blog (December, 2006)
crust must giving
John Muir walked away into the mountains
in his old overcoat, a crust of bread in his pocket.We have no knowledge and so we have stuff and
stuff with no knowledge is never enough
to get you there...-- Greg Brown, Two Little Feet (Further In)
disengagement more dangerous than ideology
from Dave Pollard's Why Both Conservatives and Progressives Are Out of Touch With Mainstream Americans, interpreting Michael Adams' American Backlash:
liberals and conservatives are closer in values to each other than either group is to non-voting Americans
"It's not the values of the politically ascendant conservatives or the values of politically challenged progressives that are growing most rapidly -- but the values of the 50% of America that is politically disengaged -- risk-taking, thrill-seeking, fatalism, survival-of-the-fittest false Darwinism, exclusion, ostentatious consumption, and status-seeking... The values of the politically disengaged lack any sign of idealism: These Americans seem to reject both the Republican (traditional religion and values, father-led home, obedience to authority) and Democratic (gender equality, inclusion, tolerance, and personal spirituality) visions of the good life and the ideal community."
Youth disengagement has, on many occasions in human history, been a precursor to especially brutal exhibitions of civil and international violence. America may well be, as Adams says, "perpetually exceptional", but when what makes it exceptional is intellectual, psychological, and emotional withdrawal on a massive scale, that sounds to me like cause for alarm.
Renaissance souls
Renaissance souls from jack/zen.
Reading “The Renaissance Soul” by Margaret Lobenstine where she describes the 5 signs that you may be a renaissance soul:
- The ability to become excited by many things at once, often accompanied by difficulty choosing
- A love of new challenge; once challenges are mastered, easily bored
- A fear of being trapped in the same career or activity for life
- A pattern of quick, sometimes unsatisfying flings with many hobbies
- A successful career that has left you bored or restless