a new understanding of today, time and space.

ok, I have read the first chapter of the Bhagavad Gita…
and one of the idea’s mentioned is this idea of personal
salvation…if you are driven by such things as money or
fear, personal salvation becomes unimportant…
you only care about making money and being safe doing so…
that is your goal and your priority…
but what about this idea of personal salvation?

and does the pursuit of personal salvation work for
or against the possibilities of the collective, the society…

if we pursue personal salvation in the guise of trying to find
what is our own personal possibilities, then what does that
search mean for society, for all us?

this conflict between the individual and society/state has
been one of the driving forces of history since human history began…

much of what we think of as history, is this conflict between the individual
and the society/state… think of philosophical, religious and political
history as being this conflict between the individual and the socity/state…

Among others, we have Socrates and Jesus and Gandhi and Martin Luther King and
Martin Luther and Mohammed and Spinoza, all having conflicts with society/state
and all have driven history for the last 2,500 years…

each person in their own way, sought to find individual solution to
the problem of human existence and each came into conflict with the
society/state over their solution to personal salvation……

Are you brave enough to seek personal salvation over the demands
of the society/state or will you bow down to the demands of the society/state?

for the state/society, the answer to what it means to be human is different
then the solution offered up by each person listed above…

and who you got? the society/state or the individual?

depends upon what drives you… money/fear and you got the
society/state… and if what drives you is freedom or justice,
then you got the individual…

but the real solution would be to merge the two, the individual needs
and the society/state needs… into one nice happy family…

Kropotkin

“Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s
and unto God the things that are God’s”

this statement is however incomplete…
for what about the third rending…

“Render unto ourselves that is ourselves”

for what do we miss if we only render unto Caesar
and God? what about us? What should we render to ourselves?

is personal salvation the answer? or is the answer something else?

we have render to god and we have render to the state,
but what about the individual? What should we offer to ourselves?

Kropotkin

Chan is a form is Chinese Buddhism…

The famous poet Bo Juyi (772-846 AD) asked Chan Master
Niaokou (741-824) about the true meaning of Chan, Niaokou
responded, “as for doing evil, avoid it; as for the good, practice
sharing it.” When Bo Juyi derisively dismissed this as a the kind
of advice given to three year old children, Niaokou didn’t disagree,
but simply added that although it was advice that easily rolled
off the tongue, it was advice that most eighty year old’s (most people) failed to
put into practice…

we have our words, I am a Christian… I am a good person… I am
honest… I am an American……

and we have our deeds, our actions… and rarely do the two, deeds and words
actually match up…and therein lies a great deal of issues and problems
in the world, our deeds rarely ever reach the level of our words……

if your words proclaim yourself to be a genius, then your deeds must
affirm your being a genius…our words need to match our deeds…

a rather visible public demonstration of this disconnect between the words
and the deeds is IQ45…His words are I am a strong, tough individual,
but his actions revel him to be an extremely weak individual…
He ran away from serving in Vietnam, He has never put himself
into harms way, he is so cowardly as to be afraid to fire a person in person…
note the number of people he has fired but never by himself personally…
he has even cowardly resorted to firing people by tweets instead of
firing them personally…most people he has fired has been done by his
chief of Staff, John Kelly for example… for example IQ45 was so afraid
of firing Comey from the FBI, they waited until he was across the country in
L.A before firing him……

so when understanding a person, see the disconnect between their words
and their actions…

that reveals the real person… the disconnect between a person and their words…

Kropotkin

as I expand my studies of eastern/Chinese/Indian philosophy
I note that they/the eastern school of philosophy approaches
philosophy differently then we do… and they approach it, as
the ancient Greeks/Romans approached philosophy… I have written
about this before… the Greeks/Roman from the ancient pre-Socratic
philosophers to the rise of Rome and then the Romans beyond to the end
of the Roman empire, all did someone we don’t do today… which is
live our philosophy… we study philosophy but we don’t live it…
it is a field of inquiry like math and history and economics but we
don’t take what we learn from these disciplines into the way we live
our lives… the two are separate… we live… and we study…
they are two distinct and separate matters whereas for the Greeks/Romans
and the Chinese/Indian philosophers what they studied was how to live…

the philosophies they studied they tried to integrate into their lives…
philosophy wasn’t an abstract, separate study of life… it was meant to
be something we live by… to engage with philosophy as a way of life…
that is what the Ancient Greeks and Romans and Chinese and Indian philosophers
did……….

today, here and now, we so called philosophers, we don’t engage with philosophy,
we simply study it and then go about our business doing whatever the hell we want,
regardless of the philosophy we might have studied 5 minutes earlier… because
there is no connection between the philosophy we study and the lives we lead…
until we live our philosophy, we are simply engaging in mental masturbation…
stroking what feels good mentally…philosophy as a means of feeling better
about one self…

instead of using philosophy as a means to engage with who we are
and to indicate our Kantian questions, “What am I to do?” instead of answering that
by thinking about how much money we can make or what will give us fame, money,
sex, power…we use philosophy to understand “What am I to do?” or “What am I
suppose to believe in?” or “what values should I hold?” not just to feel better about myself
or to flatter myself… “I am the Ubermensch” words spoken by young
men who think themselves superior to others because it flatters their ego…
mental masturbation…

instead of true, honest philosophy which is to engage with philosophy
as a way of life… meant to be lived, not studied as an abstract,
transcendental, hypothetical study of how people are to live……

for the east, philosophy is to be lived, to be a way of life…
are you prepared to engage in philosophy as deeply?

Kropotkin

on the next part of the Bhagavad Gita, we reach a point where
we are forced to consider the difference between following
the materialistic, the temporary or follow the permanent…
but this too is a false understanding…for what is the permanent?

I am not saying that the materialistic is the true path, no, but I am
saying to follow the “permanent” is not the path either because what
is the permanent?

You look at life and life is full of the material, full of things
that are temporary, brief, momentary, transient…
the table that I am writing on and the books I am reading
and the stove in the kitchen and the water bottle I am drinking from…
all are transient, temporary, momentary…….as I am temporary, brief,
momentary and transient… and so the religious and the philosophical
think, if we are so transient and all our material goods are transitory,
then let us pursue that which is not brief, momentary, transitory…

the religious say god and let us pursue god,
the philosophical say, all that is left outside of material
is spirit, so let us pursue that spirit…

and as the east, Buddha says, the material is about suffering,
let us forsake the material and thus forsake the suffering……
once again, pursuing the permanent……by not being reincarnated,
we can avoid suffering and how do we avoid being reincarnated?
by overcoming the material in us and becoming the Buddha…
overcoming is the means by which the Buddha became the Buddha…

by finding the permanent and avoid the temporary, the materialistic,
us and everything that is of material which is temporary, brief…

but we find that in thinking about it, we find that there is a permanent in life
and that we find in the original beginning of the universe… and we see
as the basis of Einstein’s formula, E=Mc2… energy and mass is equivalent…

we can take this as being the permanent in the universe… everything has mass
and everything is energy and the two are convertible to each other…
the immediate form of the mass or the energy is not relevant…
the mass can be anything, anything at all, a stove, a book, a water bottle,
a human being, a planet or my lunch… and energy can be anything at all,
a stove, a book, a water bottle, a human being, a planet or my lunch…
and they are convertible to each other… thus we find that the permanent
in the universe is mass and energy… what the mass and energy momentarily
looks like is irrelevant… for mass and energy is permanent and the shapes are not,
the shapes of mass being a stove or a water bottle or a human being or a planet
and the temporary shape of energy can be a stove or a water bottle or a human being…

that, that is the permanent aspect of our universe… not the temporary,
momentary, illusion of matter and energy… the temporary shapes that mass
and energy has at the moment is just that, temporary… the real point is the
mass and energy itself… that is permanent aspect and can only be changed into each other…
the temporary forms they take, who gives a fuck… it is about what the mass and energy
is… which is mass and energy which is permanent…

Kropotkin

as stated, the problems of human existence is reduced to birth, old age,
disease and death…or so says the Buddha…

and we can certainly see the problems of existence caused by birth…but
we can also see something else caused by birth… love, charity,
hope, beauty, the fascination of life with life… curosity, treasures
beyond gold and silver but treasures of existence…the Buddha fails
to see this… he can only see the negative, suffering, old age, disease and death…
but life is more then just suffering and old age and disease and death…

life can be wonderous and life can be suffering and life can be diseased
and life can be more beautiful then one can imagine…….

so what are we to do? should we focus on the negative, birth,
old age, disease and death? or should we focus on the beauty,
the grace, the charm and allure of life… we can, by our choice
of vision or our choice of focus…see the positive or the negative of life…
but me, me personally, I see both sides of the same coin… life as a negative
and life as a positive… and we see once again, we hit that portion of our
program where we think two things are opposed to each other, opposite to
each other and then we find they are two sides of the same coin… and then
after some more reflection, we see that they are one and the same…
just as good and evil grow from two distinct and opposite sides to two sides
of the same coin to being the exact same thing……

there is no opposite good… and evil…… there is simply one and the same.
I wish I had a word in which to unify the two words, good… evil…
but that is where we are at… good and evil are the same…
just as mass and energy is the same……

I am a human being… mass and I am energy… I am convertible from
mass into energy and back again… just as any life form is…a dog
is mass and is also energy, convertible and just as a monkey or a cow
or a bee or a tuna…… or a bear… they are all mass and they are all
energy and they are convertible into mass and energy…

that is our connection to life…we are one and the same…
mass and energy convertible into each… so when you harm a
dog, you harming yourself because there is no difference
between a dog and yourself… both are mass and energy
convertible into the other………that is why we must preserve
trees and plants and other life… for that life is us and we are it…
for both are mass and both are energy and mass and energy is convertible
into each other…….

that is the permanent we must seek… that is the permanent that
we pursue… our temporary forms, be it dog or human or stove or water bottle
are just that, temporary… but they connect and are the permanent by being mass
and energy………… you are me and I am you by a very real and direct path…
we are mass and we are energy and we are convertible into mass and/or energy…

Kropotkin

Arjuna asked Krsna to solve his laminations over the false
materialism (the four problems that the Buddha spoke about,
birth, old age, disease and death)….

so failing to find a solution to his problem, Arjuna asked
the Krsna to solve his problems… and that is how it goes,
we are unable to solve our own problems and so we go to others
to solve them for us…we depend upon the “Authorities” to
solve our problems… we ask society to solve the homeless problem
and we ask the church to save us and we ask society to entertain us
and we ask sports to amuse us…at what point do we say enough,
we shall no longer obey the authorities and we shall listen to ourselves?

this question has appeared before and no answer was given there either…

if in my ignorance I cannot answer a question, at what point should I appeal
to a authority? how long should we attempt to answer our own questions?

I say, answering our own questions is a lifetime quest… it takes as long as it
takes…….and a man who seeks the meaning of his own life, taking his whole life,
has done as much as any man alive… including Alexander the Great and Caesar…

it is not about the answers, but the questions we ask…

Kropotkin

we have the four forces of the universe but they are not
what you think they are…

you have mass and energy which as we have determined,
to be one and the same and we have time and space
as Einstein has determined to be one and the same,
space/time… so once again we have two distinct and separate
things like good and evil, mass and energy and space and time,
starting off as distinct and separate things evolving into
one and the same, two sides of the same coin…
and if we look even further, we shall see that mass and energy
and time/space, become one thing… as all concepts become
one concept…that is your permanent goal… making everything
into one concept, not two or four or many, but one…

Kropotkin

got a few moments…

so, what does this mean? it means that what human beings consider too
be important enough to live over and die over… isn’t…

the things we consider important fame, money, land, titles,
are all transitory, momentary… they last for a short time
and disappear…what value does something have when it
only last a very short period of time? Money for example,
it comes and goes at the speed of light… my wife and I was just
shopping, (at Costco) and the bill was $277… money came and money
went…it isn’t something that is permanent… and yet we fight and kill
and do other really stupid things for something that is so transitory…

land for example, the land I am standing on, right now, was under
water thousands of years ago… land rises, land sinks, oceans rise
and fall, mountains ranges build up and are broken down…
even land, land is transitory, momentary…but because our lives
are so short it looks like land is permanent… it isn’t……

so if we realize that everything human fight over and die
over is transitory, momentary, brief… we cannot really expect to
take seriously these notions that power or money or fame is forever and worth
fighting over… so if we understand the nature of the universe…

what is the really important matter?

Kropotkin

hint… listen to a song as I am doing right now…

listen to the music…

live in that moment…

and that is the meaning, the point of life…

to exist in that moment because nothing else
is permanent or lasting…

to exist in that moment…

Kropotkin

ok, so we live in the moment… the here and now…
and this question of existing, in the here and now…
is the now, metaphysical? No, the here and now is
anti-metaphysical… so here I am…
What should I do? What should I believe in?
What should I hope for?
The Kantian/Kropotkin questions of existence lie here,
in the here and now… as they lay everywhere we look.

Kropotkin

I have been thinking about experiences…

we rush from one experience to another… my wife went to Reno to
experience what they offered there and a few years we went to Europe
to see what experiences they offered there and we spend time, money,
effort to discover new experiences…some mountain climb, done that,
and some try to skydive, not in this lifetime or the next, and some
learn new languages I’ve tried but I just can’t and some travel… I love to travel…
some eat at new restaurants for new experiences… I like to eat at new places…

the human search for new exeriences is never ending… but ask yourself why?
why this, not desire for this is far more intense then just plain desire, this need
of human beings to experience the new, the different and sometimes the fucking
strange and crazy experiences we force ourselves to…

this strange fascination with new experiences drives
our live… but what exactly is an “experience”?

isn’t this need for new experiences simply another
example of us needing to exist and live within the moment?

in a few hours I go to work… I really, really don’t need to experience that…
I’ve worked for over 40 years… but if you think about it, everything,
yep everything we do is simply about another experience… familiar
or not doesn’t matter… everything in life is simply just another experience…
learn to exist within that moment of experience… learn to live within the moment…
for the fact is, all we have is this moment… the past has already been experienced
and the future doesn’t yet exist…

old hat advice Kropotkin… everyone says this… give us something new,
give us some new advice that will fill my need for a new experience…

and I can’t… I have nothing new for there is nothing new under the sun…

instead of rushing toward new experiences…try to understand why you need
to experience something new……. begin there…

Kropotkin

Well if Immanuel kan’t, I don’t think Pete kropotkin kan either. I’m sorry, man.

K: I apologize if I am moving too fast for you… perhaps you should stick
with “see spot run” that might be more your speed……

Kropotkin

[quote=“Peter Kropotkin”]
ok, so we live in the moment… the here and now…
and this question of existing, in the here and now…
is the now, metaphysical? No, the here and now is
anti-metaphysical… so here I am…
What should I do? What should I believe in?
What should I hope for?
The Kantian/Kropotkin questions of existence lie here,
in the here and now… as they lay everywhere we look.

K: ok, in thinking about this…we have ism’s that are materialistic,
communism and capitalism are examples of this…the materialistic
philosophies and ism’s that drive our pursuit of the material and ignore
the Kantian/Kropotkin questions of existence of “what am I to do”
and “what should I believe in” and “what values should I hold”
now in looking at those questions, people then might think they
are metaphysical questions, questions which require or need
god or religion to answer these questions… but we find that
we cannot answer our questions metaphysically… in other words…
we have two types of questions and we really need a third question…

we have questions about materialism and we have questions about
metaphysics… two distinct and separate questions…think of the
opposition between say Marxism and the Catholic church…
the focus of the two groups is quite opposite… one focuses in, the church
and one focuses out, the Marxist…

but what we need is a new understanding which is not materialistic
and not metaphysical… in other words, we are exploring the problem
that bewildered Nietzsche… how to find that third path…
perhaps that third path is the simliar path we have seen before…
the idea that good and evil is two distinct and separate
ideas and then we see good and evil are two sides of the same coin
and then we see that good and evil are the same idea and we can rise
above good and evil as concepts…… perhaps we can see materialism
and metaphysics as just two sides of the same coin and soon, soon perhaps
we can see them as the same concept…perhaps…

Kropotkin

One of the Kantian/Kropotkin questions is this, “What values should I hold”?

Ok, what are our choices for values to hold? we can hold so called “Religious”
values… (whatever that means) or we can hold secular values… Materialism
values like communism or capitalism…

We can pursue religious values which usually are values determined by
or demanded by god and/or religion…surrender to god is both
Christian and… and Muslim…and Jewish and Hindu and………
surrender to the “AUTHORITY” is usually the nature of these values…
and the “AUTHORITY” is usually the local one… the local values…

(to turn this into reality, in sports, we usually root for the home team,
Here in the San Francisco area we root for the Warriors, Giants,
Sharks, 49’s and A’s and why? because they are the local teams
and we don’t root for the Yankee’s or the Braves or the Twins because
they aren’t the local team… Religion is done the same way, we root for
the local team be it Christians or Muslims or Hindu’s or Buddhist)

we don’t choose a religion because of what it values, we choose
a religion based on our proximity to our community, our parents, our
state and our education… we simply adopt the home team’s beliefs…

the next possibility is to adapt secular values… materialism values
that are encased in such materialism forms as communism and
capitalism… modern values that permeate the modern world…
that money and goods such as cars and couches hold more value then
inner values such as love and hope and honesty… we exists in a modern world
of materialistic values… pursue the material goods instead of thinking about
the soul… but in saying that, one automatically assumes that the soul
we refer to, is taken in a religious context and we don’t want that…
so, we are caught between having values that are materialistic and values
that are religious…what about a third way? can we have secular values
without an appeal to the materialistic values of communism or capitalism?
can we approach the values of the soul without, without being forced
to adapt religious values?

and this was Nietzsche task… how to find meaning in a meaningless world?

How to find values without recourse to religion or to a recourse to
materialistic systems such as communism or capitalism?

that becomes one of the primary task of the modern world…

to find a third way to see or understand values without any recourse
to religion or to the religion of capitalism/communism?

a rather tough task because in our hast to build the modern world,
we only allowed two and just two choices for us to discover our
question, “What are we to do?”…… we can see to our soul, the religious
or we can see to our body, the materialistic… we didn’t leave any third
way…but we must have a third way… we cannot believe that we have
only two choices, the soul or the body? Logically, we must have, we need
a choice that includes the two… now remember our discussion of
good and evil… two distinct and separate entities which after some thought
becomes two sides of the same coin and then after some more thought
become the same thing… UMMMMMMMMMMMMM

I wonder what this might have to say about our soul / body question?

I wonder? :-"

so we have rejected the two primary understandings of the human being,
that we must favor one or the other, the soul and adapt religious values
or the body and adapt materialistic values… in favor of some sort of
compromise that allows us to adapt both understandings, the body and
the soul… without any recourse to a religious or to a materialistic
concept of the soul/body… this is a tough nut to crack but a necessary one
to work out… we cannot be about one or the other, the soul or the body…
we must include both in our understanding of the world… we need both…

let us try this…….let us work this from inside out…

it is clear from the rules that we all play in regards to other human beings,
that the positive values, love, kindness, hope, charity, peace are values
that are a benefit to both us and to the society…the negative values
of hate, anger, lust, greed, violence are values that damage both us
and our society… given our daily interactions within society, we see what
those values do during our daily interactions with others… and because this
isn’t rocket science, we can see that the positive values begat the positive
values… love and peace and kindness reap benefits that
are a benefit to us individually and collectively……… love begat’s love
and peace begats peace and hope begats hope and kindness begats kindness…

and we see the negative values damaging us individually and collectively…
hate begats hate and greed begats greed and lust begats lust and fear begats
fear…

so instead of embracing an ism that may or may not promote positive values
we simply embrace those values without an recourse to an ism or an ideology…
we take values such as love and use those to decide on our course
in life… instead of using an ism or an ideology as an road map through
life, we take values such as love and peace and hope and charity to chart
our course through life……….

this is how we avoid the two courses of the religious and the materialism…
we adapt values instead of ism’s and we chart our course through life by
the values we adapt…………not the ism’s or ideologies we accept because
they are in proximity to us and not because of what they might offer us.

now at no point am I saying, this is the values you must accept…
I cannot tell you what values are your values… I can only say,
think about these values… I am promoting certain values but I am not
saying you must choose these values… you can certainly choose other values
or even other ism’s or ideologies… and I can say, there might have been a better
choice then that or those values and those ism’s and ideologies……

I can only lead you to the water… I cannot make you drink…

so what values or ism’s or ideologies are you going to drink?

and as important, is why? why those values and why those ism’s?

Kropotkin

Ok, so we have some understanding of the two systems that
are fighting? for your soul, the materialistic and the religious.

and I think that perhaps the answer lies in a third path, which combines
the two… but that still leaves us some questions…for example,
why do we chase the materialistic vision of human existence?

I gave an possible answer in an earlier post… we chase experiences…
we will travel for thousands of miles to experience a new city or a new
restaurant or a see some new wonder of the world… and this desire for
new experiences, which I suffer from, is a materialistic “disease”…

for to experience things, that is about the body, not the soul…
I have been inside the Notre Dame Cathedral and it was pretty wonderous,
for both the body and soul… but that is part of the materialistic mode,
to chase after and seek new experiences… and that is part of the human
experience to be sure… but that chase after new experiences is, in part,
what has lead us to adapt our materialistic ism’s and ideologies…

how do we hold unto this basic human need of new experiences and still
not feed into the rampant materialism that exists today?

I am not sure there is an answer at this point… but we cannnot allow
our need for experiences to overcome our need to combine body
and soul… we can feed the body and still feed the soul and all the while
have experiences that give our soul/body the fix that the body/soul needs…

Kropotkin

and now we try to properly understand this concept of the here and now
given what I just wrote…….

in the Bhagavad Gita, Arjuna wishes to quit the battlefield because
his relations, uncles and grandfathers and the like are in the opposing
troops and he doesn’t wish to kill them…and the supreme lord, Krsna
is trying to convince Arjuna to go through with the battle… One of the
tactics that Krsna tries is though the idea that the body is temporary,
but the soul is permanent…and if the body is temporary, then its
ok to kill the opposing forces because it really doesn’t matter because
their soul will go on and they will be reborn, reincarnated into other
bodies…it is basically a no-lose situation for the opposing forces
because regardless of what happens, the opposing forces will not suffer…
and if Arjuna fails to go through with it, even if for good reasons, he will suffer
from a loss of the esteem of the opposing forces… thinking Arjuna is a coward type
of thing… but if the body is temporary, who gives a shit what someone thinks about
you… and the second part of the argument that Krsna tries is because the body
will be reincarnated, it doesn’t matter if the opposing forces are killed, they
will be reincarnated… but that is an assumption that we are reincarnated…
the same type of assumption that we somehow go to heaven or hell for that matter,
when we die…

but, if we reject both types of arguments of Krsna, then we can have a third understanding
of this matter…we refuse to fight the battle because all we have is the here and now…
there is no such thing as yesterday, a long gone phantom and there is no such thing
as tomorrow because it hasn’t happened… so we are left with only the here and now…
this moment… and we can infuse this moment with values… values
like love or peace or charity or justice… that is what gives this moment
some value, some importance… yes, we might, might be reincarnated or
be sent to heaven but we can’t be sure… but we can be sure about this very moment,
this very second because we have infused it with love and honor and peace…
by our very actions, we create the value/s of the moment…

Arjuna should have just held onto the moment, not depend upon
some misty eye hopes for yesterday or tomorrow because they
don’t exists… yesterday is just dust in the wind and tomorrow
hasn’t happened… there is nothing else but right now and right here…
and he can say to Krsna, "I will not fight because the right here and right now,
has more value then some suppose vague hope for the future, heaven or being
reborn… and we cannot try to pin our hopes on yesterday because it is a phantom
that has no shape or form…yesterday has no form, it is dispersed particles
that have no shape or form today… I went to work yesterday… and
I stood there for 4 hours… and what exists of that work I did yesterday?
nothing… it was simply actions done in air and is gone with the air…
it has no form, no value, nothing concrete about it… it can’t be touch
or seen or heard or felt or tasted…it has disappeared… and that is all
yesterday is… phantoms in the air…….

and just as tomorrow has nothing… no form, it cannot be touched or felt or
heard or seen or tasted… it isn’t concrete because it never existed…
so how are we to pin our hopes on something that has no form or existence?

we cannot…but we can look at right now and right here…
I can see this very moment and I can hear this very moment, music by
Haydn and I touch this moment by touching the keys of this computer
and I can taste the cookies I am eating and I can smell the rain outside
of my open window…I can give this moment, this very second,
this place a value, by infusing it with values… I am at peace
and at harmony… that is the value I am giving this moment…
you can give your moments your values but I would suggest
your give your moments positive values like peace and hope
and love and justice……….

I can also give this moment anger and hate and fear… but to what end?

what can the negative values offer us at this moment and place?

Hate begats hate and fear begats fear and greed begats greed.

if so, then we can give this moment something besides hate or fear or greed…

we can give it the positive values… we create the moment by inserting
values into the moment… and what values are you infusing into this moment?

Kropotkin

it is easy to seek material goods and material success
and try to gain money, fame, wealth, power… they
are low laying fruit… and easy to attempt…

but what is harder and more satisfying?

attempting to improve one’s soul…

to seek another analogy… in sports,
and I played sport for many years, I always thought
it was about beating the other guy/team… but that isn’t
the value of sports… it is a competetion alright, but
the competetion is inside of you… in track, the 440 isn’t
about beating the other guy, but about improving your time from
a 63 second 440 to a 60 second 440… for their will always be
people faster then you… always, but it is important to seek improvement
even if you finish last in a race, if you improved your time, you
have done what is the point of sports, which is to improve yourself…

who finishes ahead or behind you is irrelevant… what is relevant is
improving your time… that is the point of sports and the point
of life… what does it matter if you finish with a million dollars or
15 dollars? the amount doesn’t matter or how many toys you die with
doesn’t matter… it is the moment that matters because we are transient,
temporary beings… the possessions we buy aren’t going with us
and they only hinder what is of real value which is some improvement
in the here and now…

life is a competition with yourself…
not a competition with others…

don’t fight with the outside world…
engage in your own battles, your own fight,
your own engagement with yourself…
improve your own time regardless of what others are
doing……

for it is only the moment that exists, not yesterday and not
tomorrow… this moment, this here and now…….

the question still exists, “What are the values I should hold?”
and the questions can only be answered within the context
of our engagement within ourselves… we can confirm our
answers with our engagement with the world or we can
discover that our values don’t match this moment, this here and now…
and so we must adapt our values to match the here and now…
sometimes we must engage with the world when we would rather
be engage with our own values and sometimes we can engage within own
our values without any outside interference…

the situation can force us to change or adapt our current understanding
of the world and how we respond to the world……

but in the end, we must return to our engagement with
the here and now… with our own values and what it does it
mean to the questions of existence like “What am I to do?”
or “what should I believe in?” “what should my values be?”

Kropotkin

in thinking about this, I can see why IQ45 has been such a dismal
failure… he is about the unimportant matters of fame, wealth, power…
if he wasn’t born into wealth, he would be living in a trailer park in Nevada
and be part of the MAGA movement because it helps explain why
he would be such a failure… clearly it is the immigrants or the jews or
the brown people or women who have keep him living in poverty
and despair… but the begining of any understanding of our present
situation begins with an understanding that we are responsible for
ourselves…as Abe Lincoln once said, our wrinkles are caused
by our own efforts, our own actions… you cannot blame anyone
else for your current state or your current wrinkles…or any future ones…

fame, wealth, power are transitory, temporary things…
they have no value in our lives…and that has been the message
of the religious since before Jesus… but we don’t have to
make it a message of the religious… we can have values
and a point to our lives without any recourse to a religious
understanding of the world…we can be concerned with our soul
and still not be religious………

it is about finding the third way that should concern us…
somewhere between the materialistic and the religious
exists the third way of being concerned about our soul
and not be religious and not be concerned about
the materialistic world of fame, power, money…
the temporary, the transitory, the insignificant matters of our lives
that mean nothing because they are so transitory………

to find that which is permanent has been the goal of philosophers
and theologians and thinkers and scientist since the beginning of time…
but there is nothing that is permanent, that will last forever…
so we must take the next best course and take what is something
that has value even if it doesn’t last forever, if it isn’t permanent…
and that is an understanding of the Kantian/Kropotkin questions of
“What should I believe in?” and “What should I hope for?”
and “what am I to do?”………

the basic questions of human existence that are created at
the very moment of birth and because they are the basic questions,
they last as long as you breath… for at death, even these basic questions
no longer concern oneself…….for even these basic questions of existence
are, for each individual, transitory, momentary, transient… but these
questions apply to every single human being born, since the beginning of time
to the end of time…so these questions are both permanent and transitory…
and that is a good question… one that is full of contradictions…
and the truth can be found within a contradiction… between good and evil,
between right and wrong, between night and day…

Kropotkin