassion sit within this American society?

The most salient deficit within this materialistic society is the state of economics. What about the obvious deficit in compassion, is this ever talked about? It seems to me that our priorities and perspectives within this society have been focused on the superficial aspects of being human. This declaration of the shallow nature of contemporary American culture probably does not sound unfamiliar or unjust to many of us. The more important question to me is - if our society is suffering from a lack of heart, how do we as individuals help to fill this void? I believe that one way of balancing this budget of being human is to bring compassion into our full attention. Living life with one's attention on compassion for others is an ancient practice of being human.

Through my own experience with the practice of compassion, I have noticed how it can help to tear down the wall of - us and them. If there is any one human virtue that can help balance out the socially destructive affects of extreme individualism, it is compassion. When we see ourselves in others, we tend to treat them a little differently than when we see them as the other.

I think that when we couple the role of separate realities with this deficit in compassion, we can start to view our society in a very different light. Is it fear that is keeping us from the realization that we all are truly connected? I think that there are multiple causal factors that are creating this deficit in compassion, but I do see fear as being a major catalyst. Maybe the biggest fear is that if we do live our lives through a compassionate perspective we will realize what a fallacy American individualism really is. Can we as a society return to that preschool lesson of treating others as we would like to be treated? I believe we can, and I believe that we can do it through the practice of compassion.