a new understanding of today, time and space.

listen to a conservative and listen to their idea about
what the world is…

the world is dark, dangerous, a jungle, dog eat dog,
nasty, brutish, unhappy, brutal…….

what does it say about a person who cannot see
any love or beauty or joy in the world?

it says, the, conservatives, are deeply unhappy because
when we describe the world, we don’t actually describe the world
objectively, we describe the world as we see it through our colored
glasses…

and conservatives see a dark and unhappy world, which is a reflection
of who they are.

we see the world through our inner eyes, not our physical eyes……

so how do you see the world?

if it is as dark as the conservatives viewpoint is, perhaps you should reconsider
who you are and what you are pursuing…

Kropotkin

it is my friend’s witching hour of 3 am but I shall post here instead of
there…

We see in Hesse for example, the attempt of one to “unify” our soul…

we have been atomized, destroyed into small moving pieces by the forces
of capitalism and the industrial revolution……

but that is not the only thing going on…

we have been negated, nullified… as human beings and
as beings holding values…

what is the reality of modern human existence?

I stand alone and negated… My own personal values of
love or justice or peace or charity is negated, deemed unimportant…
the modern economic system demands that I negate my own values
for the modern values of money/profits… that is the only value worth
holding in the modern world…

so the question becomes, how does one become who they are?

How do I return to holding values that I honor and that I am…

if the modern world demands we deny our values and being in the name of
profits, then how do we return to who we are?

I stand… alone, naked apart from my fellow human beings because
the modern core values of the pursuit of money/profits, denies me
me holding my core values because my core values don’t
contribute to profits/money…

I stand alone, alienated, disconnected from my fellow human beings
because we are in competition for the scraps off the wealthy man table…

that is the essence of the “trickle down” theory…… we fight over
the few scraps of money that has falling off the rich man table…

we don’t engage in the search for our values because we are supposed
to negate our being, our values in this pursuit of wealth and profits

How do we reunite ourselves into the real values of existence?

the first step, the first step is always awareness, becoming aware
of who we are and where we are in this process we call life…

in a couple of weeks, I turn 61 and that knowledge establishes
me in a different place then if I was turning 21 or 31 or even
51…our age is an indication of our place in the road of life…

I am heading into the last and final stage of old age…

what happens when we become old? At each step of old age
is a reduction of our possibilities… I can no longer be my possibilities…
in other words, I can no longer run a 10 minute mile or climb Everest
or live the life I lived when I was younger because my age has precluded
me from the many possibilities I had when I was younger…
as we age, doors close… as we begin life, doors begin to open and
possibilities exists until one day in middle age, doors begin to close…
until we reach old age, when finally all the doors close except one, death…
that becomes the only possibility we can reach and become… death…

the modern world also reduces possibilities by forcing us to engage
in the nihilistic practices of our modern economics and politics…

modern economics reduces my choices of becoming…

I can only achieve a negation of who I am in the capitalistic society…
because I cannot hold my values in the modern corporate world
because my values don’t create profits/money and all the modern world
is concern with is making profits/money… anything else is
unimportant, our values and our lives is deemed of far less value
then the pursuit of profits/money…

it is not about the unification of our soul that is important,
but the understanding that our values, indeed our very lives
have been negated in the modern pursuit of profits/money…

now this looks like we need to reunite our separated
being of existence… recall that Goethe once said,

“alas, I have two souls in my breast”

and we modern think ourselves lucky if we only have two souls
residing within us… I am diverse and can I contradict myself
because I am wide and diverse… if I contradict myself, so be it…I
have many souls within my breast… and not all of them are so inclined
to make their views so neat and tidy as to not contradict myself…

I am a modern child and so I have been negated and denied in both
body and spirit… how do I regain my self and am no longer negated
or denied in either body or spirit?

that is the real modern question, how can we exist without being
negated or denied?

what does it take to live a life that isn’t negated or denied?

what must I do?

so, the problem that exists, as is currently exhibited,
is that the society, the ism’s we live, is negating
and denying who I am, and negating my own values
and is negating my own life… I am expendable, in the modern
world, my life is expendable, my values unimportant
and denied… the only thing that matters and that includes
my values and my life is the pursuit of profits/money…

so how do I escape?

How do am I saved?

How am I to be redeemed in the modern world?

the modern world demands that I must negate who I am in
the pursuit of profits/money… My very body is negated in
the pursuit of profits/money… I am being worked to death
and the corporate world couldn’t care less because I am being
sacrificed on the alter of corporate profits…

so, how do I become who I am?

by working less, by buying less, by not engaging in
the modern economic world… by starving them to death…

if the system is the problem as I have suggested, then the system
must be overthrown, demolished…

but it is more then just overthrowing an economic system,
it is also about us becoming who we are and is also
about us taking accountability and responsibility for who we are…

it lies in our choices we make for ourselves…

I have been negated, denied by society and its economic system
and in return I get some little amount of money which allows
me to buy a car or a couch or a new TV…

our salary/wages is our 30 pieces of silver
for which we have we betrayed our soul and body and our values…

so the first step is to become aware… to engage in the question
about what is the examined life and what is the unexamined life…

we must find the time to engage in this question of who we are
and what are our values……… we are so busy in this modern age
we no longer have any time to just sit and listen to our soul
as he sings in the dead of night…

and what songs of despair might our soul sing in the cold
dark night?..

I can only speak for myself but tonight, my soul
was in despair of my own values and existence
as it was/is threaten by our modern society and its
demand that we put society/state before ourselves…

find the peace and quiet needed to be able to listen
to your soul as it sings songs of engagement and despair
at 3:00 in the morning…

Kropotkin

so we have in our “modern society” people with
fractured souls… Goethe “alas, I have two souls in my breast”
and we see Goethe at the beginning of the modern age, he lived
during the events which have dominated us politically and economically,
the French revolution and the rise of the industrial revolution…

the question becomes how do we in the 21st century, reunite our
soul which have been torn asunder by the multiplicity of our modern age…

we have been fractured by the demands of our modern economic
system which has dehumanized, robotized modern man…

we drill in lockstep to the arbitrary and soul crushing
march of the industrial revolution… with its brutalizing
demands of time clocks and set schedules and punishments
of any who commit the ultimate crime of disobedience to authority…

we have separated ourselves in response to the crushing demands
of the modern world… we play different roles in response to the
all consuming demands of the modern world… I am, at my appointed
times, father, son, husband, worker, consumer, citizen……

or said another way, the demands of our modern ism’s and ideologies
force me to play at being a citizen or an American or to be nationalist
or a democrat or a consumer… I must be willing to sacrifice myself
at the demands of works, society, the state, the church… the culture…

if called upon, I must play my role or be isolated and called names
like radical, socialist, communist, un-American, terrorist, liberal……

society has all kinds of names to call those who won’t play the games
demanded by society or the state…

and these demands have fractured our soul……

individually and collectively……

exhibited by the many schools in ART and in philosophy
and in history and economics… these diverse schools of
thoughts in the various disciplines are symptoms of our
fractured souls……….

the modern world has no center to hold because the
soul which is the center of who we are, is fractured…

how to overcome our fractured soul is the question of
our modern times……

the unity wanted by various religions, to become one with god or
be one with the original thing from which we came from is no longer
a goal to be achieved… Buddhism is based upon a return to that from
which we came… to achieve “nothingness” is the Buddhist goal…
no more shall we be reborn and reborn again…that is the Buddhist goal
but that goal is not the answer to the question of, how do we repair
our fractured souls?

it is our fractured souls that prevent us from being able to
meaningful connect with my fellow human beings…
I cannot be a part of something bigger then me if I do not
have a soul that is whole and together…

we desperately search for meaning in our lives but we cannot find
meaning/purpose because our soul, individually and collectively,
is fractured and divided…

how do we mend this broken and damaged soul of ours?

we begin this by creating a spiritual autobiography…

we begin by sorting out who we are and what are our possibilities…

I am Kropotkin… I am old and so my possibilities are far more limited
then when I was young… but, and this is important, but I still have
possibilities even as I am old and the doors which at one time in my life
opened and those same doors are now closing because I am growing older…

so I still have possibilities… I must seek them out and engage in which
of the remaining possibilities are who I want to become…….

reduced to a sentence…

being and becoming…

we have being… who we are and we have becoming… how we shall become…

and that is really the entire question of life… who are we and who shall we become…

but we cannot understand who we are if we have a fractured soul
and we cannot become if our soul remains fractured……

individually and collectively…

so what is our solution?

Kropotkin

now I must say that I don’t offer any answers…

I am a child of the modern age and all I have to offer is
questions… but finding the right question is all
that one needs… the genius of a Socrates, Newton,
Descartes, Einstein is not in the answers they gave, but
in their work in creating the right question…

answers are easy to find… everyone has an answer…

but discovering the right question… that takes real talent…
that is where true genius is found…

Kropotkin

so I ask once more… what is our meaning/purpose?

we can help discover that by means of a spiritual autobiography…
help find it, not necessarily will we find it, but it might help find it…

it is in the recognition of the human condition that will help us to
understand what it means to be human……

we are born… tabula rasa… blank slates…
and society and the family fill that blank slate with
the ism’s and ideologies of the state, the church, the culture,
the media, with schooling/education is simply being educated into
that society’s ism and ideologies…

we are filled with ism’s like nationalism and patriotism
and Catholicism and Hinduism’s and Christianity and
capitalism and obedience to authority which I guess is called
Authoritism….and obedience to all the other ism’s and ideologies
that a society tries to indoctrinate its citizens with…….

then at some point in time, we become aware of the indoctrinations…
we become aware that our belief in nation and state and religions has been
taught into us, indoctrinated into us… and so we begin, if we are so lucky,
to examine our beliefs and our indoctrinations… that usual begins around
our teen years and can last for a long, long time……

if we are unable to begin the process of an examination of our lives, then
we become like IQ45 and blindly accept everything that we were indoctrinated
with as children……

but we can become aware and alive to our other possibilities and thus
we can begin to examine the other possibilities that exists out there……

we are… being and by examination… we can become…

I was raised moderate democrat… and by examination and by
events, I was radicalized… to the point of becoming an anarchist…
where I was for many years… this is politically… and I was by examination,
also changed philosophically to the several strands of philosophy that I
moved from and into as the years passed…

my adults years have been changes from one possibility to another,
from anarchism to communism to democrat to liberal…
and my philosophical possibilities also changed from Nietzschean to
a follower of Hume to a follower of Kant to existentialism to Kierkegaard
to today… where I don’t follow anyone anymore… I simply express my
own values and views as I see them philosophically……

I have grown and become something more as the years and my experience
has changed… I have gone from being to becoming…
and I still am becoming…what I don’t know… but my process hasn’t
stopped, at least not yet…

I still seek meaning/purpose in my life…
and I still have a fragmented soul……
and I still don’t quite understand what it means
to be human, fully human………

my journey to becoming is still going on…

one possibility for me is an ongoing spiritual autobiography that
I write for me and me alone… as I am writing today and have for all these
years…and hopefully for years more to come…

I have become aware of the loss of possibilities that has occurred in
my life… but I seek other possibilities that might replace those
lost possibilities…

I seek to obey the Socratic oath which is to examine my life
and the life I lead and in doing so, become aware of who I am…

I can, as another possibility, become more moral…….

but what does being moral… being… being moral actually mean?

I can engage in aesthetics or work on my life as art…

or I can engage in my life existentially where I see my
life in terms of existentialism…….

I have possibilities…but I must seek them out…

I cannot be passive in my search for those possibilities…

I can also seek out my meaning… purpose in terms of the values
I decide to pursue… such as finding my meaning/purpose in terms
of the values I decide to pursue… such as pursing values like justice,
love, hope, charity, peace, honesty……. I can find meaning and purpose
in my engagement with the values that I pursue…

I can make justice my reason for being… I can exist to
follow and create justice at every chance I get…

I can make justice, as a value, my reason for being and my reason
for existence…meaning/purpose……

that is the point of values… they give life its meaning/purpose…

I can live for and die for my higher values of existence…

they make life worth living……

and that is how we reunite our divided and broken souls……

we reexamine life and conclude that we can reunite our souls under
the banner of justice or of love or of charity…….

we can become our values…… and that possibility becomes our
meaning/purpose……

and so in making justice, as my value, I create a new possibility for
Kropotkin to exist… when all other possibilities slowly go away,
I can create a new possibility for me… by being… just……

being… becoming… that is the path of life…

Kropotkin

I have often spoke of the industrial revolution and the political
equivalent, which is of course the French Revolution……

but I haven’t said a word about the prior revolution,
the scientific revolution……

which can be said to have started in 1543, the publication of
Copernicus’s “On the revolutions of the heavenly spheres”

and lasting to today…but why should the industrial revolution
create the havoc that it did and why didn’t the scientific revolution
create similar havoc?

It did create havoc but given the distance we are now from the beginning
of the scientific revolution, we cannot see it for what it is…

the scientific revolution wasn’t the nihilistic revolution
that the industrial and the French revolution was……

science offers us something that is positive…
it gives us a vision of what is and what isn’t…

but the industrial revolution has only offered us a nihilistic vision
of the universe…we might be people with values but you certainly
wouldn’t know it from the industrial revolution… values are negated
and human beings are negated in return for profits/money…

that is the heart of the industrial revolution and its ism, capitalism…

the scientific revolution still holds people to have values
and the right to existence… whereas the industrial revolution
and capitalism only offers the values of profits/money…we have
no values or existence within the industrial revolution…

that is the difference… the scientific revolution still values people
whereas the industrial revolution, doesn’t…

Kropotkin

This past week has been exhausting. I have multiple
doctor’s note stating because of my spinal surgery,
I am only able to work 32 hours… this past week they
gave me 37 hours…I haven’t worked this many hours in over
10 years and even after some rest, I am still exhausted…

this question of finding meaning and purpose becomes more
relevant in the face of yet another attempt by work to kill me
with excessive work and stress…

I don’t find meaning/purpose in work/job/career… I never have found
any meaning in the lifelong struggle to create profits/money for others while
I get table scraps from the various corporations I have worked for…

now some might get meaning and purpose from work but I suspect what is
really happening is their childhood indoctrinations that work is good and
part of the value of being human is to work hard and keeping our nose to
the grindstone…and other foolish propaganda that only serve our
corporate masters… our working ourselves to death for pennies
and a very slim chance at retirement isn’t worth the effort we put into work…
I know what I speaks of, I am 61 and I have worked for over 40 years
and the only thing I have to show for it is a broken down body…

to think that the ideal of the American dream is some sort of meaning or purpose
is a lie meant to deceive you into slaving for 40 years and get nothing out of it…

the house with a picket fence with two car garage with two kids, a boy and a girl
and a dog name spot… lies meant to deceive you into thinking that is some sort
of goal to achieve… it isn’t…to own a house is a trap, forcing you
to sink deeper and deeper into the nightmare that is the American dream…

to buy into this lie of house, cars, vacation homes, couches, TV…
all meant to get you to spend your life working to afford unnecessary
baubles that don’t count for anything at all…and what do they cost you?

the rest of your life working pointless and meaningless jobs trying to pay
off the American nightmare……. walk away from all that crap…

find meaning and purpose in other things beside the bill of goods that
society and the state offer you…

so how do we find meaning/purpose in life?

I have become aware of how we find meaning and purpose by
events such as the recent super bowl and Valentine’s day for example…

we create an event and we affirm within that event, some meaning or
significance for us…I have a birthday coming up… I am supposed to find
meaning and purpose in that birthday… but the only significance I can find
in turning 61 is, I am old…and the possibilities available to me, has
remarkable been reduced to a scant few…and that is the result of being
old… your possibilities become fewer and fewer as we age……

finding meaning and purpose in those few remaining possibilities is all I have left
in my life…….at some point here, the only remaining possibility left in my life will
be death and I must come to embrace that one final choice when that day comes…

but that day is not today and today, I still have the chance to find meaning
and purpose and possibilities in my life……….

many find their meaning and purpose in their children and grandchildren,
and I have no burning needs that I see in others to continue creation by
having children…and we can call creation just another word for meaning
and purpose…….

the day to day events that we seek meaning and purpose in like birthdays
and holidays like upcoming Easter are not enough, in my humble opinion,
to create meaning and purpose in our lives…

but Kropotkin, you have eliminated every single possibility we might
have to have meaning and possibility in our lives…

I suppose I have… which is to suggest that we can find meaning and purpose
in some other fashion… which is to suggest that we find meaning and
purpose in seeking and fulfilling the possibilities available to us…

I can, at my advance age, seek to fulfill what possibilities are still left to me…

and one such possibility is what I am doing here…which is to explore what it
means to be human… to seek out our possibilities and then fulfill them…

but it is not enough to explain or write out what is possible for me…

I must physically engage in that which is possible for me……

so I read about other people report about what is possible…

Nietzsche wrote a whole slew of books making a report about what is
possible for human beings from his standpoint and Hesse wrote
several books about the possibilities he discovered
and Goethe wrote books about the possibilities he found
and Hume wrote his books about what he thinks are possibilities
available to us human beings and Kant and Spinoza and Plato
and writers like Isaac Asimov and Ray Bradbury and Philip Dick
and Jules Verne all wrote their reports about what is the human
possibilities……. we only have to read those books to see what is
possible for us human beings.

We also have the Russian reports to what is possible in Tolstoy
and Dostoyevsky and Pushkin……

we have many reports as to what is possible for us human beings
to be and to become… being and becoming…….

we only have to take them seriously and act upon those reports left
to us by all the writers and thinkers and philosophers that have left
their reports as to what is possible for us to become…………

being and becoming

in that we can find our meaning and purpose…

Kropotkin

Personally, I moved to a different country.

61 isn’t insanely old, and if the house/whatever is paid for you could sell it and move everyone somewhere where the exchange rate means you won’t have to work anymore. Or grab a ctefla and teach a bit of english to adults. More fun than 37 hours a week in a job you hate. Bit of sunshine etc. Foreign climes.

K: alas, it isn’t just about me, but also about the wife to whom I have been
married almost 25 years… whatever is decided, must be agreed by both and
therein lies the issues… we like our little, vastly overprice area we live in…

to me, almost anywhere else is a step down………
and she has never lived anywhere else whereas I have lived elsewhere…

well some more thought must be given to this…

Kropotkin

Peter, when can You retire?
Would Your life ease up a bit then?
Or are You caught in a meerygoround from which it is not possible to get off?

Maybe Your budget could allow a different standard which would weigh more then staying where You and Your wife live?

first part: meaning/purpose
second part: Kropotkin issue’s

the question of meaning/purpose should dominate our lives…

but let try another tack… let us take at random musician like
Miles Davis… How did Miles find meaning/purpose?

clearly he found meaning/purpose in the creation of music…

he found his meaning/purpose in the creation of music…

We can look at another artist, say a Poet, Walt Whitman…

he found his meaning/purpose in poetry, right?

well, Whitman practiced that nameless love that bigotry stills
holds in contempt…so was Whitman engaged in his affairs as his
meaning/purpose and then wrote about them later?

I can tell you from personal experience that matters of the flesh
are as temporary as it gets… we don’t find meaning/purpose from
the engagement of the body in fulfilling its lust…

meaning/purpose with another person lies not in the physical but in
the deeper engagement of the heart with another… we find meaning/purpose
with another by our mental/psychological/emotional parts of our body…

that is why we can find meaning/purpose in events,
writings, emotional actions……. we think it is the physical
actions/events that cause us or creates in us meaning/purpose…

but the connection we have that is about meaning/purpose is within
the mental/emotional/psychological part of us being human…

it is that search for connection that is meaning/purpose……

we connect with someone and that creates meaning/purpose…

now what is the major problem with the “modern” age?

we are disconnected with, alienated from society/ourselves/ the state…

that disconnect, that alienation is emotional, psychological, mental…

and that is the source of our alienation and disconnect from modern society/state/
culture… it isn’t physical, it is emotional, psychological, mental……

you can connect physically with all the people you can but it still won’t
allow that emotional, psychological, mental connection to exists with
society/the state/the culture… you so desperately desire…

we think our connections must be of the physical kind, but it is within
our emotional, psychological and mental connections that we must make
that allows us to become human…

let us follow this through: the final days of the Roman empire wasn’t about
a physical action… no, the final days were about the loss of the empire’s
connection with its citizens… the people felt disconnected from the empire,
they felt alienated from the Roman Empire… and that is why it fell… it isn’t about
a physical reason why the Roman Empire fell, it is about the loss of the connection
people felt with the empire that caused it to fall…

let us fast forward to today… we see millions of Americans feeling
disconnected from, alienated from America…this isn’t a physical feeling,
it is a disconnect, alienation from psychological, emotional, mental
disconnection… alienation…from society……

the America is see today isn’t the America I grew up with…

the America of my youth was a “shining city on the hill”
that was an example for all the world to become…
we were the “Moral” society, the society striving the most for
such values as justice, equality, personal achievement…

we have lost those values and replaced them with the negative values
of anger, hate, lust, greed, bigotry, prejudice… we are no longer that
shining city on the hill because of our adapting negative values……

we no longer hold the high moral ground… simple as that…
we no longer fight or engage with the higher standards of
human existence……… we engage with the lower level of
using extreme measures to defend our selves… when we
engage in such examples of Torture and assassinations
and such laws as the “patriot act” to reduce personal freedoms
and liberties, then we are no longer the city on the hill…

we are now like everyone else, just wrestling in the mud over
petty concerns about how much taxes we should pay…

we no longer consider the bigger, overall questions of morality
or what is right or what is possible…we have abandon the larger questions
that matter most and we have grown small and petty… that is not living
on the city on the hill…

you say, Kropotkin, these questions which you consider to be small and petty,
they are important question… and the fact you think they are important
questions show us how far we have fallen…important question are questions
that signify what kind of people we are, not how much we pay in taxes or
the partisan petty politics that people play in D.C… but the important
questions are the questions that define us as a people, as a state, as
a culture…to play petty politics over who has power and who writes the
bills aren’t important…these things too, shall pass…….

no, the valuable, important questions ask us, what does it mean to be human?

the valuable questions don’t ask us petty questions like, should homosexual love
be legal? no, the question isn’t about homosexual love, but the important questions
ask about the big questions like love, not who is loving whom, but is love happening?

the questions we should be asking are questions that allow connections to occur,
questions of bigotry and prejudice and nationalism, alienated and disconnect
people… are you white? that is a disconnect question, the only questions that
matter are questions that ask, do you love? Questions that matter don’t ask about
specific color or gender or race or creed or sex preference of people…
the questions that matter aren’t interested in the accidental properties
of people like skin color or nation you were born in or your nationality,
the questions that matter ask about what it means to be human…
regardless of your accidental traits……

does demonizing color people or people from other countries, does
that help people connect or does that disconnect people?

the answer should be clear but because we are no longer the shining city on
the hill and we don’t care about understanding what it means to become human,
we don’t know that demonizing people regardless of their race, color, creed, sexual
orientation… that demonizing people is to negate, dehumanize people, it is to
be nihilistic… the defining belief of our modern times is to hold to nihilism,
the negation and dehumanization of people… if we hold money to be of higher
value then people, then we are practicing nihilism…

our modern age has made nihilism the defining answer of our age and as such,
we no longer are the city on the hill… if we practice nihilism, then we
place money/profits over people, if we put such ism’s and ideologies over
people, like nationalism over people, then we are practicing nihilism…

one might ask, why are we no longer the shining city on the hill?

it is because we practice nihilism…our economic ism of capitalism is a study
in nihilism because it put money/profits over people…

if we ask the important question and all we can ask, is how much does this cost?
then we have fallen victim to nihilism…if we put material goods over the
needs of human beings, then we are practicing nihilism…

so what are the big questions? Questions that are engaged with people
as beings with needs that must be met… the irrelevant questions, the
unimportant questions are about the cost of programs or projects or
the tax rate…where people are secondary, at best, to the
materials/money/profits in question

we are disconnected, alienated from society/the state/the culture because
the society/the state/the culture has by its practice of nihilism, put
us second or even third in the overall priority in the land…

if we put the defense of the people first, then we are putting people
second…the primary point is the word, defense, not people…

and we have failed as a society/ as a state and as a culture…
if we put ism’s and ideologies over the needs of people…

and this is why the population of America has become
disconnected, alienated from America…

we are second, at best, to the nihilism that makes money/profits
and the pursuit of materialism/capitalism first……

we are no longer the city on the hill because we practice nihilism over
the benefit of the people…….

Kropotkin

my answer to both Meno and Tab…

my current situation is all about the possibilities that we find ourselves in…

I am old, and thus I have less possibilities then I once had…
it is less possible for me to uproot my life now then it once
was years ago… not impossible, but less possible…

my wife and I have talked about reducing expenses to allow me to retire,
but given our current economic situation, that doesn’t seem likely…

which leads me to the second part of being old, you become far more
risk adverse, in other words, risks that you have easily taken years ago,
you would not take today…I have become far more cautious in my old age…

it creeps up on one until one day, you sound off on the younger generation
and realize you hear the voice of your father or your grandfather…

and you ask yourself, when did I turn into my father or grandfather?

it is in that momentous moment that you suddenly realize that you are old…

much of what you say sounds great intellectually, but old age is
about the emotional argument ones hear inside your head…

I would have dropped everything 20 years ago and traveled the world,
perhaps even 10 years ago, today, not so much……
that is what being old means, you hold back because of the
prisons within your own mind that hold us old people back…

I despise people who are for IQ45 but I can see why they
follow that chipmunk, they are held hostage by their own
feelings and thoughts in old age… they are afraid and people
who live in fear make bad and irrational choices… like
bush Jr. and IQ45 today…

I am trying to avoid living in fear and darkness like those
clowns who wear those MAGA red hats… but somedays are
harder then other days…the battle we fight, the real battles
aren’t about fighting dragons or saving the virtuous maid from
the vile uncle, no, the real battle we fight lies within us
and is connected to our battle to rise up or to lower ourselves
into animals with animal values and beliefs…

I seek to become human and leave my animal past behind me…
and in doing so, I must reject the lower values of fear and hate
and anger and lust and greed and violence…….

I must accept the higher values of love, peace, hope, charity, honor,
honesty, non-violence………

to become human means, requires that I attempt to be “moral” even
if I don’t quite work out what being “moral” means… at least there
is an attempt to become “moral”…

as usual, the question is about being and becoming…

I am and who will I become?

Kropotkin

And what of the second part?

Kropotkin said:
“first part: meaning/purpose
second part: Kropotkin issue’s”

How does that fit in?

I made a second post afterwards…

Kropotkin

what values are the current values of that shining city on the hill?

that is being…

and what values should be the values of that shining city on the hill?

that is becoming…

Kropotkin

now some might say, Kropotkin, you are being naïve and totally lacking
in the “proper” judgement about what is the reality of today…

but I say unto you, it isn’t about what is, being, it is about what
is possible…it is about becoming, and the values we should
find inside of us… not about what are the values within us now,
for we are still fighting the battle between the animal side of us,
the hate and fear and violence and greed and lust that is animal,
and we must find the human values above us, love, peace, joy,
charity, non-violence…

it is not about who we are, but who we want to be that matters…

I would rather fail reaching for the stars then succeed with
remaining the same…

what are the values offered by IQ45?

They are the values of the animal, hate, lust, greed, violence,
bigotry and prejudice. Are those values the values upon which we
search for meaning/purpose?

the values of IQ45 and supported by millions are not the values upon
which we can use to become…you cannot build on values like
hate and anger and lust and greed and despair and violence…

build a house upon these values and the house will collapse under
the weight of its own negative values…….

try to build something with the values of hate or anger or violence…

say try to build a family with those negative values…

you will fail… it is as simple as that…

negative values cannot, cannot be used to build anything of value…

we must build our families and our homes and our community
and our society and our state and our culture with positive values
of love and charity and hope and joy and honor and non-violence…

but Kropotkin, you are ignoring the reality of our current modern society…

No, I am not ignoring it, I am saying build something better, build something
not made out of hate or anger or greed or lust or despair…

build something out of the positive values of being human…

being and becoming…

we are but we can be so much more if we aim higher then just being
animals with negative values…

what are the values of that shining city on the hill?

what values should we offer the world as we are the beacon
of light in the world?

we cannot offer up the values of IQ45 which are the negative values
of despair and only hoping for safety/security…

we must engage with the values that build people up which
are the value of freedom and liberty…

for in our search for security and safety, we have forsaken those
important values of freedom and liberty…

if we spend our time, money, effort on defending what is ours
and those are the negative values, then what is the point of defending
those values? they have no meaning or purpose that can be use to rise
higher then who we are now… there is no point in defending
the lower values of animals…we must sacrifice some safety and security
in order to achieve values worth defending, freedom and liberty
and hope and love and peace and charity…

which values are you in favor of defending?

are you just going to be or are you engaged in becoming?

being or becoming… that is the question…

Kropotkin

let us say you hold certain values,
either negative or positive…

the values you hold are the values you will see…

if you hold negative values, then you can only see negative values
if you hold positive values, then you can only see positive values…

so what values do you see in the world?

and that is… being…

and what values do you want to see?

that is becoming…

Kropotkin

Oh I get that completely. I was 27 when I decided to chuck my life in and get on a plane. My life in the UK wasn’t bad so much, as limited. I was living in a shared house with some of my best friends from the university we’d all just graduated from. I had no long term girlfriends, a series of awful soul destroying temprorary jobs, none of which utilized my degree, and a bicycle. :smiley:

Nothing very much to lose. And I could see my life stretching out ahead of me if I didn’t do something drastic, a very small grey life full of compromise and meh, as you say, meaninglessness.

I’m 52 now. Married like you for almost 25 years. A house, 2 kids. From time to time I feel a wanderlust. A homesickness almost for places I’ve never been to. But no escape until the kids get their lives sorted out lol. Those lovable little millstones :smiley:

The idea of chucking things in again and hitting the road is not very scary. Three things my life has taught me. People are people all over the world, they think the same things, say the same shit, worry about the same stuff - learn their language, respect their beliefs, don’t assume superiority and they will like you just fine. A land is just land, trees, water, rocks and sunshine. I can survive anywhere where people want to learn some english.

However. When I was 27, I was a healthy chap. Now, not so much. Wherever I went, I’d need a good pharmacy lol. And it would have to be somewhere sunny. So done with dreary climates. I fancy thailand or maybe south korea. I dunno.

As you say, having possibilities is nice. Don’t know if you’ve read, I think maybe it’s Black Swan. The author speaks of the importance of having “fuck you money” - money set by that if the worst comes to the worst, and your life becomes unbearable, you can take it out of the bank, fuck right off over the horizon and not have to sleep on the street or sell a kidney to live for at least 6 months to a year.

I have fuck you money. Even if I never use it, and end up leaving it all to the kids after I kick the bucket, just having it is a constant source of comfort.

I dunno what to tell you Peter. One last anecdote. A little dark. I have a friend, he’s a warrior soul, strong, self-sacrificing, who put the lives of his family ahead of his own for many years. He tried, luckily very unsuccessfully, to kill himself. Then he made a better decision to go see a shrink. He told me the only useful thing the therpist ever said to him was “you spent so much time making other people’s wishes come true, you forgot to have any of your own.”

40 years is a long time of putting food on the table. I’m assuming any kids you have are sorted out, or at least capable of being responsible for their own lives. You and your wife is another story, and none of my business. Eh, don’t be scared of change I guess, is what I’m saying. Good luck either way.

Removed

I have noticed, in my case as well as others, that we are
keen on “solving” the problems of other people and yet, when
it comes to solving our own issues, we are reluctant, at best, to
to engage in our own solutions…

I am just as guilty as anyone else in escaping my own problems
to attempt to solve other people problems…

I am now reading a biography of Da Vinci, and I come across
an interesting point… the writer of the biography, Isaacson,
mentions friction in regards to a perpetual motion machine…
friction prevents the creation of a perpetual motion machine
and that got me thinking about our very lives…

think of a ball going down a ramp… the ball going down
the ramp is slowed down by the friction created by the
interaction between the ball and the ramp… friction causes
energy to be lost… this is also true of both water and air…
we meet friction every time we walk due to the impact
of our bodies and the air and the same is true in water…
as we swim, the impact of body and water causes friction…

now let us examine friction in terms of our own lives…

as I go through life, I am getting friction from the actions
and desires of others… let us say, at work, I want to do my own thing,
but the managers demand that I follow their rules… this is creates
friction between their demands and my need to do my own thing…

if I don’t have anyone in line, the managers demand that we stand in front
of our checkstands or we are told to face items… which is to literally take items
on shelfs or in the coolers and face them toward the front… make everything even
on the shelfs… this is boring, tedious work that sucks time away from my being
able to take the down time to think about what is the meaning of life or what does
existence mean or what does it mean to be human?

I don’t want to face items because it prevents me from being able
to think about the matters that really count to me…

I face friction at work because of this… it slows me down…
each of us in our daily life face friction of some sort…
being married is a life long lesson in the act of friction…

doing the dishes or vacuuming is not conductive to my thinking
about what I consider to be important but trying telling the wife that…
it doesn’t end well… for me anyway…

we fight against this type of friction all our lives… it could be said
that our lives is a lesson in friction… human interactions is simple
a lesson in the various types of friction one can have between human beings…

I must admit, I have jealousy towards those philosophers who never married
and thus were able to focus entirely on their philosophical issues… instead
of being impacted by the friction we mere mortals face, when dealing with
other human beings…

that friction or interactions we engage with when we
interact with any other human being can be said to be life itself…

one question of humanity might be, how do we reduce the amount
of friction we meet when interacting with other human beings?

How do we set it up that we don’t meet with as much friction as we
do in our daily lives?

I cannot say today… I have been married over 20 years and friction
is a daily part of my life… that isn’t to say it’s bad, just that it
is always there…

how am I to personally reduce my friction in my daily life?

a philosophical question for brighter minds then mine…

Kropotkin