Schalt: I feel it is essential that as we talk of development and higher structures we also include references to lower structures, because they still operate and have to be acknowledged.

Right, I have found this really helpful. It's also a really fun discussion. I'm going to be thinking Magenta for weeks! :)

 

For starters, the art of kuntu is the art of selecting and defining the very terms or form of the debate, regardless of the content. There is a very healthy art to this that I think used to be common knowledge. My father still exhibits it. When you talk with him, he'll give you this look if you start to go off on a topic, regardless of the content, that violates the kuntu.

I get that! I can see him doing it and know just what you mean. I think it's just a "sense," meaning the Divine Intelligence in us, and some people are closer to it than others. People with a lot of pathology or certain kinds of it begin to lose touch with it. It's priceless to have someone like that who can transmit it to you.

 

For practical purposes, it is impossible to get anywhere with most people talking about a Bantu concept! It lacks legitimacy. But doesn't it seem like the most effective translation would be something like "mood?" How to invoke and build the healthiest and most appropriate moods for a given environment and situation?

Yes, that's perfect. We might talk about it as "the flow" or something as well.

The whole Monica-gate episode was a big revelation of where classical red stands. The White House is the man's home. He wasn't in a public restroom at an airport in Minnesota. His wife is not meeting him at the time where he needs to be met. A decent young lady is willing to "dance" with him in private.

Yes, and the right-wing conspiracy ran with it. I suppose there's blame to be spread around, but I find particular fault with the press, who weren't able to call Ken Starr on an obviously politically motivated witch hunt. I believe I also find fault with Janet Reno for allowing to Ken Starr to investigate Monica. Starr said he wanted to investigate Monica to establish a "pattern of covering up"--but what would that prove about what they did at Whitewater? Nothing! Now you would know a lot more about that than I . . .

By the way, what do bow ties tell you about a person's kuntu? You see conservatives wearing bow ties. They're about the only ones. I was also thinking about Monica's dress and women's jewelry and such, but I haven't gotten anything too concrete about that.

I'll bet Bubba extended more love to Monica in 5 minutes than Ken Starr has extended to the whole of humanity in his entire life.

Right! I am sure. Bubba has a way with the women, for sure. He probably thinks it's a damn rip off he can't just fool around all the time like JFK.

It's also something that Green--it was probably basically a Green moment for Bubba, with the obvious Infrared, biological urge, and perhaps a bit of Red, who knows, after all he was the President and she and intern, though she seems to have been the seductress. Anyway, this is just a weakness with Green--Jesse Jackson had an affair, Bubba had an affair. With integral they will start to appreciate the Amber codes of fidelity more. It was perhaps Bubba's lack of integralness (though he surely had a touch of it) that brought down his presidency. However, from a 4-quadrant perspective, we would also have to add his Bubba-caliber sex drive (UR), the stress he was getting in the LL from all the coneservatives who hated them so much and were investigating them, and what else? Maybe Monica's desperation in an unforgiving capitalist system (LR), where a woman might be tempted to, um, suck up to her boss.  :)

 

And conversely, many people like to try and find how the sexual urge can serve as the root of high cosmology. Tantra and the like. I personally feel that the healthy approach is to just see it as an invitation to play with kuntu without making a big deal of it or even trying to explain it. It should be a simple and slightly irrelevant act.

That sounds like a really healthy approach. Rather than get obsessed with it in some big Tantra--if you get obsessed with sex as a spiritual practice, how spiritual is it, really? What stage are you dwelling on really?

 

There is no denying, that at every level there are ways to attract and manifest strength. And strength is simply healthy. A lack of strength is essentially a failure to live in alignment with the guiding a priori principles that govern any endeavor, isn't it?

It can be, but I think we have to be open to the possibility that genetics, for example, could be involved. This could be no fault of the person, really. They could be aligning themselves as best they can, perhaps even better than people with better genetics who appear to have more strength. But I think you're basically right.

 

We live in a society where is it shameful to talk of strength. And yet we are all strong. Our ability to even read and write is a function of strength and obedience to principles of growth. And our entire mission is to grow stronger so that we can manifest the higher and more integrated vision that is not optional to begin with.

That's a really interesting insight.

 

I think of being in a river. You can talk about whether you should be there or whether you are really there at all, but it is hard to deny that you are thrashing around getting wet bobbing up and down and the greatest intelligence seems to be to simply admit that that is where you are and to start enjoying the act of paddling downstream and trying not to bash your head on rocks.

This is my favorite metaphor, too!

 

So, force, spirit, momentum, catalyzation, economy of movement, freedom from friction, mojo, kuntu - whatever you want to call it, seems to operate at every level in increasingly refined ways. An enormously valuable revolution would be to commit to the empowerment of every human being.

I think that's excellent. So many people are sacrificed. That's one of my pet peeves, really, the sacrifice--happens in almost any group.

 

Yes, there are many people who live their lives day to day without a sense that things make sense or that there is a Principal operating that makes tomorrow meaningful. Kind and decent godless people! They know that in the end there will 10,000 lost golf balls as their legacy and they might as well try and retrieve a few of them now. 

Hahahahahhahaha! I will have to remember that one.

One of the most shocking realizations for me is that the summum bonum is not to intellectually understand the Principle. That is an important launching point for me. For example, the rational understanding of how a non-dual state fits in with a waking or dreaming state is not a live exemplar of a non-dual state. 

Right, that's a hard one to get. Our conditioning to have to know something, to grasp it with the mind, is so strong. And the morphogenetic grooves above that, in non grasping, are so shallow.

Honestly, it occurs to me that if Jimmy Carter got a crash course of Integral, spent about 6 months in the gym, put on a leather jacket and came out fighting, he could be President again! "Tan, Rested, and Ready to Give 'Em Hell  - Vote 4 JC in 2012!"

I think you're right. I think he was probably held back by the LL COG. He's done great work as an ex president though, the trip to see Hamas notwithstanding.

 

Doesn't it say something powerful about the realities of kuntu when a guy like Arnold can win the governorship of what is probably the most collectively evolved state in our country?   

That's interesting. I never thought of it that way. But I suppose it does. Of course, they also the value the look of bodies especially highly there.

It was really interesting to hear that stuff about the navy and your time in it.

In the late 90's, the U.S. Navy was starting to get friendly with China. I was on USS GERMANTOWN at the time and we made a port call in northern China together with USS MCCAIN, named after John's grandfather. A group of us from GERMANTOWN went on a tour of the Forbidden City in Beijing. We are standing outside the massive entrance, the place where Mao proclaimed the establishment of the PRC back in 1949. About as holy of a site as you will find in communist China.

We are getting ready to walk inside the compound, under the huge rostrum where Mao's picture is hanging when someone says, "my God." We look up, and a group of guys from MCCAIN have snuck up onto the rostrum about 60 feet in the air and have unfurled this huge banner that says "USS MCCAIN"!

This is an amazing story! I find that so incredible. It reminds me of that native american ritual where the braves would line up on their horses facing another line and then ride across and try to steal a feather from a guy's head or something. But occassionally it got violent and someone was killed. I can't remember what it's called. That's an awesome kuntu symbol example, too.

Excellent point. Unhealthy green women are incredible bitches and green men have to be so careful to act gentle around them. And the more gentle the men act, the bitchier the women become until there is a big blow-out and everyone goes off to sulk.

David Deida would probably say that when the Green men get too gentle they activate the masculine in the women.

Cheney . . . his mechanical heart says it all. He is a robot with software programmed by a cowboy.

Hahahahaha.

This is a very fascinating and important kuntu-type organizing principle in the Japanese world. The subject is "Hara." The best book on the subject was written by a guy named Durckheim. You must read it!

I will check it out. The story about the Japanese courtroom is amazing--meditation!

I think you're so right about Hillary's Hara. She has taken so much abuse and her mind is still working well and she's still smiling and her voice is still booming. Quite a performance. After her win in Indiana, the forces are all descending and trying to push her out; in one big push they are trying to put an end to her, for different reasons, some for Obama, others for McCain. Well, she gave it a hell of a good fight. And she's not dead yet. Well see if the superdelegates want to go for Obama, though. I heard one say that he isn't going to vote until the convention. He must want Gore. Some others might thumb their noses at Howard Dean as well and not vote until the convention. That would be interesting! I'm looking forward to the primary in Puerto Rico, myself. 2,000,000 voters likely to come out. I hope it still means something at that point.

 

mm

 

PS. You're from Seattle! What part? I lived there for a few years, in Capitol Hill. I really liked it. I'd love to move back some day.

hi schalk,

for better or worse, the car, with all its speed and power, as well as freedom, has been a symbol of our way of life for some time now, hasn't it? something that needs to change, but how do we go about it? attacking it (mean green) is not going to help.

and in the short run, if hillary could have ridden that car to, say, a double digit win in indiana, the home of the indianapolis 500, then it was the thing to do, most people would agree. of course, it didn't work, but i have to admit i thought it was worth a try when i first read about it.

i understand your skepticism, but i like the effort she has been making to connect with voters. i think she has learned alot in the process that will stand her in good stead, whatever she ends up doing subsequent to this campaign.

it sounds like we're mostly agreed about local/global interplay. there's something i especially want to recommend in this regard, from the e.coast, the modern museum of art: the may 7th interview of paola antonelli about 'design and the elastic mind' on charlierose.com. i know you take umbrage at this notion, but i think she's another example of someone who is really intuiting integral. btw, somehow the 747 got into the discussion.

---

Ralph:

Thank you. 

About the whole Indy and NASCAR phenemenon, I can only suggest that it is like going to Sudan in your Ford F-150 and having a big tailgate party with BBQ ribs, cold beer, dogs, and loud music ... at a refugee camp. Yes, you could do it, but it is disgusting and wrong. It is flat out immoral.

I would have respected Hillary a lot more if she had showed the courage to go to the Racetrack and say, "Hey, people. Wake up! Act locally. Take responsibility. Dismantle a culture when that culture symbolizes something very wrong. Which is gratuitously burning large amounts of gasoline and creating models for our youth to find inspiration in burning up gasoline all for the purpose of entertainment."

Ralph, would you have a problem if I created a sport whereby the contestants try to blow up 50 gallon drums of gasoline with shoulder-mounted rocket launchers while riding on motorcycles? What if it was legal to do it in Idaho? What if I attracted crowds of people and many jobs were created? Would you say "to each his own?"

We are ready for our politicians to start acting courageously and speaking the truth. The truth about what is good, and true, and beautiful. Even if it pisses people off. Better to lose an election and strike a chord of truth, justice, and beauty, than to win an election based on falsehood, unfairness, and ugliness.

You say it is a "mean green" act to "attack" NASCAR? Negative Ralph! Negative ghost-rider!

I send all of my love to the drivers and their crews. And I will then tell them to get the hell out of their cars, stop encouraging a culture of gratuitous waste of resources, and start contributing to the future of humanity.

You are really missing the point of what green pluralism is about, and especially what Wilber calls "the mean green meme", if you think that attacking NASCAR is a "mean green act."

Attacking NASCAR because it does not accomodate blind drivers is a mean green act. Attacking it because it is an immoral activitity at this stage in the planet's development is not mean green.  

Ralph, when I take a moral stance, even at the risk of angering the good people of Darlington and Talladega, that NASCAR is wrong because it is gratuitously polluting the environment and promoting the notion that this is a fun activity, this is enormously different than when EARTH FIRST sends out a squad of mean green activists from Eugene to blow up a tractor somewhere because the tractor is operated by business interests that think that man is superior to snails. Do you see this Ralph? Please, tell me something that indicates you get this distinction.    

How do, Ralph:

Check this item out.

"Revolution is in the air, as the Swiss Government's Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology concludes that plants have rights, and we have to treat them appropriately. A majority of the panel concluded that "living organisms should be considered morally for their own sake because they are alive."

 http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/05/bill-of-rights-for-plants.php

Is this a classic example of flatland confusion?

As an attorney, I will of course be interested in making a compelling case about the pain and suffering each plant endures as I file suits on their behalf. Because, in the law, it is meaningless to speak of rights without a corresponding remedy for violation of the same.

Are there any experts I can call on with specialized knowledge in the pain and suffering of particular plants? I know that my fir tree is highly distressed when I mow the lawn, while my magnolia is quite content... Sounds like a budding field of exertise, eh?

And of course, I will manage the trust fund holding their recovered awards.

 

schalk:

Better to lose an election and strike a chord of truth, justice, and beauty, than to win an election based on falsehood, unfairness, and ugliness.

of course, i agree--almost anyone would. the rub is in interpreting what constitutes 'falsehood, unfairness and ugliness'. i just heard a commentator from NBC claiming, basically, that obama, knowing about bill clinton's famous temper, has succeeded in getting his goat at crucial points in the campaign, e.g. south carolina. i wonder if he actually means the obama campaign as a whole, and not just obama himself. one way or the other, his claim makes sense to me, and just underscores how bill has been sort of an achilles heel for the clinton campaign.

was that unfair or ugly of the obama campaign to do that? if they hadn't done it, wouldn't h. clinton be sitting in the driver's seat now, with the transmission in overD? and isn't this par for any campaign that is seriously bent on winning? so, is it better to lose than to resort to such tactics?

that's a tough question in my view. i think obama has succeeded in making the coming presidency his to win or lose, but we would agree, i imagine, that his way of getting there may (i guess you'd say has and will) impair what he'll actually be able to do once he gets there. i guess where we part ways is i'm willing to accept that, if that's the best that's possible at this time, i.e. it serves no purpose, imo, to label something unfair, if everyone in the game is, then, being unfair, unless you want to do away with the game altogether. mugabe would go for that!

i'm no fan of racing myself. i've watched them go a lap or two and asked whoever was available 'is this going to go on for another 3 hours?' if you see one lap, haven't you seen, if not all, at least most of them?

i think we're more or less in agreement that, generally speaking, this could only appeal to someone who's altitude is less than green. even if we succeeded in outlawing racing, he, or she, is going to remain a racing fan at heart, unless they somehow move further up the spiral, so that's what we need to work for, imo. short of that, i think attacks on NASCAR, while nothing like EARTH FIRST, are only going to be destructive, and aren't going to do anyone really any good.

---

Ralph:

I know you are always game for a good dialogue, so let me challenge you on this one:

let's say that the Daytona 500 has just finished, and every spectator at the race is now sitting in an air-conditioned auditorium outside of the raceway, no one is drunk or stoned (hypothetically), and you have center stage for a 20 minute monologue to tell them whatever you can tell them that would lead to the greatest possibility of advancing the greatest number of them the greatest distance up the spiral. They have to listen to you for the whole 20 minutes.  

What would your basic message be? What is the Word?

By the way, you're right, the rub is always in the interpretation. My sport is your gratuitous waste of resources, isn't it?

My mantra has been that we all may have a duty to do more to let the politicians know that we won't tolerate their playing the game the way it has been played. How to bring that about? By not rewarding those who play the game dirty. By pointing out who is playing the game dirty. By rewarding those who opt to act in ways that may hurt their own interests but that display integrity.

To a great extent, I feel that we have been let down by the mainstream media. They have the voice to frame the issues and reward the integrated and to expose the dirty games, and yet they coast. I have not heard one truly passionate position taken by the mainstream media this entire campaign season. In their jaded tactical mentality, it has all been about the game and the machinations and who is up today. Where are the commentators who will voice the courageous message? Where are they?

The fact is, they know we don't want to hear it. They give us what we want to hear. Those who will listen to political news want to hear about the ploys, and the digs, and the getting the goat, and the spin. Like master tacticians appreciating the skill of other masters.  

Yes, Ralph, we get exactly what we collectively want and deserve, don't you think?

Schalt in Red; MM in brown; previous MM in Green

 

I have found that in really healthy families, the group is very respectful of mood and from the outside things can actually look boring, because people are sacrificing their momentary impulses which might disrupt a deeper mood. In the old days, people were much more sensitive to mood.

This is so useful. It's as if the mood is more apparent than rationality, for example. The mood is more important not because it's higher but because it's more fundamental. It needs to be honored. Not to honor the mood would be like not feeding the body.

Yes, I think you're right about tolerating too much. When I was growing up, our Catholic neighbors would turn off the television during commercials. I wonder how many families still do something like that. I wonder if that family still does it.

Yes, that's perfect. We might talk about it as "the flow" or something as well.

To even feel it or be aware of it, you have to have your heart open, don't you? You can't just be thinking about things. It might not be the heart, but some organ of discrimination that we have. Any thoughts on this? What is this organ that senses mood or flow?

This is interesting. I think we'd have to say the brain is essential first of all, of course, and the heart--in the oriental systems they say mind/heart, and that makes sense to me. But when I was living in Seattle I saw a Chi Gong master named Guan Cheng Sun, and he talked about "the body's information system." So I wonder if for each thing going on in the brain there is a correlate in the body. Probably we need to use everything, I would think, be aware of everything. That said, perhaps at the deeper levels it is the deep heart, or the deep heart/mind.

Also, Ken writes in TOE, I believe, that it is Turquoise that is aware of flow states. That's not to say that people in lower structures couldn't be very attuned to the flow, just that they wouldn't really be doing it so consciously. It would just be in their healthy nature to go with that mood or flow. Then later, with Turquoise perhaps, one could do it consciously and stay with it when we have impulses to go other ways. Each structure, of course, will lose the flow after a certain point--it will say, "No!" It may be in the flow for the Chinese government to be nicer to Tibetans; people may protest, but the Chinese government can't go there. They may go with the flow beautifully up to a point, say Red or Amber, starting into Orange perhaps, but Green? Respect the Tibetans? "No!" And so they lose it at that point and things grind to a halt; there is conflict.

Well, let me get poetic for a second. A tie is a phallus. A white shirt represents a pure soul and a bright red tie says "we are fundamentally pure but right now we are all stoked and ready to deliver some heat," right? So a bow tie says, "I am willing to tie my penis in a knot so that the juice does not flow. Clamp me off in service of the machine. Remember the astronauts of the early 60s? They submitted to the machine (as did most everyone else) buy having their unruly mane chopped into a "crew" cut. So they are part of the crew, right? The team. But then, they put on bow ties that said, "whatever juices are flowing are flowing cranially only. The animal in me has been clamped off."

At first I thought this was really funny, but then I realized it was also true! Those Amber conservatives have tied up their Red sex drives! They've tied it up for their Amber religion.

Another big kuntu symbol comes to mind--the cross. Of course people may well mean Christianity by it, even integral Christianity or such, but the symbol is still fulfilling some Magenta function, right? Tattoos are another that come to mind. Motorcycle gang jackets.

Soooo, just the thought of Bubba's seed in the carpets got many an amber and red landlord in America all fired up. Impeachment was an action to evict. I mean, who can really deny the possibility that right now, somewhere in the White House there is the seed of Bubba in some crack somewhere, right? Or three, or seven. In fact, do you think he has it in him to do it deliberately, the way a dog might deal with a fire hydrant? Honestly. Just from a purely evidentiary standpoint?

Actually, come to think of it, he did it on her dress, didn't he?!!!

Probably under the portrait of Abe Lincoln, on the oval office desk, Air Force One, Camp David--I'm sure the list goes on and on.  :)

By the way, did you see him behind Hillary in Indiana after the loss in NC? They had had him down there working all the small towns, just like in SC--what does it mean that Hillary's campaign took a big turn for the worse after Bubba's remarks in SC (though don't think this was fair or justified--I think the Obama campaign, in the single dirtiest and most effective maneuver of the campaign, played the race card on him unjustifiably but did manage to turn the African American population against them and in there favor for good) and that it perhaps came to an end in NC, where Bubba again tried to make the difference? He gave it everything he had, though, for sure. Frankly, I think it's too bad he couldn't run again himself. He'd do twice as good a job if he started again now. He'd have the energy for it, too. They oughta just make them take a term or two off and then make them eligable again.

So, who's got the bigger kuntu, McCain or Obama? If it were McCain 2000, I don't think there would be a question that it would be him. Now I'm not so sure. But I still think he has a lot in him. Hillary did weaken Obama--but him prevailing does help him. Rev. Wright hurt him seriously. At this point it's hard to see Obama winning the electoral college. I have heard people talk about some map including wins in Virginia and Colorado--I suppose it's possible and that things change, but McCain is the one Republican who could beat a Democrat in this election, and with Obama having not only failed to appeal to but having alienated Reagan Democrats, I think he is a good chance.

The Orient has the healthiest perspective on sex. They tie the act in with healthy bodily functions and also admit of its more delicate human side. But it generally is not an obsession. Ever read any of Mantak Chia's materials? A very good introduction to that perspective on sex.

Yes, actually I have one book, purchased within the last year. I found it--Taoist Secrets of Love. I haven't read it thoroughly, though, just picked at it a bit. But I've found it really helpful. Are there any others you recommend or parts of this one? I also have The Way of The Superior Man by David Deida, which is also good.

Yeah, you are right about genes. And that is exactly the reason why, if you are woman, you want the healthiest most prime seed you can get in the oven. I have seen this over and over, women ultimately selecting a man the way a rancher selects a stud. They will sacrifice love for good genes. The really exquisite marriages come about later in life when the partners select each other for companionship and even cognitive, aesthetic, moral or spiritual resonance, without concern for off-spring.

That's really interesting. I'm sure you're right about that. It's really interesting to me because our behavior so often is being dictated by things we're not aware of. We may think we're making conscious decisions, and tell ourselves we made this choice because of this and this, but it might be something totally different. Nice to hear that about exquisite marriages later in life--there's still hope! :)

Much of our fashion and grooming habits are designed to suggest our seed is more genetically valuable than it may be, right?

Yes, or to suggest that other things are really more important.

Hey, it is going downstream whether we like it or not, right?

Right, even jumping off the cliff probably doesn't get you out of the stream.

 

How many people have been shamed or ignored over the years because they did not have a high cognitive line as demonstrated on a "test" while they had other lines with exquisite altitude that no one even noticed or cared about. It is really encapsulated in the phrase, "I'm no rocket scientist, but ..." Well, good, because many rocket scientists are immoral, blind to beauty, dead emotionally, etc.

Right, I think that goes back to what you said about empowering each person. Only certain types excel the way things are set up, and certain lines are valued way more highly than others. There could be a great artist, for example, who experiences all kinds of stress, to the point of illness, moving through such a system.

"And the wind shall say: Here were decent godless people. Their only monument the asphalt road. And a thousand lost golf balls."

I appreciate that; I'm into poetry--from a play; I hadn't heard of that.

I saw Cats once, though.

Yes, you are right. Just from a simple engineering perspective, the morphogenetic grooves are really shallow. It is hard to get into the "groove" in the first place and when you are there it is easy to fall out of the trough too, right? Whereas intellectual apprehension is like rafting throught the Grand Canyon. You can close your eyes and never fall out of the canyon.

Yes, with regard to the higher stages it's a little like learning Chinese in Iowa--hardly anyone around to listen to or talk to in Chinese.

So the act of intruding or inserting anything in society (a law, an idea, a custom, an artifact) becomes associated with the use of a rod. And green men have tried as hard as anyone to not use their "rod" cognitively, sexually, emotionally, or any other line you want to talk about, out of pluralistic concerns for equality and fairness. And green women sometimes are begging for a rod while the green men are tippytoeing around trying to talk about it or be gentle about it. The whole while the animal inside is screaming "RUT RUT!" Frustration.

Right, and then you find yourself in integral and begin to penetrate, but guess what? Everyone else is Green, and they think you're Red for doing it.

If we were to do a chart of his line development, if would be cognitive off the charts, and everything else really stunted. That is my sense.

Yes, I agree. I don't think he's got Orange ethics down well. I was glad he was there after 9/1l, though. I thought he might go too far, might do a few things wrong, but he wouldn't do too little. He would take care of things, and I think he did. Most of the time I complain about him, though. Have you seen the Frontline documentaries about him and Bush?

 I'll bet he has a horrid sense of aesthetics.  

Hahahaha! That really made me laugh. I think it could be truly horrid.

I was really struck by just how powerful that enormous fountain is - it is, what, 250 feet in diameter and it shoots water easily 100 feet in the area and right down the pathway bordered by fir trees behind the fountain you can see 75 miles to the south Mt. Rainier like the awesome primordial home of the gods it is.

Yes, it's a beautiful place. I think the Olympic peninsula is one of the coolest places anywhere, too.

(By the way, do you give credence to the notion of negative ions impacting health or well-being? I have a couple of negative ion generators in the house. I have often thought that you could sell a lot of these little devices in Mexico City. Ever been there? The air is choked with positive ions. Just not good.) 

I actually got a lightbox with one of those things, but the ion generator never worked. Or at least the light indicating that it wasn't working never worked, or blinked once or twice in the beginning. But I really wanted that feature. I neglected to send it back and have it fixed, though. Have you found those helpful? Can you recommend a brand? I really think I might need one. I live in a 15 story apartment building.

Why do we not even try to do that anymore? Hardly ever do you see exquisite choices made in public structures. I mean, just a big beautiful fountain alone can make an enormous difference in a community. What is holding us back? My sense is that the people who ultimately make the decisions, the City Councils, etc. lack the courage or even the awareness to step up and do it. Are we afraid of ushering in the twilight of our civilization? A kind of superstitition that after flowering comes decay and death? What is going on?

Art is undervalued. It's all about the bottom line. And the lousy feng shui messes us up. In Chicago there is the beautiful Wrigley building, but going up right next to it right now is theTrump Tower. And the Trump Tower is going to be a monster. It's not that it's totally awful; there have been worse buildings, but standing next to the Wrigley it . . . seems kind of sacriligious.

 

 mm

 

 

schalk,

you know how hillary would, at least recently, answer you: 'I don't deal in hypotheticals. I'm working hard for the American people, so, frankly, i don't have any time for that."

not a bad answer, imo, but i'll try to give you one more to your liking. there's a general rule in these situations, which i'm working on, to first identify with your audience--let them know you understand them (in that bit i heard last night they joked about going to bill clinton and telling him how they felt his pain).

so it would probably be good, say, to praise some of the courageous driving they saw that day, even if we felt personally it was insane. for this to come across as authentic, we would really have to tap into red/amber courage, and, paradoxically, once we get beyond amber, the higher our altitude, the better we can do this, the better we actually get what it is to be red and amber.

then, we would want to link this lower level courage to some higher version, but not too high. it would have to be at a level that they can, indeed, attain during a good moment. i'll leave it to your imagination what that might be, and what sort of message we could craft for that level. at any rate, they would get no better than what they deserve.

---

MM in brown; S re-direct in green:

"...in the oriental systems they say mind/heart."

Yes, in Chinese, the word for "mind" (xin or hsin) means "heart." "Brain" means "brain." It may seem trivial or quaint, but to have the heart center open and tied in with cognition makes a huge difference. All the way back to Confucius the emphasis has been on following the rules of "li" or "how things really work" and the only way to even sense "li" is to activate "xin" or "heart" when using what we call the "mind."

Xin will never confuse or violate a mood. The brain operating in full force with the heart closed does it all the time in massively intrusive ways.  

Another big kuntu symbol comes to mind--the cross. Of course people may well mean Christianity by it, even integral Christianity or such, but the symbol is still fulfilling some Magenta function, right? Tattoos are another that come to mind.

I have never figured out tattoos. I have never felt so strong about a design that I was willing to embed it in my skin forever.

I remember starting to see preppy guys wearing short white socks with their Docksiders so you could see the tattoos on their ankles. But when it comes time to interview with Goldman Sachs, those tattoos are gone. Back to George Schultz and the Princeton Tiger on his buttock. Left or right, can't recall. Weekend warriors.

My visceral reaction to tattoos is they drive kuntu away. I think you can do a better job of attracting whatever kuntu you are seeking by wearing a leather jacket with the same designs colorfully stitched in.

I knew a guy in high school who was deeply in love with a girl and had her initials tattooed on the back of his hand. This freaked her out and she dumped him.

My favorite tattoo is just a big heart with an arrow through it and the word "Mom." How can you go wrong with this one? After all, at a fundamental level, my body is in all actuality ... my mother's body! Literally.

At this point it's hard to see Obama winning the electoral college.

Yeah, I took the position long ago that McCain is going to win hugely in November. Honestly, I don't really care. I could live in an Obama America. Not much about my ILP or life will change.

But I am trying hard to envision white voters across the land, and especially those older than 30 years old with jobs and some semblance of "buy-in" to law and order and tradition, am trying to envision them voting for a black man who has some undefined connection, through his name if nothing else, to the Muslim world. For some it will be subtle racism, but for most it will simply be a sense of McCain representing the most stable and responsible meme for America.

It's not coincidence is it that Sharpton is now on the ropes, as was Wesley Snipes recently, for tax evasion?

Whatever rainbow gusts of kuntu Obama has are turning faint as people remember that for magenta (the Wrights and Sharptons and Farrakhans and others who are in the Obama world to some degree), they are not even red enough to love their country, to say nothing of orange enough to be motivated by a healthy recognition that each person has a flat out duty to scrupulously follow the law. Law is important big Al! Hey, I am paying the costs of having FBI agents try to untangle your tax fraud crimes! You think Al cares about that? Magenta kuntu is a world of base power, and in its playful moments it loves to play hide and seek with what seems to be dry and non-vital realities such as orange. It forgets, or never knew, that orange citizens can also play the game of tax evasion, but we decline to, and then the taxes we pay are applied to pay the wages of the enforcement organs of the government who have to try and track down the truth. Sharpton had some credibility at some point, but he is a dead duck now. Harlem is the only place he will be loved hereinafter.

There will be a lot of cheering and a lot of big names on the avant garde (Graydon Carter of Vanity Fair, Hollywood stars, and everyone involved in green) who will scream as loud as they can that we need Obama now. And in November, you will find that America punches McCain chad in an overwhelming way.

I am pretty familiar with the Hispanic world by the way. You know, the Hispanics in Chicago are not exactly chums with the world of Rev. Wright and Obama in Chicago. And Hispanics in the SW and Colorado share many of the same visions as McCain.

One of the things that is overlooked about our Marine Corps is that there are two predominant groups that lead that community. White guys who grew up shooting guns and Hispanics. To put it bluntly. You would be surprised at home many Hispanics excel in the Marine Corps. They love that shit. The dress uniform, the sword, the rifle, the press of the trousers, the shine of the shoes. It is built for their kuntu.

And the Hispanics in particular are doing very nicely with the war in Iraq. The terrain is familiar to them, the "opponent" does not look so different from them (where most white Americans can be frightened of Arab extremists, the Hispanic Marine sees him as a "pussy rag head" from the same family. It is the same kind of visceral contempt that an IrishAmerican from Boston might feel when he goes back to County Mayo and sees how hicky and stupid they act. The Hispanic Marine knows that this running dog across the street shares the same genes as him, inasmuch as a Hispanic has some roots in Moorish Spain to some degree which of course traces back to Arab lands. Here brother, get some of this!)

So to put in bluntly, the Hispanic community is our biggest strength in the war on terror in Arab lands. They are racking up medals and huge kuntu. While the white boy and the black guy are doing their tour and getting out, the Hispanic Marine is saying, "simon! send me back." I mean, patrolling the streets of Baghdad is not so different in mood from doing battle in Laredo. "Death before dishonor" is a real value in that community.

So, to sum it up the Hispanics generally, as a community, are gaining kuntu from their leadership in the war and they want it to continue, they don't really cozy up to the Al Sharpton kind of mojo that Obama still has an odor of, and they will go McCain in droves, just as will a lot more whites that people can fathom.

So, who are these quiet voters that are going to give the electoral college votes to Obama? Or to put it another way, almost everyone who will vote Obama has already stood up and been heard. There are no quiet Obama supporters out there. There are hordes of McCain supporters out there. They don't support McCain so much in particular, as they support sanity and stability. They go to work on Monday, don't follow politics too much, and already know how they are going to vote.

It is the same principle that caused Obama to win 90% of the blacks in NC, just operating in reverse, right?  

That's really interesting. I'm sure you're right about that. It's really interesting to me because our behavior so often is being dictated by things we're not aware of. We may think we're making conscious decisions, and tell ourselves we made this choice because of this and this, but it might be something totally different.

I feel that there should be a course in "Man as Animal" in our high schools. Just explicitly teaching our youth to what extent we are animals. Of course, you have to run in by the Christian fundamentalist crowd in the community. That's a non-starter, right?

I actually got a lightbox with one of those things, but the ion generator never worked. Or at least the light indicating that it wasn't working never worked, or blinked once or twice in the beginning. But I really wanted that feature. I neglected to send it back and have it fixed, though. Have you found those helpful? Can you recommend a brand? I really think I might need one. I live in a 15 story apartment building.

I think the electronics of a negative ion generator are really simple. Put up a sheet of paper or something on the wall behind the generator and a month later you will find a layer of dust and sediment that has been pulled against the wall. I have no brand recommendations, just a simple device does the trick. A little fountain with splashing water contributes to this too.

Art is undervalued. It's all about the bottom line. And the lousy feng shui messes us up. In Chicago there is the beautiful Wrigley building, but going up right next to it right now is theTrump Tower. And the Trump Tower is going to be a monster. It's not that it's totally awful; there have been worse buildings, but standing next to the Wrigley it . . . seems kind of sacriligious.

I don't like skyscrapers. They are frightening. They loom. In our primate brain, there is a place that is vigilant for large looming things up in the sky.

They violate our visceral notion of how steady something is, even though they are bolted deep into the earth. Such a structure should not be standing.

This is why the old cities of Europe are so restorative and feel so healthy. The skyline is defined at 3 or 4 stories. It feels human and supportive.

Thank God for magenta superstitions about not building any structure taller than the church!