By Stuart J. Whitley | Bio
I read somewhere that good decision-making—indeed, good relations—depends upon a virtuous cycle of respect, trust and candour (which takes some time to establish, but which can easily be interrupted). Attitude, after all, is everything. Perhaps that last statement needs a bit of refinement: the ethical attitude is everything. By that I mean the determination of the answer to the age-old question: who is right? Was Harold right to express his annoyance
By Stuart J. Whitley | Bio
Einstein is supposed to have said that the most important decision we ever make is whether the world is a good place or a bad place. I don’t believe that we consciously make that decision—we are taught to believe it, one way or the other, and the most difficult lesson of all to unlearn is that we live in a hostile universe. There are just too many confirmatory events that tend to erode our courage to think differently.
Current strategies in intellectual discourse talk
By Stuart J. Whitley | Bio
“O body swayed to music,O brightening glance,How can we know the dancer from the dance?”—W.B. Yeats, "Among School Children" (1928)
I had lunch with an old friend, a Tlingit elder, Harold, today. I’ve known Harold for nearly a dozen years. And I know him to be a serious, thoughtful man; he’s someone who has taught me many things, not the least of which was the powerful consequence of even the smallest positive intervention in someone’s life. I have seen it in action: Harold is the embodiment of Emerson’s dictum that it is one of the most beautiful compensations of
By Jim Selman | Bio
I want to create a new organization to stamp out stupidity and indifference and restore common decency and goodwill into society. I think I’ll call it the National Organization of Pissed-Off Elders (N.O.P.E.).What’s pissing us off?
A lot more than just ‘aging’ issues like Social Security, pharmaceuticals and our sex lives.
First, it pisses us off that the people in charge are squandering away the opportunities they had to make the world work, or at least be a better place. For example…
N.O.P.E. could have both positive and negative strategies. For example, when we’re talking to someone who is speaking baby talk to us or raising their voice so we can hear, we could shout
By Rick Fullerton | Bio
In church this weekend, I made a public announcement about the International Day of Climate Action on October 24, a global initiative to develop grassroots support for substantial agreement when world leaders meet in Copenhagen this December. At stake is nothing less than the future of life on planet earth. As of this morning, there were more than 3,500 events planned in a total of 161 countries. For more information or to join a group or announce your event, check out
By Jim Selman | Bio
Julia Baird has a nice piece in the September 25th issue of Newsweek called “Positively Downbeat”. She’s commenting on Americans’ obsession with being happy and the billions we spend to learn “the secret”. It’s all about quick and easy fixes for life’s dilemmas and the not-so-small industry of consultants, motivational speakers and authors that are standing in the wings to offer answers and potions. She rightly points to the grand daddy of all self-help offerings, “The Power of Positive Thinking” by Norman Vincent Peale and its latest incarnation “The Secret” by Rhonda Byrne as archetypical examples of this genre.I am not against the intentions behind our quest for happier and richer lives. Like millions of others, I can nod my head in agreement with most of the wisdom contained in these offerings. I have been a self-help junkie myself in the past. But as I get older, I have learned that I am not my ‘thinking’ and the little voice in my head is not always my friend. Most recovered alcoholics and addicts will tell you that it was their ‘thinking’ that took them to their
By Shae Hadden | Bio
My habits of reducing and reusing come from a tradition I inherited from my family, a tradition that firmly believed in the value of sharing and stewardship. My father used to tell me of Depression days when his mother would wash the tea bags and dry them for reuse, and when he, being a ‘middle’ son in a family of 13, could always count on wearing ‘hand-me-downs’. Considering the environmental and economic crises we face, it’s no surprise that the principles of communal sharing, stewardship and ‘gifting’ are feeding the move to reduce, reuse and recycle. People of all ages are looking at ways to keep ‘stuff’ out of landfill sites.In the 1960s the hippies of Haight-Ashbury opened ‘free shops’ to swap clothes, shoes and personal items. In the US today, ‘giveaway shops’ have evolved into ‘swap sheds’ in rural towns (where people leave things that are usable but unwanted for anyone to take) and ‘free stores’ or ‘free bins’ on college campuses (stocked with donations or items that students have sorted from trash). Official give-away stores with retail storefronts have existed in
By Jim Selman | Bio
I was listening to a lecture today on the philosopher Martin Heidegger. He is pretty difficult to understand at the best of times, even though I have been a student of his thinking for many years. The lecture today spoke of the distinction he made between ‘tradition’, which he felt was a bad thing, and ‘heritage’, which he thought was a good thing. In fact, he felt heritage was essential to understanding the true nature of ‘Being’.
I won’t pretend to grasp it all
By Rick Fullerton | Bio
Recently, I have been focusing more and more of my attention on
global warming and, in turn, on understanding my own reactions and responses to
what’s happening. The results so far have been both fascinating and
challenging.
One aspect of the global warming conversation involves the role
of the media in reporting scientific evidence and projections regarding the
effects of carbon dioxide in heating the planet. In particular, I have learned
about the disproportionate