Consider for a moment these two articles:
http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.com/2009/10/twilight-of-money.html
and
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2009/10/msm-reporting-as-propaganda-no-one-minds-our-new-financial-lords-and-masters-edition.html
You know, I am constantly in awe by how well these folks write. I cannot thank them enough for their efforts and their generosity in sharing with us.
I am pointing these out as sterling examples of a theme I have harped on repeatedly in the past, the fact that we have taken on false dreams as the driver for our society. We have dressed up the truth in a veil of illusion (माया) and then pronounced the veil to be the real truth.
Maya is a theme in the Indian religions, where philosophy tries to pierce the veil for a transcendent truth, we in the west are just now piercing the veil to find a more mundane truth: that we have lived well beyond our means and that the piper is at the door, demanding payment.
But to look beyond this mundane, some folks are starting to see a more basic truth, that the lives we have made for ourselves can never be paid back. The "debts" that we owe are paper myths. Stocks are tulip bulbs. Deriviatives are opium dreams. We fear the accounting that will come because we want to think that our "share" of the dreams can be salvaged from "that person from Porlock".
1 comment:
Nice.
Regarding veils, illusions and dreams to live by:
Aren't there dreams and illusions that are far more interesting and attractive than our current dream of consumption and luxury, anyway?
To put it another way, if we are going to choose a dream to live for, why not something more inspiring than the selfish dreams of today? I watched the recent PBS American Masters special about Joan Baez. What a woman, devoted to her music and peace and non-violence. Perhaps peace is a dream or illusion, but it is far more worth pursuing than the greed and sloth of today, wouldn't you agree?
So let's choose larger, more fulfilling dreams and illusions while we go about the process of simplifying our lives and learning to survive in this world being born.
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