by Prateado | Dec 19, 2017 | boldly onward!, bullshitt, de-evolution, divest, ecology, evolution, fear, fear the fearmongers, intuition, Uncategorized
The Wisdom of Uncertainty is probably Alan Watts’ best-known book. In it, he describes the fundamental openness of the future, the horrible indeterminacy, and the lack of control that is indicative of our condition as embodied beings in this collective experience we call human life on planet earth. This embodiment, this consciousness, is a fragile, finite thing–despite the ramparts and buttresses especially western civilization has erected to attempt to dam(n) the inexorable flow of life and death. This fear of death, what Freud diagnosed as Thanatos, or the death instinct, is precisely what compels us towards our destruction. For the desire for death (thanatos) and the fear of death, are just the Janus faces of craving and aversion. That is, both instincts, are out of alignment with the fact of death itself. And of life, for that matter. Death and life are not events or limns to be fetishized, but respected. As we’re reaching a low for the human race, ecocide, renewed racism and sexism, there is hope. And there is despair. Resting in either of these is unwise, as they are both incomplete half-truths. The steps back with every step forward, are indicative of predators and parasites holding on to their host, believing that their stability and certainty is tied up with dominating others. There is no recognition that maybe they themselves also are fluid, queer beings, subject to change and metamorphosis. No, instead–and in fact what ontologically makes a parasite a parasite–they are blind to the potential to be anything else. They are scared of evolving. They are scared of readapting to a changed ecology. This is...
by Prateado | Aug 18, 2016 | breath, intuition, yoga
The older I get, the more I appreciate the power of breath. Intentional breathing is one of the esoteric secrets of all cultures that has been lost in the homogenization of awareness in the grey mass indoctrination of our species. Amidst the polluted air and polluted thought, we have literally forgotten how to breathe. I remember when I first started doing yoga. I was lucky enough to be able to work with the world-renowned Tim Miller, one of Ashtanga’s luminaries and among Pattabhi Jois’ first western students. I knew not who Tim Miller was, of course, when I was 16 in Encinitas and inexplicably gravitating towards a free after-school yoga program for at-risk teens. But the breathing blew me away. I had never been so high before. And relaxing after a 2 1/2 hour Ashtanga series 1 session, the shivasana was a dreamy realm of true peace and surrender. When I was in college, however, somehow I forgot about the breath, and despite training in capoeira and then yoga and acroyoga again, breath seemed ancillary, tacked on as an extra rather than the fundament of the practice. It would be a long time before I found myself paying attention to breath again, as I got wrapped up in movement practices as if they somehow were separate from this fundamental activity. For me as for many others, its only when something is gone do you begin to notice it. So it was for me and my breath. I was having a hard time breathing, a stuffed nose, and I realized that my brain wasn’t operating properly. That it was...
by Prateado | May 1, 2016 | bullshit, intuition, mechanization of life, responsibilitization
The New York Times’ op-ed attacks midwives. Quite a “women must deliver babies for the state” sort of article, making individuals responsible for the necessary work-around in an anti-midwifery hospital industry. The article is heavy on the responsibilitization, light on the “its a systemic problem.” Par for the course coming from a Harvard Medical School Dr. Shall we even begin to speak of the environmental toxins that complicate births and how BAU is complicit in the necessity for hospital births? Lead, mercury, diesel, anyone? Or asking the question: Why aren’t there more doctors, rather than only nurses, who get their residency in midwifery and do house calls? These are systemic problems not addressed (at all) in the article. Instead, we get irresponsible women: soon-to-be mothers and these uncredentialed...
by Prateado | Apr 6, 2016 | Bernie Sanders, ecology, evolution, fear, intuition
As much as I would like to gloat, this really isn’t about proving the NYTimes wrong, Facebook wrong, the Oil Companies wrong, or any of these other institutions that never thought that Bernie would have a chance to win. This is about giving us, and the planet, one last chance. The mainstream, tight-fistedly controlled newmedia never thought Sanders had a chance. The NYTimes writes today, Senator Bernie Sanders defeated Hillary Clinton in the Wisconsin primary on Tuesday, his sixth straight victory in the Democratic nominating contest and the latest in a string of setbacks for Mrs. Clinton as she seeks to put an end to a prolonged race against an unexpectedly deft and well-funded competitor. I can’t help but thinking that Secretary Clinton has no right to stipulate the beginning or end of a race that doesn’t involve her. Her existence–no matter how established she is–does not generate a coronation. She is one among competitors. And if she seeks to “put an end to a prolonged race,” then she should concede. Otherwise, she should polish her credentials, and increase her transparency. I have to hand it to Amy Chozick for at least running a Sanders story with a positive headline. That’s a first for the news agency, which sabotaged Steinhauer’s recent article on him which initially was positive, and then changed into a smear by editorial staff. What matters most, though, is not that Sanders is finally getting a little respect long overdue. No, Sanders is an important magnetizing force because the truth is, the policies that Cruz, Drumpf, and Clinton propose, will not lead to the deep, broad, and swift...
by Prateado | Nov 20, 2015 | bullshit, fear, intuition, mechanization of life, Uncategorized
My political views? I’m basically against anything that kills people or destroys the planet we live on. The problem is that many people, if they have some of their illegitimate privileges taken away (like the rich being taxed. or corporations being regulated ) FEEL as if they are being killed, even though they’re not. The lack of distinction or inability to discern between the actual and perceived threat of life is one of the gravest problems facing us today, and driving people, corporations, and governments into a preemptive berzerker mode killing everything around them because they are so over-threatened by everything that moves. This hair-triggered anxiety, paired with technological weapons, is a recipe for disaster. We need to be helping people to recoup their sense of boundaries, and recognize the difference between giving up toys, and mortal threat. Until we make this distinction between luxuries and needs, we are in for some serious trouble. Hyper-reactivity is a symptom of disease, in this case, of mental-illness. I remember the old film, The Corporation, created by the Canadian Broadcasting System back in 2003, which is still shown to high school students in Canada as an education in protecting yourself against corporate propaganda. One of the most chilling scenes is when the filmmakers check off a list of all of the qualities of a sociopath, and corporations fulfill–in a deadly way–every one of them to a T. We have come to believe that corporations, like Philip Morris (now Altria) or Exxon Mobile are people–which have indissoluble rights. I’m guessing if they could corporations would even try to be granted Human Rights, if it...
by Prateado | Aug 28, 2015 | ecology, evolution, intuition, Uncategorized
I had this meditation over the last month, as I have been eager to start a family. But after spending time in nature, both in Berlin and California, I realized how dire our problems are ecologically, and what a supreme responsibility and tragedy it is to have children in this age of machines destroying the earth. Our earth is getting warmer, less hospitable. Food and water are becoming scarcer. There is less grace and abundance being sent our way, as we have raped and murdered nature’s creations relentlessly. Action and equal and opposite reaction. The laws of the universe. Only the arrogant ego (maya, illusion, ignorance) could ever think that he would be above the inexorable cycles and laws of creation, of our cosmos. Action and action in kind. Also, in my meditation, I realized that I thought I was ready to have a partner. I was so sure that finally I was mature enough, that I had put in “the work” and paid my dues spiritually, and that finally, miraculously, just because I had moved on to a new phase in my life professionally, that that automatically meant that I was also mature enough to start a family. And my meditation helped make me aware what a conceit that was; that I had been well-wishing and self-delusional. That I had not looked at those things that were really blocking me from enacting my visions, from realizing my dreams. I had not done the shadow work. And part of that shadow work helped me reexamine whether having kids at all is ethical in this day and age; let alone popping...
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