Archive for the 'Essay' Category

28
Apr
10

You Can’t Eat Money

Money does not exist. On some level we all know this to be true – and the thought scares us to death.

The essential problem of money – the lesson we have set ourselves up to learn – is to be able to differentiate between abundance and wealth.

Abundance is absolute. Wealth is relative.

I have two anecdotes to share, to illustrate how common it is for humans to confuse wealth with abundance:

For my first year of University, I had to commute daily by car. My University was plagued by a shortage of parking spaces so students would arrivie early for classes and and line up in front of B-lot waiting for other people to leave. One day I was stuck so long that I missed the exam I had come to write. When I finally got to the front of the line, I vented my frustration to the parking attendant.

Unsympathetic, she said to me: Perhaps you should have come a little earlier.

But if I had been earlier, someone else would have had to wait longer for their spot. Her solution to the problem did not address the shortage of available parking spaces. Her solution addressed my problem – but only by shifting it onto somebody else.

On another occasion, I saw a TV commercial in which a police officer was endorsing “the club” – a device which reduces the likelihood that one’s car will be stolen. I wondered – why would a police officer be enthusiastic about the club? The club does nothing to address the issue of car theft. The club is effective only because most people don’t have one. Let those people lose their cars first.

Most humans on this planet spend much time “making” money. But money does not contribute to abundance. We all have more and more money, but this money is worth less and less.

When we feel constricted, we always seem to believe that the solution is to make more money. But this attitude is responsible for our woes in the first place. We have become so adept at making money that we are literally drowning in it. The only problem is that all this money is not really worth anything.

This subject is never far from my mind. I firmly believe that the days of money are numbered. Soon we will stop using money and marvel at how easy it was to break the habit. It will seem easy when we look back on it, but it doesn’t feel that way from our current perspective. We are in a stuck moment – the last gasp of money.

I have often tried to inspire people to imagine a world without money. I wanted to illustrate that such a world is easily possible. What’s more difficult, is convincing people that money is not something we really want. After all, we all have money and it makes us feel rich. Doesn’t it?

Actually money does not make us feel good about ourselves at all. Predominantly, if you ask people, they would tell you that they do not have enough money. If you asked them about food to eat, clothes to wear or gasoline for the car, they would reply that all their most urgent needs are met. But when we turn the focus to money, the feeling immediately shifts from abundance to lack.

Money makes us feel poor because we always wish we had more. Is it really so strange to suggest that the time has come to give up our obsession with money?

I don’t think that money was always a bad idea. The problem is that money no longer functions the way it was originally conceived. Nor are we the same humans who invented money. We are the same beings, perhaps, but we have evolved. It is likely that at some point in our history, money served humanity. Perhaps it even served us well, but this time has now passed. Not only will money longer be able to serve us in the future – it will literally not survive our current shift into a higher state of being. Therefore it has to either disappear, or else transform itself into something new – something that may resemble money in some ways but functions very differently.

In this moment, we are still buying lottery tickets, (mistakenly) believing that we seek wealth. Wealth can serve us only if we believe ourselves to be separate from everyone else. As we re-awaken to our connection to spirit, we can’t help but become aware of some form of universal oneness. As this shift continues to unfold we are realizing that the time has come to relinquish wealth in favour of abundance.

06
Oct
09

the end of money?

The red blood cells have had enough. The price of oxygen keeps going up and the profit margin is down. Also, there are no days off. There are talks of layoffs and possibly a general strike.

The white blood cells on the other hand get better compensation and rarely have to work. Mostly they just patrol the area and hang out in case any virus comes around. They are prone to abusing their power because they are secretly funded by the lungs.

The lungs control the oxygen supply and are in the business of gouging everybody. They keep getting richer while everyone else is barely scraping by. The heart is becoming weaker and the brain is getting stupid because there’s no funding for maintenance. All the money is being syphoned off by the lungs. Much of it goes into vaccines and other defense spending.

The idea of money is tied to the concept of separation – the feeling that Michael, Sandra and Kate are separate entities. This is an illusion. We are separate only in the sense that the lungs are separate from the heart.

The parts of our body seem to have found a way to cooperate quite nicely without the artificial burden of a financial system. This is not to say that our body is without governance. Government can loosely be said to reside in the mind (inaccurate but for the purpose of this metaphor we’ll run with it), though various parts of the body (the stomach, the penis etc.) can hijack the agenda from time to time.

In most bodies, this form of governance seems to work quite well, though this is not universally true. In some instances the parts do fall into dissonance. In such cases serious health issues result.

Money has no intrinsic value. Legal tender functions as a medium of exchange for as long as people are willing to honour it. One day, when all the world’s money is concentrated in the hands of a single individual, the people will collectively opt out of the game. Money will cease to exist.

Imagine the day we wake up to the realization that we are one. Our current reality will resemble a really confusing, vaguely disturbing dream. It seems to me that the changes are already all around us, but most of us are subconsciously resisting them. We are heading into the great unknown, and it’s a little bit scary. That’s why things keep getting uglier and darker (on some level), though they are getting much brighter on another.

As Janis Joplis sang: “Freedom’s just another word, for nothin’ left to lose…” We still have houses and cars and mutual funds – perhaps we have to lose everything before we are ready to let go of a a way of life that is coming to an end.

“But wait a minute”, someone is heard to exclaim. “We still need money to exchange goods and services”.

Explain that to the three trillion cells in your body. They exchange goods and services each and every millisecond without the need for financial instruments to do it.

Money exists in a world of scarcity. We have created no shortage of shortages. Not enough food. Not enough water. Peak oil and so on. In this kind of environment we need money to sort out who gets to feast, and who must starve. The system is barbaric and one day (soon) we will surely outgrow it.

The alternative is that we create a world of plenty, with enough food, enough clean water and enough energy for everyone. This is both possible and necessary for our continued survival.

It may be hard to imagine for a lot of people, but one day we will realize how superfluous money is.

Of course I can make no claims to know what the future will actually look like. As with anything I write, these are just rambling thoughts. However, if I had to place my bets, I would guess that in pondering the possibility of a brighter future, most of us vastly underestimate just how different that future will have to be, for life to continue on this planet.

Are we ready for change, or is fear of the unknown holding us back?

15
Feb
09

Why is zero point energy hard to come by?

Why is zero point energy hard to come by?

Around 1700 we saw the first commercial applications of rudimentary steam engines which were used to pump water. Over the next hundred years the machine evolved rapidly and went on to power the industrial revolution.

It took only seventy-five years to progress from the first simple compression-less internal combustion engine to a working four stroke engine (Otto engine, 1876) resembling the motors we still use today.

In the case of computing technology, it took roughly forty years to progress from electro-mechanical calculating machines to desktop home computers. From there another thirty years have led us to semi-conductors of such tiny dimensions that we now have super-computing laptops.

When we look at the relatively sluggish progress in the broad field of zero-point research one must wonder: Where’s the holdup? We tend to cite human greed, the constrictive nature of the patenting process and suppression by vested interest as the prime inhibitors to progress. But is that really the whole story?

Consider the example of Stanley Meyer’s water-powered car. Thousands of people all over the world are trying to replicate his success by twiddling with frequencies voltages. How many combinations can there possibly be? We live in the internet age where instant global mass communication is a non-issue. Considering that this technology has already worked for several different inventors working in different parts of the world, it boggles the mind to know that we are struggling to re-discover the “secret”.

The same is true for all other approaches to tapping into the zero-point field. It seems like nature is clinging to this particular secret more than any other. To add further complexity: Not only is the evolution of human consciousness entwined in the progression of this technology, but there seems to be a direct connection between the zero point field and consciousness itself. Perhaps we are at that critical moment in our evolution where we are beginning to discover the fuzzy overlap where physical states and mental states merge into one. The question: Where does consciousness reside? feels very relevant to this exploration.

Of course this is idle speculation. At the very least, it is safe to say that when it comes to zero point energy, regardless of the particular process under investigation, we don’t fully comprehend the physical principles involved. For example: In the the case of Meyer’s car, we simply don’t understand why that particular design worked when other very similar designs clearly do not. If we had a better understanding of the physics behind the inventions, then surely it would be a very simple matter to reconstruct devices which have already been proven to work.

All this got me thinking about the relationship between technological progress and progress of human consciousness in general. For example, we know that Tesla had incredibly advanced solutions to satisfy our energy needs, but his technology was scuttled by JP Morgan and the vested interests that Morgan has become symbolic of. On the surface it seems clear that Morgan has done us a disservice. With the launch pad of Tesla’s technology we could have progressed freely into an era of unimaginable abundance and prosperity.

What this analysis ignores is that free energy without sustainability is more than just dangerous. In an odd way we needed to arrive at this messy moment in history first. It is fair to say that in a very real sense, society was not mature enough in Tesla’s own lifetime for the technology that he brought forth.

Right now we are still in the process of consuming ourselves to death. Ninety percent of all that is created by humans ultimately ends in a landfill. Sixty percent of our output (by volume) has a life-span of less than six months!

Imagine the degree to which free energy, when it arrives for good, will accelerate the rate at which we extract resources and generate landfill fodder! To obtain minerals we dig holes and crush rocks. The only brake to inhibit this process is the cost of energy. Within the existing economic framework, free energy will bring run-away extraction and consumption.

In an odd way there is something appropriate about the nauseating delay that we have been dealing with. It almost feels like nature is deliberately withholding the secret so that we are forced to grapple with sustainability issues before the pathway towards this technology is opened up.

This is more than a metaphor. We don’t have a clear idea of where inspiration comes from. The greatest leaps have always resulted from seemingly divine origins. Inventors experience visions, “downloads” and flashes of deep insight. Kekule solved the riddle of organic chemistry in a dream in which he envisioned a snake biting it’s own tail.

Perhaps there is a higher intelligence at the other end of these other-worldly transmissions. Perhaps a crucial piece of the free energy puzzle is being deliberately withheld from us until we demonstrate as a species that we are ready to use this technology for something other than the mass production of disposable consumer goods.

Like children who are learning to play with adult tools, we have been existing in a constricted space. Perhaps this dynamic is required for any civilization to find it’s wings. A child is given blunt scissors before it is ever allowed to go near “real” scissors.

One thing we have not addressed within the new energy movement (as far as I am aware) is the reality that with free energy comes a HUGE responsibility for humanity. Is it merely coincidence that our current economic system is imploding at this time? I think free energy is not compatible with capitalism as we know it. Will the transition be smooth and natural, or will we use our free energy to make a monstrous mess before we, collectively, understand what we have laid our hands on?

07
Mar
08

9/11 progress being made – but whither the CBC?

Canadians watch the CBC to catch a glimpse of themselves. This particular taping of The National illustrated to me that the reflection we see is not quite as genuine as one might believe. There is a subtle distortion that occurs, raising questions about the integrity of the CBC itself…

…What I am suggesting, is that the CBC is misreprenting Canadians to themselves. By choosing pundits to tell us what is “at issue”, the CBC is framing political discourse inside a very narrow box. While the CBC openly solicited questions from the audience, the apparent spontaneity we see on television is entirely fake. What viewers are not told is that questions had to be submitted by email, days in advance. This panel may pretend to be addressing the topics we want to examine, but the reality is that they are playing Q&A with themselves.

Read the article on mixeye.

The December 13 “At Issue” panel is archived here. In this edition, the panelists address questions presented by members of the live Chan Center audience.

Two weeks later added the following follow-up:

The story bears updating because 2008 has begun with some major developments that most people are not aware of. The big story is what took place in the Japanese Diet on January 11 of this year. The house was debating whether or not to continue to support the US-led “war on terror”. Japan’s contribution is in the form of a refueling mission, the renewal of which was up for discussion.

Yukihisa Fujita of the Democratic Party argued for thirty minutes that the mission could no longer be supported until it is established who the actual terrorists are. In the words of Mr. Fujita:

“So far the only thing the government has said is that we think (9/11) was caused by Al Qaeda because President Bush told us so. We have not seen any real proof that it was Al Qaeda.”

Fujita on YouTube

Full article on mixeye.

18
Jan
08

Those Yellow Ribbons

I live in a city patrolled by a police force parading war propaganda. If we as citizens fail to understand how inappropriate this is, then we are in deep trouble.

 Read more on mixeye.

05
Jan
08

From A to B in my City

In my city transit sucks. As our civic planners are about to bestow their latest round of gifts upon us, it is useful to ask ourselves why Vancouver’s transit infrastructure continues to be so deplorable.

Read more on mixeye.

16
Nov
07

Whither the Titans

The other day I ran into an old friend. Like so many university educated Canadians of my generation, Angela had spent time teaching English in Japan. I myself had spent my “working holiday” there in the mid nineties, so we began talking about our common experience. What she told me blew my mind.

Whither the Titans

12
Nov
07

Notes From Mixeye

More and more, on those occasions when I do watch mainstream news, I find myself thinking that the reporter did not bother to ask any of the questions that I would have asked in that situation. Consider the oddness of this statement: “Bargain-hunting consumers crossing the border to find deals on Bombardier snowmobiles are frustrated by a company policy that prevents U.S. dealers from selling to Canadians.”

Loonie Tunes

11
Sep
07

Common Ground

9/11 the Plane Truth, published in this month’s Common Ground.

13
Apr
07

Struggle at the Gate

Many who criticize the Truth Movement like to quote the gatekeepers, in particular George Monbiot. It is important, therefore, to pick apart the stuff these guys keep coming up with. In response to the gatekeepers, I wrote the following piece, which can be read in “The Canadian”:

9/11 gatekeepers muzzle truth toward societal dumbing-down




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