Category Archives: Wisdom in Action
Wolf’s Theorem: Show Up, Work Hard, Let Go
By Stuart J. Whitley | Bio
I’ve been writing about the ethic of aging, which is an internal imperative obligating the transmission of values, ethics and wisdom from one generation to another. Usually, this is a phenomenon that occurs unconsciously, in a way nearly invisible against the tapestry of quotidian life. But now and then, it’s rendered explicit, often in surprisingly casual ways.An old friend Wolf and I were in a hunting camp one brilliant fall day this September, each of us with our new son-in-law. It was a spot of extraordinary beauty, near the confluence of the Stewart and Yukon Rivers. It was about as close to nowhere as one can get without a GPS fix. It had been a glorious full day, and sitting on the high riverbank at sunset, scotch in hand, it was hard not to think that when God decided to put His hand to world-building and started to
The Future Habit
By Jim Selman | Bio
It is almost impossible to turn on the television or read a newspaper or a magazine without encountering one pundit, expert or “man on the street” either talking about the future or trying to blame someone for something. Our media commentary is rarely about what is happening now: mostly it’s about what happened in the past or what someone thinks is going to happen in the future. Combine the establishment media with all of the blogging and chatting going on, and it is incredible
Harold’s Story – Part 3
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
Harold’s Story – Part 2
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
Harold’ Story – Part 1
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
What is that?
350: The Call to Climate Action
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
Positively Stinking Thinking
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
The Alternative Economic Paradigms: Gift Economy II
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