A Day of Gratefulness

Like many things coming out of history, the American holiday of Thanksgiving has roots in a deep wound:

The story is that in 1637, the Puritans who had come here to escape persecution surrounded a group of Pequots who had gathered for their Green Corn Festival during the night. The next day, they ordered the Native people to come out, and as people followed their order and came out, they were ruthlessly killed. Then the governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony called for a Day of Thanksgiving to celebrate the slaughter of 700 innocents. And now we celebrate this holiday by gorging on food, watching people engage in violent football and then fighting over low priced consumer items the next day. Ah, bliss!

But as we enter a newer age, perhaps it is time to reassess some of these ancient and modern traditions.

1637 was a different age. One lineage of Hindu Astrology believes that this occurred during a dark time in history known as Kali Yuga. They believe that this is the far point on our planet's rotation around the universe and/or galaxy.  During this time energy is at its lowest, and people are prone to darker deeds. Some of the things that happened during Kali Yuga were The Crusades, The Inquisition, the slave trade, and so on.

While there are many who believe that Kali Yuga actually is still going on, and will be for the next 480,000 years, or so, Swami Sri Yukteswar reinterpreted the yugas, and, according to his calculations, we have moved on to the next phase, during which we are discovering that we are energy beings much more than physical beings. He calculated that this will continue to increase over the next 10,000 years, or so, at which time we will be at the zenith of our energy existence, close to the energy source of the galaxy and/or universe. Here we will realize that we are made almost entirely of energy. We will then drift again to the low-energy portion of our rotation.

In this context, it is east to see why so many of our traditions are rooted in such dark times. But rather than dwell on the evil roots, it is time to reframe these to some more positive times.

While in the Eastern traditions, the great Yogi Paramhansa Yogananda said “Every day should be a day of Thanksgiving for all the gifts of Life — for sunshine, water, and the luscious fruits and greens which we receive as indirect gifts from the Great Giver.”


Instead of Thanksgiving, gratefulness is what we should celebrate. While, as Yogananda said, we should do this every day, there are many for whom one day a year this would be a start. There is also something to be said about most of the citizens of a country celebrating something together. 


The traditions of our Thanksgiving involve getting together with family and friends, and that is a good  thing. However, the over-indulging represents taking and not giving. And, well, the whole 'Black Friday' scene is just ugly.


Gratefulness is something our society is very poor at. We spend a lot of time indulging our appetites, but very little time thanking ourselves, our families, friends, co-workers and so forth for all they give to us. As a society, we focus deeply on what is missing in our lives: we obsess over our shortcomings, lack of funds, feelings of sadness and anxiety and all the things that are not perfect in our lives. But what about the myriad of things that are perfect all around us? It is so seldom that we celebrate this yearly, let alone daily.


Many saintly people say that they begin their day with gratitude, and take time each day to give back to the world and to celebrate all that they have to be thankful for. Some of these saintly people are impoverished. Some of them have suffered from physical ailments, but these are people who see the world as opportunity and not, like so many, as a burden.


Once people begin to look in their lives for things for which to be grateful, they can see more and more things until the little things in our lives that cause depression or boredom or lack are insignificant. This shakes us loose from the past - the same way we need to shake Thanksgiving loose from its root in a dreadful day in November back in 1637.

Dona Nobis Pacem

My lovely wife, Stephanie's, logo for today's blog. To see her blog go to http://pharmdacu.blogspot.com.

Today is "Blog Blast for Peace" day. http://mimilenox.blogspot.com/. Bloggers all over the world are writing about the topic of peace to collectively influence peace on the planet. This is not just a crazy, hippie idea, as most activities involved with peace are labeled. There is actual, scientific evidence that whenever large numbers of people focus on one thing, there is an effect:

Researcher Dean Radin, from the Institute of Noetic Science (IONS) and others have had ongoing studies in which random generators are always operating all over the planet. Whenever something big happens that focuses the attention of large numbers of people, they check the random generators to see what is happening. On such dates as 9/11/2011, the reading of the O.J. Simpson verdict, and the like, they noted that there were strong anomalies in the randomness of the numbers that correlated exactly to the focus of attention during and after these events.

There is science to consciousness, so taking the day to focus people on writing about peace is a powerful idea. Thanks to Mimi for putting this out in the world.

I wanted to write, today, about internal and external peace, because I believe they go hand-in-hand.

I used to be an extremely chaotic person. I was excited by interpersonal drama, and created a lot of it. After an eight-year marriage filled with all sorts of excessive drama, that included being in revolutions, trying to survive in third-world countries, and the like, we realized that our attempt to bring such drama into our mundane lives back in the US was making us miserable, so we went our separate directions - both in search of greater drama and chaos. She went to other troubled parts of the globe, and I pursued my career working with troubled and often aggressive teenagers.

It was more chaos than I could handle, and I knew I needed to carve out a bit of peace in my world.

I set out to the most quiet place I had ever visited on the planet, which was the expansive desert of the Navajo Nation. This is the country's largest Indian Reservation, and occupies a vast portion of Arizona, and parts of Utah and New Mexico.

I very quickly established connections there with people who made it possible for me to stay in very remote areas of the territory, where I could go for many days, if not a week or more at a time with no human contact. Not only no human contact, but with very little evidence of humans, whatsoever, apart from the occasional airplane and deserted hogan.

I would sit in the desert, listening to the wind, for hour upon hour, day upon day, and after three or four weeks, I would have a feeling of peace.

For almost twenty years, I spent my summers in the desert. The amount of time it took to find peace decreased from weeks to days. Finally I could achieve a feeling of peace within a few hours of arriving. After that, I could actually develop a sense of inner peace just by thinking about the desert, when at home. And after many years, I could bring the sense of peace home with me.

I have a weird, and stressful job as a teacher of adolescents with severe emotional challenges. One year, I came back and remained calm at school for a whole week. Then a month, a quarter, a semester, and finally most of the year. My goal is still to get through the entire school year with a sense of peace all the time.

To help with my goal, the severity of the students I work with has increased from year to year: owing to budget cuts each year to provide services for people with mental illness, and reduction in insurance benefits, medicaid and so forth, the type of students I have in my classes these days are the type of students who would have been in long-term care in hospitals a few years ago.

My goal is to turn my workplace from a loud, intimidating place filled with anger into a monastery of sorts: A quiet place filled with joy and peace and that can be an environment for quiet contemplation.

As far fetched as this sounds, there are actually moments where it works.

I used to start all my classes telling kids to be quiet, and they just got louder, and then power-struggles would take place, and so on and so forth.

I now start my classes by sitting quietly in a chair in front of the class, and getting very quiet and centering myself. As I do this, the kids almost always go to their seats and start to get quiet themselves. After a few minutes of silence, I ask every student how they are and if there is anything I can do to help them that day. Some kids say it would help not to call on them. Some kids say they need a five-minute break. I usually try to grant them what they ask, if it is reasonable. Sometimes the whole class period can remain peaceful.

So I feel I have, at some level, developed an inner peace, and that this inner peace translates to an external peace, and this external peace translates to people beyond me... even people who are generally unable to have their own, internal peace.

I know that the idea of this blog day is about peace for the world. Can many people who are internally peaceful create world peace? I believe the answer is yes.

There is a theory about the spiritual balance of the planet: that a few 'avatars' - people who have achieved  god-like enlightenment, can balance millions of people who are absorbed in chaos, that more people who are highly, spiritually developed, balance thousands of people who are lost and misguided. I have actually read a theory that puts numbers to this. Maybe there is something to it.

One thing I believe about wars, which have to be the least peaceful things on the planet, is that many of these wars are motivated by greed. The rest are motivated by rigid thinking, such as 'my god is the correct god, and therefore I will kill you and your family for believing in the wrong god.'

These are both very easy problems for mass consciousness to overcome. The greed one is being addressed by world-wide protests, even as we speak. People all over the plant, tired of being taken advantage of by greedy people who want more and more, and therefore take from those who have very little, have cast off governments, and created huge movements, such as Occupy Wall Street. Each week, these protests get larger and larger. A world consciousness challenging the 20th century value of greed will surely bring about a change in time.

Through many of these same movements, people are also learning the value of diversity. As young and old, and people of many creeds, persuasions, and colors work together to overcome greed, they are bound to see in each other the value of their similarities as more important than their differences.

In many ways, these protests are more than just protests, they are Satsang. Satsang is a Hindu word that is about the coming together of people to discover the truth. It is also the coming together of Guru and student, which I am sure is happening in large scale in these huge gatherings.

I think the 'protest' part of it is almost just an excuse for the real work or removing people from their couches and televisions, (where much of the chaos and drama in our world begins...) and pitting them, face-to-face, together to discover each others' humanity.

People also are doing a lot of chanting together, which is a very primal way of building unity, and a very evolved spiritual practice.

Here is a video that exhibits some of what I am talking about as far as the coming together of internal and external peace and its influence on the masses. This is Dada Pranakrsnananda an Ananda Marga monk who was arrested on the Brooklyn Bridge during an early Occupy protest. His story is remarkable.

There is only one small shift that needs to occur for the Occupy movement to become a peace movement or more, which is that instead of connecting with the emotion of anger, which, in today's world, is our most accessible and easily shared emotions, we connect with our hearts to one another. It is actually a tiny and subtle shift, which, I believe, will be a natural outgrowth of the human bonds occurring in these movements. It is not a bond many people can create in their offices, or while engaged in media. It is only something that can happen when we meet in large numbers with a common goal of equality.

There are predictions that many millions of people might be contributing to this blog blast for peace today. That is a lot of minds singularly focused. Peace on any level is noble. We first need to think about it and talk about it, then attain it for ourselves and then spread it to the world. Thanks, Mimi for organizing this effort. Hopefully it will begin to manifest lasting peace in the hearts of all, and throughout our world.

The "Battle" for Good and Evil - Politics and Yoga - Not Really a Battle.

Politics is a microcosm for the "battle" for good and evil played out today. That is not that one party is good and another party is bad, as within each party, these value wars occur. It occurs at many levels in our world, it is just focused in the political world.

When I was studying psychology in college, I took two classes on psychopathology. One of the things I most remember was Dr. Cline pointing out that the psychological profiles of politicians and con-men are generally the same. While there are many very great people who have devoted their lives to politics; I would count among these Bernie Sanders, Bob Dole, Ron Paul (He's crazy as a loon, but is in politics because he is devoted to his beliefs, and I feel truly wants the best for the country), Barack Obama, Gabrielle Giffords and Raul Grijalva, among many others; but there are also numerous people who are called to politics by their desire to be powerful and exercise control over others. Need I remind anyone of how common it is for political figures to misuse their power in personal relationships (Anthony Weiner, David Vitter, John McCain, Bill Clinton, to name a few.)

And so this is an interesting forum within which the "battle" of good and evil takes place.

I would like to say, first of all, that I am not a person who sees religion as a struggle between good and evil, nor do I actually see the "battle" for good as a difficult one - nor even a battle, really (I'll address this later.) I do not believe in hell or the devil, or any type of eternal punishment. I believe good and evil are purely human traits, most often coming from misuse of power and from being obsessed with physical possessions. I actually see the root of it as the desire for power and control that looks like greed, hence my passion for the Occupy Wall Street Movement I have written about so often.

I think the finest example of evil in the political world, and perhaps the world in general, is Karl Rove.

Karl Rove is evil genius defined. He has an ability to scrutinize the law, and figure out exactly how to break the law in a way in which he will not get in trouble. Everyone knows he is breaking the law, yet he remains free to operate and continue manipulation because he has such a keep grasp of the legal loophole that he evades breaking the law by mere millimeters.

A little background on him:

Karl Rove's first foray into the world of politics occurred while he was in college. He broke into the office of Treasurer of Illinois candidate Alan Dixon, stole a pile of letterhead and printed up fliers inviting people to a beer party. He effectively discredited the Democrat, and allowed the Republican contender to easily win. After that, Rove worked as advisors to Republican candidates, helping them find legal loopholes and ways of manipulating the system to get them elected and to put forth their agenda.

Karl Rove became George W. Bush's advisor. During this time, he worked behind the scenes in Florida and Ohio to enact voter suppression. In Florida, a "scrub list" was created in which felons were removed from the registered voter roles. The suppression aspect of this was that people whose names were similar to the felons were also removed from the roles. People were not made aware of this until they arrived at the poles to vote, and were powerless to do anything, since voter registration had closed several weeks before. This reduced the black vote in key counties by about 3%. George W. Bush would likely have not become president if not for this suppression.

In Ohio that year, and in 2004, registered letters were sent to registered voters for them to confirm their addressed prior to the election. While this was fine for most people, those who were transient, homeless, or working multiple jobs and couldn't get their letters were removed from the roles. This allow Bush to win in Ohio in 2004, and that clinched the election for him once again.

Voter suppression continues to be a problem throughout the country. Simple things that result in removing poor, minority and other predominately Democratic voters not being able to vote allow Republican victories in close races. This year, there is much contention over having people present government-issued IDs in order to vote. This will eliminate a small percentage of people who do not have these documents - mostly people who use their twenty dollars to buy food instead of an ID - from voting. Notice that states that have this law are predominately Republican states - like Idaho, Arizona, Ohio, and so forth.

But back to Mr. Rove.

He was able to accomplish many other sinister deeds within the Bush White House. They pushed through legislation that repealed many of the regulations that had been put in place after the Great Depression, which helped their banker friends and eventually resulted in the collapse of the economy. They fired many people within the Justice Department, replacing them with aggressively right-wing lawyers and judges. The legal school most represented in the Justice Department today is Liberty University. This was formerly Oral Roberts University. They teach a curriculum of 'the ends justifies the means' and encourage people to use their positions in courts to push forth their religious views as a means of getting around the whole 'separation of church and state' stuff. Michele Bachman is a graduate of Liberty University.

They pushed through The Patriot Act, which allowed the NSA to spy on Americans. Under the guise of looking for terrorists, they listen to phone calls, read emails and so forth in order to collect any information on our citizens they feel may be important. I wonder how this could affect the outcome of elections?

After the Bush years, Karl Rove influenced the conservative members of the Supreme Court to uphold the stand that "money is speech." This eliminated control over money entering elections, allowing foreign money and unlimited corporate and PAC money to be given to candidates. Karl Rove's American Crossroads infused some $20 million into the 2010 election, mostly spent on TV ads supporting GOP candidates, ushering a vast number of radically conservative Tea Party candidates into elected offices throughout the country.

Rove also held a vision of using any means possible to get elected and then to push forth an agenda. The GOP funded attempts to destroy the American public school system has been evident, as radicalized candidates, supported by GOP PAC funds and conservative talk radio have been gaining footholds in school boards across the country, rendering them dysfunctional, and diverting public funds into private and charter schools - typically of a fundamentalist Christian nature. In my own school district right now, two men are lying to the public and accepting huge sums of money trying to get a quorum on the school board in order to do this very thing.

Then there is the other side.

Bernie Sanders is senator who has worked tirelessly to stand up for the rights of working people, the poor and the elderly. He gave a remarkable filibuster, lovingly named 'The Berniebuster,' last year, in which he spent some eight hours outlining the reasons if would be imprudent to not raise taxes on the rich and corporations. He has been a tremendous advocate for worker rights and protections, and has stood strong against cutting 'entitlements' for the poor, elderly and ill in the country. He is motivated by the utmost compassion in everything he does.

Similarly Barney Frank has devoted his tenure in congress to trying to make banks and corporations accountable to their investors and protecting consumers from fraud that is so unregulated these days. Like Bernie Sanders, he is a champion of compassion toward the American people.

Not to say that all Republicans are evil and Democrats are good, GOP lawmakers like Bob Dole and Ron Paul are honest, hard-workers who were/are more loyal to helping the American people than they are to their parties and those who finance their campaigns.

So, the lines are drawn and the battle is waged in Washington, throughout America, and on television.

Currently, the evils have been taking the upper hand: Fox News spreads lies and funds candidates. People claiming to be devoted to the living message of Jesus Christ, lie and cheat in order to push forth their agenda of being judgmental and eliminating the influence of non-Christians on our society. A war has been waged, based on lies, that allowed us to re-enact the crusades, sweeping Islam out of power, while, conveniently, also making it easier to procure oil, in key Arab countries. Anti-women agendas almost shut down the government. Non-Christians have been easily identified as terrorists, allowing their influence in the political arena to be marginalized.

I don't know, I just can't get over the irony of how un-Jesus-like these Christians in the GOP are. I kind of wish they would listen to their own phrase "What would Jesus do" rather than misuse the Bible to justify that God promised he would never again destroy the world. They say that therefore climate change is not real, and that it is OK to hire people to tamper with studies and otherwise lie and cheat to try to 'prove' that it does not exist, in the face of the fact that almost all climate scientists agree that there is climate change... and so forth.

But just when all seems lost, a quiet voice began to call out. It started as a few quiet voices in the world, complaining about greed and corruption and the abuse of rights. As of now, there are millions protesting throughout the world. Several dictators have been deposed and bigger changes coming as the people of the world have called for a change in our core values around power.

The twentieth century brought about perhaps the ugliest period of world history. During that century, we lost over a quarter billion people in wars that engulfed the entire planet. We saw the very worst of what humans can do to each other when vying for political power. We saw people become obsessed with money and other worldly goods, to the point that we now accept as routine people losing their lives in large numbers every day because someone wants their television, or their drugs, or their wives, or whatever.

Change is hard, and as millions in the world are changing their ways and seeing the value of simplicity, non-materialism, sharing wealth and humanity, many more push even harder for the comforts they might have to give up. It is a transitional state, and, I believe, the return of the good in the world.

I keep using the Occupy movement as a metaphor for so many things these days, and so I will return to it here:

Protesters throughout the world are being subjugated by the police, armies and political leaders. This is where this struggle is taking place. After all, why would people marching and camping around the country be seen as such a threat? A basic First Amendment right is the freedom of speech and to peaceably assemble. But we are pushing a button, and that is frightening those who have the most to lose. "When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose," sang Bob Dylan, a generation or two ago. This is true. Those who have prospered from this evil, which has been accepted as a social norm, are seeing their way of life under threat. How scary it must be to be identified as in a position where you are 1%, and 99% of the country want to take away your power and wealth! What will the world be like for them if we stop using banks and supporting corporations and corrupt politicians. And in their fury to break up the protests, they unwittingly increase support for the movement.

It will be fascinating to see what transpires over the next weeks and years as we seem poised for massive change, and redistribution of the world's power and wealth. But remember that as long as their are such things as power and wealth, there will also be evil and corruption.

So what of a world without power and greed.

As a novice yogi, I would just like to briefly address what I see happening on a more cosmic level:

We have a system of energy centers in the spine, know in India as the chakras. The progression of people, individually and collectively, rise up through the chakras from the lowest energy point to the highest.

The lowest chakra, the root chakra, has to do with basic survival and almost animal instincts. While some people still struggle with this, as a species, most of us have mastered this. The second chakra, located in the spine behind the genitals, has to do with material creation. This is where people deal with issues associated with greed or not being greedy. The third chakra, located opposite the solar plexus, has to do with power and conrol. The second and third are where people today most struggle. I believe power is a bigger issue than greed these days. I think a lot of what we see as greed is really just trying to amass power, but controlling peoples' money and goods is the easiest way to control people. This desire for control is also where judgmental religions, and all those other aspects discussed above occur.

Good news. Once we get through this, as many people are, the next chakra is the one opposite the heart, and as would be expected, this deals with love and compassion. This is also the transitional boundary between the lower, or material, world, and the upper, or spiritual world. The Heart is where these two mix nicely.

So, if you'll forgive the interjection of my spiritual beliefs here, this is why I currently feel so hopeful amid all the chaos of the day.

There is a lot of talk about 2012, and a lot of people freaking out about this, claiming it to be the end of the world and so forth (just as an aside, I believe that once a person predicts the end of the world, and it doesn't work out that way (Harold Camping) that you don't get another shot...but I digress...) I believe what 2012 does mark is the midpoint of the transition from being a species mostly guided by the third, (power and control) chakra to the fourth (heart, love and spirit) chakra. It won't be that everyone will suddenly change, but simply that the critical mass will shift around that time.

So I encourage everyone to keep up the pressure on all humans, politicians, family members, friends and acquaintances, to put aside their need to control others and to be accepting, I encourage you to show people how to see that, as the Dalai Lama says "People take different roads seeking fulfillment and happiness. Just because they're not on your road doesn't mean they are lost." Once we stop passing judgment on people, the shift will come quickly.

I have identified Karl Rove as 'an evil genius.' This is because he is misguided and has become so obsessed with manipulating and controlling others that he has no moral compass. He probably never had a moral compass to begin with, truth be told. He is one of many who are damaged people who have lost the ability to find happiness in the world, except through exercising power over others. This is not judgment. This is just the way it is for them. Judgment is emotional. I do not feel anger or contempt for Karl Rove or these children, but instead compassion. I hope that Karl Rove can find real happiness in the world. Then he will no longer have such a desire to hurt other people. I'm not even sure Karl Rove even cares about the agenda he is pushing forth on the country. It is just the game play of doing it. If the Democrats hired him to do for them what he has done for the Republicans, he would probably be just fine with that. He really is the victim in all this, and deserves our compassion. Once people stop feeling emotional about what he does, he will have no power. That is a difficult concept to understand, since we are, as a species, so indoctrinated into the victim mentality.

People who are standing up against oppression in the world have simply stopped seeing themselves as victims. They are moving beyond the power and control third chakra. And, as such, when they are subjected to rubber bullets and pepper spray, they just get their friends and come back for some more. It is really an amazing, evolutionary move! Those in power are using violence - a very overt means that used to be effective in controlling people. But even as they get more violent, those standing up to them multiply in number by the day. How confusing that must be to them!

So I encourage people who are protesting in the world, stay centered in your hearts. Don't attempt to control others. Never respond with violence. Do not pass judgment on those you stand against, and good will triumph.

So I lied a little bit in the title. I called this "The Battle for Good and Evil," because that is what we have come to know it as over these millenia.  The reality is that what we 'fight' for, we always get more of: The war against drugs created more drugs. The war against terror bred more terror, and so forth. So if we try to fight oppression, there will just be more. Einstein said that "no problem can be solved at the same level of consciousness that started it." From what I understand, Einstein was pretty smart, too!

The consciousness that started the mess involved scheming, fighting and maniplulating. So we must be careful not to use any of these strategies. Taking stands, being committed, working for and such things are what we need to do. Let them fight. The battle, then, is one-sided. They fight, we work for, and so on. Raise the level of consciousness, and it is easy to have whatever we want. And as what we want is more in line with universal values, they become less about desires. Desires are based on material wants. That is where the problem comes from. The outcome we would like to see is much less about desire of material good and power, and about high values: equality and justice.

#Occupy USA

I grew up in the Peace Movement. My parents weren't hippies in terms of having long hair and using drugs, but they were big supporters of world peace, and so some of my earliest days were spent riding in a backpack at peace gatherings in Oregon and Washington.

My sister and I protesting in Washington DC in the early 70s.

We stopped going to the peace rallies as much after there were some violent actions on part of demonstrators and police. In 1971 or '72 there was a big rally on the mall in Washington D.C. while we were visiting my grandparents. My aunt and uncle went, and may father took them into town. I really wanted to go, but due to the size and recent problems at rallies, they just didn't want to take a little boy, so my sister and I made signs and walked up and down the block. My sign was mounted on a gun-stock.

Anyway, after the 70s, Americans became very complacent. Things would happen, and some minor rallies would take place. Usually just a few 'freaks.' Everyone else stayed in the suburbs, watched TV and went about their business.

While people were watching TV and going about their business, corporations and the government took the lack of interest as permission to slowly erode peoples' rights. During the Bush administration, a war was waged based on false pretenses. I went to a little anti-war rally in Nederland, Colorado. There were about 15 demonstrators. 

That same administration was also starting to spy on our own citizens, and was torturing people in illegal prison camps in Cuba. A few people balked, but very few people seemed to really care.

The right wing has taken to busting unions, tearing apart school districts, diverting federal funding to religious organizations, illegally funding campaigns with foreign money, buying politicians, influencing the supreme court to say that corporations are people and money is speech, lowering taxes on the richest Americans and corporations, creating massive loopholes so that rich people really don't have to pay taxes at all, and so forth.

In the meantime, people were waking up in other parts of the world. People cast off their oppressive governments in Tunisia, Egypt and Lybia and are working on that is other countries around the world.

People started to wake up a little bit in the United States when Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin set about stripping unions of their rights in secret, illegal meetings of Republican lawmakers. A prank caller, pretending to be David Koch, got him to show his hand. An occupation began of the capitol rotunda for many months, until recall elections changed the balance of power in that state.

Finally, the rest of the United States is starting to take notice. Two weeks ago, a leaderless group of citizens started an occupation of Wall Street. Several hundred, then several thousand people showed up to bring notice to the manipulation of the US citizenry by Wall Street bankers and others. Many of these banks had been bailed out by TARP money - billions of dollars given to banks to keep them afloat. The banks gladly accepted the money, and then refused to free up loans for small businesses and citizens. Within a year, these bankers were back to giving themselves millions of dollars in bonuses, and just doing business as they always had, taking care of themselves and their wealthy friends, and continuing to suck on the the teet of middle-class of America.

As Andy Borowitz put it, it is like a man who has been rescued from a burning building then turning around and kicking the fireman in the nuts.

The mainstream media refused to cover this protest, as their corporate owners saw this as a minor threat, and assumed that if they didn't show it on TV, people would just lose interest and go home - the way Americans typically do. I learned about the protest through my Canadian cousin, who posted a link on facebook pointing out to us Americans what was happening in our own country that we had not heard about!

Two weeks later, Occupy Wall Street has become an international movement.

I went down yesterday to join Occupy Denver. I had a number of interesting experiences, so I'll just tell you that story:

Feeling an urgency to participate in what I saw as the most important movement since the Vietnam war, I went to my local Occupy gathering place. Occupy Denver took place near the Capitol building.

I walked several miles to get there while my wife was volunteering for The Race for the Cure. When I got there, I saw a dozen or so people milling about. No one was on the capitol steps, where my email said the protest was happening.

A little disappointed, I sat down on a bench nearby and thought about my options. When I looked up, I saw my friend Tony walking over to me. He was coming to tell me that I looked like a friend of his, and I was just about to tell him he looked like a friend of mine.

He told me that the protesters were out marching around the city. The dozen or so people milling around were the actual 'occupiers,' and they had been there for 9 days, and intend to be there until at least January first.

He and I walked down and met them. Tony had been there all morning playing his drum. I'm still not sure why he was walking around by the out-of-the-way bench I was sitting on. Just something meant to happen, I guess.

I talked to several of the 'occupiers' - and realize these were extremely well educated, well spoken and well intentioned people. They were not just a bunch of radicals. They spoke from the heart about the issues they believed in.

The message of the day had become "We are the other 99%," meaning that the millionaires and billionaires being so well taken care of by our government constitute 1% of the population. We are the remaining 99% - the vast majority of all Americans.

The marchers came back after a short time and rallied on the capitol. The headcount, according to the 'occupiers' was nearly 600. The week before, a similar rally had brought out 50.

Then the protestors took off again to march around Denver.

The people occupying the street were extremely cautious about being courteous and following the rules, so that the police had no reason to move them along. They were constantly picking up litter, and making sure the sidewalk remained clear for people to pass.

After a couple hours, I needed to go back to meet my wife.

On the way back, I passed the protestors, who now seemed to have a police escort.

There was a story behind the police escort that I learned about later:

There is a pedestrian mall in Denver called The 16th Street Mall. It is a high-rent high-profile area for a lot of upscale stores, hotels and restaurants. A video on youtube showed the protestors approaching the mall, which was being blocked by the police. The protestors came upon them, and the initial cries went out "get your cameras out" "cameras out!" and hundreds of people started taking pictures of the police. After that, the chant changed to "The police are the 99%!" "The police are the 99%!" After a minute or so, one of the police officers gave the order to allow the protestors onto the mall.

Like I say, when I saw them, the police were leading the protest, blocking traffic and clearing the way.

Meanwhile, the occupation movement is gaining momentum.

In New York, some 500 people were arrested as they tried to cross the Brooklyn Bridge. News agency accounts say they were blocking traffic and not following directions. A number of non-news agency interviews with the protestors paint a story of being lead onto the bridge, as if the police were going to escort them across. Once in the middle of the bridge, they found themselves in an orange net and being arrested. This is on the heels of the macing and arrest incidents on Wall Street.

However, with this sort of movement, any violence directed toward the protestors benefits the protests. People today are blogging about the fact that many current and former members of the military are saying they are going to participate, along with union member and others also joining the movement. The military people say they will offer support as well as protection to the protestors.

This reminds me of the last big protest I was in, which was a small revolution in Moscow, USSR:

There had been a coup, and the government was attempting to establish marshall law. Tanks were in the streets, and soon surrounded the "Russian White House" where Boris Yeltsin was holed up, pointing their guns at the large tower. At some point, there was a dramatic shift. Yeltsin jumped up on one of the tanks, and the tanks turned their guns to face away from the Russian White House building. In the course of a few minutes, the army had moved from being aggressive toward this symbol of freedom, to protecting it from other military that may be meaning aggression. This also happened in Egypt. Is it happening here?

The military are the 99%, after all.

So, is this our Arab Spring? Is this the beginning of the shift to put the people once again in charge of the country instead of the wealthy, banks and corporations?

This is the biggest American movement of my adult life, and I am proud to be a part of it.

There are Occupy movements currently in almost every large, American city. You can be part of it. Even if it is an hour or so. Or maybe you want to be one of the occupiers, and live with a group of like-minded people.

And what if you are not like minded? What if you are one of the Tea Partiers who has followed the likes of Sarah Palin, or Michele Bachman. Maybe for you, it is worth talking to some of these protestors and see if they are really as bad and misguided as the right make them out to be. They are, after all, asking for less influence of money, fiscal responsibility and putting control of the government back into the hands of the citizens. If you are part of the other 99%, maybe they are representing your point-of-view more than you think. Perhaps you have been brainwashed by your TV. It is worth considering. And if you disagree with what we are standing for, we will support your right to believe whatever you wish. That is power by the people.

Why I Don't Listen to Conspiracists

Whenever anyone uses the phrases 'my secret contacts,' or 'black ops' or calls something Project whatever it's called, I just stop listening. It's not that I don't believe what they are saying. It's not that I believe they are all paranoid and delusional (which many are), it's just that they are missing the big picture, and what they are going to say is probably not useful to me.

I actually used to be somewhat of a conspiracy theorist. I loved the read about crazy things people were doing below eye level. And when I started working for the government, this was kicked into high gear.

I worked for two years at the American Embassy in Moscow. When I got there, we were still in the grips of the Cold War, and there were a lot of great, juicy stories.

I was very excited that I had a top-secret security clearance. The FBI had come out and investigated me before I took my Moscow job. They had poked around town, asking about my credibility, looking at my school and medical records and talking to neighbors and employers. It made me feel very important. Really fed my ego.

Then I started my job. The first job I had was that of a laborer. I worked in all the back corners of the embassy, and saw and heard lots of things. The 'information' I got was in isolation; just little bits here and there. But my mind worked incessantly to try to connect all the dots. I would think through scenario after scenario until I came up with what I was sure was the exact story that allowed me to put all my little pieces together.

We had been sternly warned not to talk about what we saw, as the wrong information in the wrong hands could jeopardize the work of the embassy, as well as possibly be dangerous to the people who worked there. And I took these warnings seriously, and never did reveal what I was thinking. Had I been  a little more vulnerable, as Marine Clayton Lonetree had been a few months before I arrived, selling his secrets to Russian spies for some insignificant monetary compensation, it would have been easy to spin my tales for people. I never did, but I sort of wanted to. It was very exciting to be in possession of such secrets. I would have made a great 'secret source.'

When I worked in Moscow, it was during the presidency of George H. W. Bush (the elder one, that is,) and he was the topic of many conspiracy theories. I spent a lot of time with the guys I worked with talking about The New World Order and the Trilateral Commission and Skull and Bones other secret societies. This just fueled my brain and added layers to my tales I had concocted from the secret information I was exposed to.

The 1991 coup attempt happened mid-way through my time in Moscow, and after that time, relations between the Soviets and Americans changed significantly. We suddenly went from being foes to allies, and much information that had been secret before was revealed during my second year.

It was embarrassing  how far off my scenarios were from the truth. I learned that among the information I had been exposed to, some of it was misinformation that was seeded around intentionally so that when people like me and the guys I worked with saw it or heard it, that we would be lead to draw false conclusions. Also, there were quite a few people there who enjoyed 'messing with people's minds.'

One of the things that is characteristic of the conspiratorial mind is the amount of minutia, tiny details that had to fit just right, and the amount of unusual coincidence that has to occur to make everything work out. I have learned in my life that when things get too complex, there is something wrong.

So, do I believe that there are people who work together for evil purposes? Yes. Surely. For instance, I am well convinced that people like the Koch brothers and execs from Goldman-Sachs and other Wall Street bankers work together to buy off politicians and influence policy for the convenience of the wealthy. I also believe that they are waging class warfare against the middle class. Also I believe they are trying to destroy the Public School system.

A conspiracy theorist person would extrapolate that these people are part of the illuminati, a group hundreds of years old with secret ties to the Freemasons and a secret bloodline from Jesus Christ that have been attempting to control empires since the middle ages, and that there are ties to the Teutonic Knights and the work they did in Israel during the crusades. This is the type of minutia that serves to cloud things rather than to help create fairness.

And so when conspiracy theorists start to spin their yarns and tell me about secret operations they know of because of their sources, I think what a good 'source' I would have made from 'deep within the American Embassy - Moscow,' and just how confused I had been, and how manipulated I had been.

Also, when I see some of these conspiracy theorists talk,  I wonder what type of 'source' would seek them out. After all, don't the real whistle-blowers in positions of power go to Bob Woodward, or some credible journalist who will help protect them and provide them some serious compensation?

Perhaps some of the conspiracy theorists are all correct with the minutia they spin. But I still don't listen. Are they, after all, providing any sort of service? Fifty years after the assassination of JFK, does it really matter who shot him? Governor John Connally was in the bar at the embassy when Oliver Stone's JFK movie came out. He watched the CNN feed we got on the TV and declared to everyone in there that he had been in the car and had been shot himself, and he heard one gun and the bullets came from one place. End of story. He was there, and all the confusion stirred up by all the subsequent theories didn't do anything to change it. He made a good point.

A dozen or so years ago, I started reading Wayne Dyer and Ram Dass, and some people like that. In what they discuss, there is one story that they tell in hundreds of ways to make the story easily accessible to everyone. There are a myriad of writers and speakers who all say the same thing from a variety of points-of-view. It is a simple story, with no weird coincidences or minutia. They point to a big picture that is simple and easy to understand.

That is what I think the conspiracy theorists miss - the big picture of what we are all doing here.

The current GOP are operating like a bunch of conspiracists as well. They all have complex stories about how Obama is ruining the country. The have sources that give them faulty information. They make up situations and stories and statistics to make people afraid, and promise that they can protect people from these scary things. Some of them even have God himself as their secret source! They all seem to know about the US cities that have been taken over by Muslims, and people are eating this up!

There is certainly something very alluring about conspiracies, and I can understand how contagious it is. I think the people really involved in the conspiracies love the theorists, because it is so easy to further confuse their stories. And when people get so involved in trying to trace the bloodline of Jesus Christ and learn about the Teutonic Knights and the illuminati, The Koch brothers just go on buying off politicians and breaking up unions. They love the fact that we have lost focus.

I have spent the last 20 years working with very disturbed people through the course of my work. In addition to serving students with mental illness, I also have the opportunity to be around many budding psychopaths and con-men. I have learned to have a keen 'gut,' and even when the evidence in front of me points to something else, if I start to get the creeps, I act on it. My gut feeling have lead to a number of investigations that have turned up some truly sinister behavior. My gut feelings have also kept me and others out of harm's way quite a few times. Many times I am around a conspiracy-focused person, I start to get this creepy feeling.

It is important to carefully consider, with your gut, what things you are exposed to, and what you believe.

Stephanie and I did a number of wedding ceremonies last year as part of the couple-month-long process of our nuptials. One was an 'esoteric' wedding which we did in Montana.

We had become enthusiastic about some books by Elizabeth Clare Prophet. A great deal of it seemed to make a lot of sense to us. We thought it would be fun to do this little ceremony at a place called "The Western Shambala" just north of Yellowstone Park that is run by her group. We were able to locate the office of "The Summit Lighthouse," the publisher of Prophet's books on our GPS, and went there. We found a chapel and an office building. The people enthusiastically greeted us, and were very pleasant, and quickly allowed us to go up to The Western Shambala for our wedding. But even before we got there, a few things got my creepy gut feeling going. One was the way that Elizabeth Prophet and her husband were painted in and among the Ascended Masters and Angels around the compound. The other was the way that people referred to Elizabeth Clare as either Guru Ma or Mother.

But what harm could a hike in the mountains do?

We drove up to an area in 'The Western Shambala' known as 'The Heart.' People gave us detailed instructions to walk along a road, past an old skeleton of a tent, where their retreats used to take place, and so forth. But they forgot to mention the vast, underground bomb shelter that was on the other side.

With our creepy guts going strong, we walked well past the bomb shelter to a nice bend in the creek, and did our little ceremony there. After all, there really is no harm that can come from a little walk in the mountains. Our ceremony was fantastic!

So, when we got back into wi-fi range, we started doing a little research.

It turns out that starting in the 1970s, the Prophets were investigated and busted several times for stockpiling weapons. In the 1990s, Elizabeth had said that she had been told by the Ascended Masters that the end of the world was imminent, and that they needed to build a bomb shelter. The members of the church that the Prophets had started were asked to give all they had for the creation of this bomb shelter, and on a couple of given dates, all the now-broke members of the group funneled into the bomb shelters. As nothing happened, they were told by Prophet that their prayers had saved the world.

Most members left the church to start their lives over again.

It turns out that in addition to her doomsday prophesies, Elizabeth Clare also had affairs with many of the church members, was abusive to her children and so forth.

This does not change the fact that some of the things she said in her books are remarkably inspired and ring true in a very profound way.

I believe she is an extreme example of the characteristics we all have: That is that we all have a remarkable ability to tap into some sort of amazing, divine intelligence, and are all gifted with profound insights. But at the same time, if we start to believe what we say too much, we become victims of our ego, and confusing and contradictory messages start to seem as clear as those divine messages.

I think this is particularly true of the conspiracy theorists. While they probably all have some unique, divine insights that can help us all, their message becomes confused with all sorts of useless or harmful ideas that negate the positive information they can offer to us. So I stop listening.

So, I like to do what I can to stop some of the conspiratorial influencing of politicians in negative ways, or conspiracies to destroy the Public Schools, and other cornerstones of our civilization. But if you start to tell me about the black ops and Projects and military involvement and your secret sources, I may still look at you, but I am probably thinking about something else.

Playing for Grins - a Scattered and Not Very Well Organized Look at Music in the New Age

(I apologize  for the rather scattered and unclear arrangement of this piece.)

A few months ago, I went into a music store owned by an acquaintance in town. He asked me if I was playing. I said some, but that the slow economy had, unfortunately, caused several of the places I played to close. I asked him if he was playing.

"No," he grumbled. He gestured toward a drum set on the floor. "Those are my drums, and I'm selling them, because no one is paying more that $100 for the whole group to play. That means I get $25, and I'm not hauling them around for $25."

He then went on to talk about all the people he knew who we "playing for grins," meaning people playing for free. "Every time someone plays for free, they are putting someone out of work," he said.

I have been contemplating this for some time.

I do see his point, that if people are willing to play for free, then why pay someone to play. But I also see that a lot of places that used to have people playing are now just playing the radio. Part of the reason for this is that ASCAP agents come through town now and then and present large bills to restaurants, clubd and other venues, because they have people playing "cover songs," meaning that they are playing music composed by other people. ASCAP is an agency whose job it is to collect money for composers whose music is being played.

The problem I see here is that the business side of music has removed the artistic side of music. That is that people are so conditioned to want to hear songs they are familiar with played in relatively the same way as the version they hear on the radio. The music industry is a business that exists to make money. Therefore, they listen for people who play in a relatively same way as what is popular in sales, and they look for clones. It is a self-feeding cycle of people copying each other for the goal of getting rich, and those of us who play music to express ourselves are sitting on the sidelines.

This is only partially true, however in this day and age as people have instant access to music. People can record and distribute their music world-wide, completely bypassing the music industry. The music industry itself is suffering, because this same tool that makes it easy to record and distribute has allowed people to download music for free. I have seen statistics that something like 90% of all music that is distributed is through people downloading or copying music. One person downloads a track, and dozens of people copy it.

The other problem with the business of music is the old-style distribution system: In the old world, there were some musicians in each town who provided the music for ceremonies, and so forth, and were provided for. In the new world Jason Bieber sells 5,000,000 albums, or something, and the local band sells a few CDs to their families and friends, and a few devoted fans.

But enter the new age:

There are now tools, such as Bandcamp and Soundcloud and CD Baby that are devoted to the independent artist. People like bassist Steve Lawson. He has made a decent living for himself through these tools and a lot of ingenuity.

Bandcamp and Soundcloud are free sites that musicians may upload their music to, set their price and promote as they can. When they sell tracks, Bandcamp takes a small cut and then sends the rest of the money to the artist.

The Bandcamp artists set their own price, and one of the options is to allow the purchaser to name their own price, even to download the track for free. This is the choice that Steve gives to everyone. I have read his comments and blogs (check out http://www.stevelawson.net/) and he has said that people pay an average of over $1.00 per track they download. Some download the music for free, and some pay more. So, thinking creatively, this is possible. Steve has said that when people get his music for free, it is getting the music out there and will ultimately result in more purchases for him, and more people showing up at his shows.

So, the shows. Last year, he tweeted that he was ready for his North American tour, so if people were willing to offer their houses for concerts and for him to stay, to let him know, and he would arrange his tour around the offers. And he made it work. He spent a couple months criss-crossing the US doing house concerts. Some were even streamed on the internet. People could watch for free, or there was a little link to pay what you wanted for the concert.

Steve further utilizes the internet by offering music lessons around the world via Skype.

Steve is just an example of one musician who has capitalized on the possibilities out there to play music. He shows that the old model of signing record deals and playing at clubs and so forth is not the only way.

So, what about the musician who plays for free? If no one is paying for music, should we all just sell our instruments and sit at home? Can we only play music that people "want to hear" - as so often is the justification for playing only music by other people.

The bottom line is that we all got into musical performance to be expressive and artistic. We had things we wanted to say, using music (or any other medium.) Then we wanted to make a living at it.

At a very early age, I learned that music that paid meant I had to play music I did not want to play. I was playing the same pieces over and over and over in pit orchestras for musicals, and playing songs that I could not stand when I first heard them over and over and over. So I got a job to support myself, and have had a great musical career in which I have almost always played what I wanted to play at the time. I have composed my own music, explored the sounds and emotions that I wanted to explore and loved every minute of it. Many of my friends who have depended on their art to make a living have been very frustrated with their lives of performing that most often has resulted in their not playing music they like at all. They burn out on their music and resent the world that will not provide them the opportunities they desired.

I truly 'play for grins' in the sense that I am happy to play, and enjoy it very much. I don't make much money at it. I sell a few CDs every month, and occasionally get some money - a lot of what I play is for fundraising. I love to play for charity events that help organizations earn money.

I did stop playing bars and clubs and the likes when the economy went bad, so that people who needed the money to live from would benefit from these opportunities. I left the clubs, giving them the names and numbers of people who earned their living from music.

So, I guess we can have a world mostly devoid of music if people won't play without getting money. We could have a world where the only music we hear is what the music industry dictates we should be listening to, or we can have a world full of unique sounds and expressions on street corners, and other more unusual listening places.

I am sorry my friend chose to sell his drums to protest not being able to earn money. But was he truly expressing something unique in the world, or just being a pawn to the music business, at whatever level.

What Obama's Election Seemed to do to our country

I was particularly troubled this week when the "Tea Party Debate" bore out, once again, the ugliest of American qualities during a couple of points: Particularly when people shouted with glee at the idea of letting a man die and at the applause Rick Perry got after bragging about all the people he killed.

The Tea Party consistently shows us the ugliest of human emotions, as they root for ending programs that help people, encourage the destruction of the environment and call for the end of Civil Right Legislation. They have stomped on people's heads at their rallies, they promote openly racist candidates and causes and so forth, while at the same time talking about the importance of religion, and that Christianity is the only real religion. Isn't Jesus that one who had so much to say about love and compassion? You see my confusion here...

After Mr. Obama was elected, he re-instituted a very good tradition that had not been observed since the days of the Einsenhower years (I can't be absolutely sure if Eisenhower was the last one, but I think I heard that somewhere...) of addressing the school students toward the beginning of the school year to encourage them to do their part as Americans, and take school seriously, do their best and go on to get great jobs and be great Americans. A really great idea.

The first speech came up, and there was havoc in the schools. Parents were calling, forbidding their children to see Obama's speech. Letters were sent home to parents outlining the speech and saying that there were places their children could go if they didn't want them to see the president. It was mayhem.

So, would there have been this controversy if Jimmy Carter or George Bush or Bill Clinton or Ronald Reagan wanted to address the youth of our nation? I think not. After all, these men were Presidents of the United States, and it's good for the president to encourage the youth, right? Not if you have dark skin, apparently.

The election of our nation's first black president seemed to have blown the cap off of the below-eye-level racism that had existed in the country.

While racism has been subtly rampant, and such things have occurred as the closing of theaters and stores during the 1960s to avoid having to allow 'minorities' and have never opened; the continuous problem with exclusive clubs that have no race policy, but seem to refuse any non-white members and such have continued to be part of mainstream America; the brutally overt incidents of racism have been limited to violent radicals typically associated with neo-nazi or KKK types of groups.

But the election of a black president seems to have been more than the covert racists could bear, and they began to show their radical side. The GOP is now near or in the category of outright fascism.

During the 2010 midterm elections, we saw some of the ugliest campaigning in history: Comment like "if ballots don't work, bullets will" were flying fast. Immigration from a straight-out racist perspective became hot issues. Candidates talked openly about overturning aspects of the Civil Rights Acts. It was ugly, and it was scary.

Now as the 2012 campaign season has been kicked off, the GOP candidates seem to only be stepping up their rhetoric. The idea of Sharia law taking over the country, an idea absurd at any level, is a big topic among these candidates, who have reframed the "War Against Terror" as a "We are at war with Islam." Remember the crusades? These are specifically racist ideas generated only to direct hatred toward the 1,000,000,000 Muslims on our planet.

This, obviously, is not Obama's fault. He has never made an issue of his race, 'played the race card' or, to the best of my knowledge, said anything racist. The mere idea of a black person in such a position of authority has pushed them into such a radicalized state of panic that they are unable to contain their hatred, and it is affecting a large portion of the country.

Until recently radicals and crazies were seen as such, and their influence on our society seemed to be minimal. Now they have a huge power base.

The difference between the left and right at this point seems to be a factor of one character trait: compassion.

People who have compassion wish to help their fellow refrain from suffering, and as such currently make up the Democratic party. Those who only care about themselves, and don't care if people suffer, die, are killed, are living in poverty, are sick, old feeble, what have you - make up the GOP.

Sadly, the country seems to be fairly evenly divided at this point, with more, by the day, joining ranks with the radicals on the right.

It is one thing to begrudgingly see a person's when they elude to the fact that a person's choice may cause them to die (the fact is that most people who are uninsured are not because of free will, but because they cannot afford insurance, but that is another point...) it is another thing to actively cheer the idea of someone dying. It is one thing to understand that some people are so damaged that they can never be rehabilitated (despite research throughout the world that this is rarely true...) it is another to cheer a man who has been personally responsible for allowing hundreds of people to be executed (and remember, too, that the US Supreme Court had to intervene today so that a person who may be innocent, but is not white did not have to die in Texas, because Gov. Perry refused to stop the execution.) These responses are not just merely right wing, they are savage.

Furthermore, in a compassionate society, these are not even ideas we entertain.

So what is to be made of a country where half the people are compassionate and want to help their fellow humans, and half would just as soon see them die, even if they are innocent, and especially if they are not white?

There is also a massive movement in this country toward extreme spiritualism (not radical religion) where people are making amazing spiritual advances and discovering levels of compassion, love and enlightenment that used to be reserved for gurus on high mountains in the East. People in vast numbers are meditating, helping, caring, living in service to others and so forth. So while one group of people are becoming much more compassionate, another group of people seem to be honing hatred at an equal and opposite level. I don't currently know what to make of this, or what it means.

I have read science fiction books where the human race becomes divided, and part of them live as enlightened yogis, while the other part go below ground and live like trolls. I haven't read such books since I was in Junior High School, so I don't remember any details. But, is this what might be happening to us as a species?

I read an article this week about a wonderful children's book that explored the idea of evolution that was rejected by US publishers as being too controversial. The Canadian publisher that put it out seems to be quite content with the money and awards it has generated - but really? Evolution too controversial to publish?

Does the right reject the idea of evolution because they have stopped evolving?

Perhaps the next stage of evolution is not so much a physical adaptation as a spiritual/emotional/mental adaptation, and there are some who are just not going to be able to evolve.

Of course, most spiritual literature talks about the notion that Nirvana is a place everyone will have to get to, not just some, but maybe at this stage of the game, there are a lot who are not going to be making that jump for quite some time.