Steven Barnes's Blog, page 28

Why Balance?

I am sure there are means of personal evolution that do not involve “balance” as I define it.  Too many images exist of elevated saints, truly wonderful human beings who were clearly in denial of the physical form.  I honor that.   But I promote the notion of balance because it is the safest way to put “safety rails” on your progress.  There are simply too many observable cases of people who made world-class performance physically but were broke and couldn’t keep relationships together. Too m...

Did I just hit “Master” level?

I might…just might have just fully matured my workout program.

The problem was that I wasn’t getting enough MA workout to maintain forward momentum (about an hour a day is standard for this). I don’t have that when I factor in the fitness and health activities: I can make an hour a day, but I DON’T have two hours.

But I realized that if I break up the time I DO have into shorter units and can do it 5X a day, I can multiply the impact of the time. So…if I have 25 minutes for daily skill work,...

Art as healing

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A dear friend recently returned from a trip to India, on which he saw not only great beauty and spirituality, but also massive poverty, class struggle and color prejudice.  People mired forever in “their station in life”, while others claim that they were destined to be locked in that misery as a result of sins in past lives.

 

Considering the enormous respect I have for the yogic disciplines, it was sobering for me to hear these stories years ago, but I made my peace with them.   Ancient cu...

Help your allies find a “why”

“People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care”–(unknown, but attributed to everyone from Teddy Roosevelt to Norman Vincent Peele)

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We’re building the Afrofuture here, and that means building your life, your personal kingdom, so that you can be a brick in a larger wall.

I once had a business partner with whom I fought constantly, to the point that I ended up hanging up on him, and came within a hair’s breadth of throwing the entire deal away.  He was just that imposs...

Got five minutes to change your life?

I first encountered the Five Tibetans over thirty years ago, in a book I found in Powell’s bookstore, called “The Ancient Secret of the Fountain of Youth” by a guy named Peter Kelder.  Kelder (about whom little is known) told a tale of a chance encounter in maybe 1930, between himself and a  broken-down British soldier named “Colonel Bradford” (about whom even less is known–if he ever existed at all) who said that while serving in the East he had heard a story of a monastery where monks lived...

Alien Invasion!

(Not really, but…)

I got this a few minutes ago. Looks as if it was sent to the wrong email address. I’m sure its some kind of joke, or con, but I can’t quite figure out what the game is.  Names have been changed.

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(NAME) I can’t cover much of this action  here, and my blog has been censored – probably unrelated.  This is for REAL, btw… Gist: about a month ago, strange things began happening at the Chinese/Taiwanese company where I’ve spent the last 25+  years.  Discussions of “joiners” f...

Who will drive the bus?

When I say everything boils down to basics, we’re talking about pain and pleasure, and the striving to connect to the divine.   The safety of our families.    Laws and customs are generally means to these basic ends, not ends in themselves.  So…if a “mere” means, there is room to negotiate, and people can change if you can DEMONSTRATE that another path gets there faster and better.

 

We don’t disagree that we want our children to be safe.  We disagree on the methods and principles that will s...

Faith In Mayberry

Movement from one state in your life to another will always entail chaos. Birth is messy. In the Hero’s Journey the height of this mess is the Dark Night of the Soul.

 

This follows the first major confrontation with evil, during which you are defeated. Emptied out.   Nothing left.

 

Why? Because if you had what it took to reach your goal, you’d have already reached it.   You have to END who you are, shed your false self-image and dig down to create something new. And it feels like death.  Pa...

The power of courtesy

 

Reading FBI hostage negotiator Chris Voss’s book “Never Split The Difference” I’m struck by the fact that this man, negotiating with bankrobbers and terrorists, refers to the guy on the other side of the table as his “counterpart.”

 

“The guy on the opposite side of the table isn’t the problem. The situation is.”   This reminds me of a politician referring to an “opponent” as “the distinguished gentleman from such and such” and “my esteemed colleague.”

 

If Voss can speak with someone with...

Scrappers, Leaders, and Masters

It is unreasonable to expect oppressed people to be more circumspect with their language, and kinder and more forgiving than average. That said, it is those who CAN be circumspect kind, and empathetic who are most likely to build bridges. They must also be cautious to remain strong, because that strength will be tested.

 

The oppressor will always be the oppressed in some other category, so it behooves the wise to practice a doctrine of tolerance, compassion, and shared humanity–it WILL be yo...