Yesterday saw the closing of another Olympics games and yet again new human boundaries having been established in our quest for something…..? I had to think about what the quest is really for….? That was quite profound, as years ago I knew clearly what the quest was for but today it’s not so clear? It was a quest for excellence of human ability, largely physical ability in the field of organised Sports, but maybe it’s now about a ‘con-quest’.
Beyond the conquests, the Olympics stood for a ‘place and time’ where ‘all’ the nations of the world put aside their differences, gathering together in a one-ness of humanity for the purpose of ‘friendly competition’. Competition, where the top priority was the camaraderie of sports-person-ship and celebrating the wonder of human capability and participation, whether winner, loser or supporter.
I was brought up in a highly competitive sporting family, and this ethic was ingrained in us at a young age, and I took a strong competitive spirit with me into most aspects of my life. With this went a ‘conquest mind’, and the only journey was honing ‘the journey’ to compete and conquer: Whether that was business, sport or climbing the ‘Good Life’ ladder aspiring for its apex of the Elite High Life.
Around the age of 39, something changed for me, my soul was screaming out loud that this wasn’t a journey at all, this was an imprisoned ‘rail track’ to an illusionary destination. A destination, that was someone else’s ‘statue of success’, and needed their “common sense” belief and values, not my own, to ‘get there’!
At the end of my last Post I pointed to Bertrand Russell’s quote:
“The man (woman?) who has no tincture of philosophy? The ineffective person who just goes through life imprisoned in the prejudices derived from common sense, from habitual beliefs of his age or his nation, and from convictions which have grown up in his (her) mind without the cooperation or consent of deliberate reason.” As Russell concludes that this is a life of ‘Horror’ as one is following ‘somebody’ else’s belief of what life is about….…..
Twenty years later I look back at my 39 year old picture and see that the ‘tincture of philosophy’ and the ability to see beyond the “common sense” and “the habitual” has freed me from a ‘the Horror’, of living a life ‘according to someone else’ that Bertrand Russell describes!
In my last post I also pointed to the New York Times article entitled “Is our Country as Good as Our Athletes are? “ I’m assuming you have read it, but if not you can get the gist of it here.
As I read this article, I could not help concluding that the author is in his ‘Horror life’ with beliefs and values attached to The System’s statue of success… OR that he is consciously part of that same System, and living the Good Life manipulating and masking its ‘Life of Horrors’ from others? If it was the former wondered if he is not in desperate need of a serious dose of Bertrand Russell’s ‘tincture of philosophy’ and a challenge of his beliefs…..??!!
Maybe this is what ‘America’ is struggling with at the moment: The elite and those whose very identity is linked, and dependant on The System, being so blinded by its pervasive power, refusing to open their eyes and see that The Nation’s statue for Success has long run its useful day????
In this article, by a highly respected, intelligent, and clearly loyal, New York Times journalist, he points to a ‘Success’ which I see is at the very core of the World, and USA problems today:
It’s a ‘success’ that is founded on ruthless competition, domination by brute force and numbers; An almost exclusive rational orientation, void of any spiritual context, locked onto a co-dependant, economic and consumerism, success; A focus on the conquest of being Number One on all its many conquest ‘medal’ seeking fronts.
Connecting with my ‘little Howard story’ above, this reminds me so much of the ‘journey-less journey’ to winning and conquering, orientation that I was on up to age 39, and the many tinctures of philosophy I have eagerly taken in between!! (See Journey to The Truths)
The author talks about the Olympic medals as being the measure of a nation’s success, and gloats on America’s hoard of ‘medal’s Success’! Probably knowing that ‘tall poppy’ gloating, based only on force of numbers, isn’t a good advert for real success, he then casually points to another measure of success: A nation by nation, ‘per capita’ medal measure of success and fleetingly admits that on that score ‘other nations’ are ahead of America!
Maybe the most celebrated nation at the Olympics should be the one whose ‘per capita’ medal haul, is the highest? Maybe it should not even just be about ‘medal hauls’?
Interestingly the UK has a ‘per capita’ medal haul almost three times higher than that of the USA,. Australia nearly four times, and New Zealand and an amazing ten times higher that of the USA!!
Not wanting to dwell on this ‘inconvenient truth’ and its implications, the author then conveniently diversifies his analysis to the evidence of ‘more’ ‘American domination’ success:
Seemingly proud that the nation is “the world’s leading energy producer…”! Hmmm, yes it is also one of the leading ‘per capita’ ecological footprint nations nearly five times higher than the global average!!
If the whole world lived like just an ‘average American’ we would need nearly FIVE planets! This is serious leadership, where one would think a huge population with technology leadership traits would be able to be leading the world as the lowest footprint nation of The Developed World! So yeah no wonder it sees energy as being important to feed its insatiable need for energy to stay be leader of the Footprint ‘race’!
Moving beyond his claims of economic and trade success, he moves into entertainment, pointing out ‘success’ here: “Hollywood is as dominant as ever” This really does get things going: I recently went to see the latest ‘Jungle Book’, and ‘Legend of Tarzan’, movies, to see whether our relationship with Nature was being portrayed anthropocentrically, or as I believe our relationship should be represented to us, ‘planet destroying’ humans?
I came away from both movies literally shocked at the level of violence that was central to ‘the entertainment’ of both these movies. These shouldn’t be violent engagements, but rather ones that should help us bond with Nature. Ones that help us see where and how we humans fit in to Our Planet? However all ‘they’ show are anthropocentric, gladiators in death defying and violent conquests.
As I saw in these movies, the technology achievements of Hollywood are absolutely amazing, but sadly it’s all directed at the wrong ‘Statues of Success’. Hollywood is a celebrity factory whose ‘medal winners’ provide disastrous inspiration value as ‘walk the talk’ icons for a One Point Zero world, or one that even remotely aligns with us humans living in sync with Nature and our planet Earth.
I see this ‘tall poppy’, self-appraising and ignoring of the truths and a more balanced scorecard as classic case of avoiding Bertrand Russell’s ‘moment’ for a ‘tincture of philosophy’, facing the truths, and using the learning opportunity presented? Instead, in his denial of the truths, he is desperately sticking with the Biggest, Most, More and more, Win at all costs, and Machiavellian Domination beliefs, that have paved THE way, to THE Success. His success, or is he in a ‘Horror life’ too…?
Going further: Can ‘Success’ be determined and measured by a small elite group who are masters of a self-serving system, and out of touch with spirituality and the human soul? A group who are the very architects and custodians of a system that has made a country now deeply divided. Divided into the superficially ‘successful’, dominating ‘few’, who are becoming increasingly removed from the demoralised, imprisoned, and disillusioned, ‘unsuccessful’ ‘majority’.
One can’t holistically measure the spirit of ‘the majority’ in terms of Olympic medals, energy production, economic power, technological prowess, Hollywood success, etc of the ‘few’! These are the elite’s performance criteria, and ones based on winning, domination and a tall poppy, arrogant relationship with ‘the majority’ and world. It’s because that’s how they measure the success of their own lives, and have mastered how to exploit The System and ‘the majority’ to ‘get it’.
The author of this NYT article would do well to look at the USA’s obesity figures, mental illness, loneliness, spiritual health, ecological footprints, etc to find out whether the nation (the real nation, not the ‘Elite nation’) is ‘On Success’ or not? The human soul is a very sensitive ‘being’ and knows when things aren’t right and ‘Off Success’.
I believe a nation is successful if its overall human spirit is healthy. A healthy spirit comes from leading a fully flourishing, intensely human life. This fundamentally must includes belonging to Humanity, Nature and The Planet, not exploiting it for selfish intent……
Next Post will connect the London Times article “New Zealanders and the curse of the Kiwi Knight.”, I pointed to in my last post to the above, to hopefully complete a ‘tincture of philosophy’ that provides some inspiration and ideas for a path to personal liberty for all the good people who make up ‘The Majority’ of America! At this difficult junction in our history, the world desperately needs yeah to act on your truths, not on The Crowds ‘convenient falsities’ !!
More tomorrow….