Consumers

I hear we live in a consumer economy. The term is used in media constantly. It is a given. By defining human beings as consumers, some human beings exploit human greed and materialism for great profit. This is not new.

Stepping away from the addictive process of consuming every new thing is part of an awakening. The brainwashers of advertising use peer pressure and fear of isolation to peddle electronic devices, cars, clothing, alcohol and soft drinks. They used to peddle cigarettes in the same way, before the product was revealed to be more toxic than being the odd man out.

Watching television with commercials has always felt like manipulation to me. I could not enjoy the content of a drama or comedy without the nagging feeling that my brain was being programmed to do things against my better interests. I stopped watching commercial TV about twenty-five years ago.

I come back to the Japanese Buddhist mantra , "Person environment one." If you are submerged visually in commercial advertising all day, your mind and your environment are no longer your own. You are inhaling messages, overt and covert, which shape your ideals and your interests. The goal of the originators of these messages is simple. They wish to own you.

You are what you eat. In a similar way, you are what you watch and consume. Taking time away from the messages of media and the process of consuming or planning to consume is essential to finding your center. Meditation is a useful tool for this. Yoga is another. Other forms of focused activity, geared to releasing the mind from cluttered thought, are useful tools to break the pattern of wanting and buying and wanting more.

As I have said before, wanting more when you are full is a symptom of disease. The lords of the consumer economy never want you to stop wanting. This is a struggle for your health and mental well being in a world driven by money and profit. The choices are difficult and require great balance and persistence.

Crises

The best way to avoid constant crises in life is to avoid constant crises in life. By increasing your awareness and general state of mindfulness, many of life's so-called crises can be avoided entirely by proper planning and responsible action.

Yes, shit happens. To a certain degree, accidents are unavoidable. However, many accidents are the results of lack of care and attention in potentially dangerous situations. Improper home or car maintenance are common precursors to accidents, for example. There is no need to invite shit to happen.

It is important to know yourself and to take full, proactive responsibility for yourself and your personal environment, which includes all spaces you occupy in life. Practice, as I use the word frequently in my writing, includes vigilant and persistent maintenance of body and environment. The practice of meditation assists the brain in taking a relaxed and clear view of your life and your environment. Exercise, proper nutrition and adequate sleep maintain the brain and body in a state of efficiency and adequacy to the task of averting or dealing with disaster.

Multiple personal crises are symptomatic of disease and/or personal dysfunction in your environment. Where there is constant and dedicated practice, crises are minimal, because practice places you in a functional and efficient state wherever you find yourself in life. Instead of being a barreling, reactive train, headed for a wreck, the person with a well established practice of health and mindfulness is like a gyroscope, always maintaining balance and simply bouncing away when it hits obstacles.

Disease

Wanting for more, when you are already full, is a symptom of disease.

Breathing

I have had to learn how to breathe. Breathing deeply and slowly has become a conscious practice for me. I spent the greater part of my life unconsciously focusing tension in my chest, gut and neck muscles. Tightened chest, tightened gut, poor posture, poor breathing. Poor breathing, poor oxygenation to brain and muscle, which leads to more tension and even worse breathing. The result is disease and dysfunction.

Learning to sense tension in your body is a very good health-promoting skill. Taking an inventory occasionally through the day is the key. While sitting in a task chair or walking to work or sitting on the subway, consider your own body's posture and attitude. Straighten the spine with chin up and shoulders back. Inhale deeply. Exhale deeply. Repeat. Feel the change in your body. It will relax. You may even feel a burst of alertness and increased energy, as your brain is oxygenated.

Whenever you can, follow this procedure throughout the day. Stretch your arms and legs. Remember to keep your chin elevated as you look at monitor screens, listen to lectures or carry on conversations. This helps to keep the posture erect with shoulders back.

This activity is a form of meditation. It brings you back within your consciousness of your own life, your own body, which is ultimately all you truly and temporarily possess in life. Mindfulness of your own state of well being or dysfunction is the first step to greater mindfulness. By staying well, you will have energy to practice compassion and generosity to others.

Reproduction

At the core of all the problems facing the human species is its inability to examine and effectively deal with human reproduction. Reproduction is considered a human right, but dealing rationally with reproduction has not been treated effectively by most societies as a human responsibility.

The result is the ever-growing problem of overpopulation, which lies at the root of all the planetary problems of our age. Do you doubt this? If so, I would suggest that you are either ill informed or naive.

Industrialization, based in petroleum, has developed as a means to support population, as well as a means for the most aggressive and wily of our species to ensure their own progeny's survival and dominance . This petroleum based industrialization is the cause of global warming. It is the basis of corporate agriculture, which is stamping out biodiversity and producing food which can maintain an overpopulated planet at a huge cost in nutritional and cultural value. The processing of human waste in industrialized, urban population centers produces a sludge, which is used as fertilizer on millions of acres of land. The heavy metals in that sludge have already rendered thousands upon thousands of acres permanently useless for food production, due to the heavy metals from pipes and pollutants in it.

Educated people in industrialized countries look to the underdeveloped world and shake their heads at the lack of family planning there. Well motivated couples adopt children from those countries, as opposed to having children of their own. These people are perhaps the most rational and courageous planetary stewards in our times. However, corporate capitalism preaches the values of overpopulation, which is considered 'growth'. More cookie-cutter developments, more widgets for more factories to produce more useless junk to fill more landfills. Insanity.

An examination of the Chinese experience with The One-Child Policy illustrates the inability of human beings to address, understand and control their own reproduction for the common good of the species. And, even in a China which is now reaping the benefits of that policy, it is spoken of with condemnation by 'human rights' advocates in China and abroad. How about the human right to have enough space to grow food and enough clean air to breathe?

I hold the opinion that being a truly mindful and compassionate Humanist entails a commitment to fostering and practicing socially responsible reproduction of the human species. It is key. Wars, disease and famine have been the only modifiers of human population to date. With advances in medicine, a growing abhorrence of war, and a growing movement to feed the poor of the world, overpopulation will become a more and more obvious issue. Whether human beings will be able to chose quality of human existence for all people over their selfish choices, based on sexual and instinctual urges, may well determine the survival and continued evolution of our species.

Gaza

Overpopulation is the most critical environmental and ethical issue on the planet. It is also the most ignored. This is simple to explain. Overpopulation is a problem of heterosexuality, ignorance and religion. Heterosexuals are the majority. Ignorance is rampant in a world where personal greed takes precedence over public education. Religion maintains control of women by the men who foster it by encouraging high birth rates.

Gaza is a striking microcosm of this phenomenon.

Women who maintain practice and their personal freedom are especially challenged and especially admirable. They must overcome great obstacles to see past their conditioning and control by men in their lives. Women will either solve the problem of overpopulation or the species will suffer tremendously before becoming decimated by starvation, disease and perpetual war.

Possession

We truly possess nothing. Possession implies control over that which is possessed. At best (or worst), we make a social contract through Law to have the exclusive right to hold or use something. Yet, the Law can take that so-called possession away at the rap of a gavel. Even our own bodies are not solely controlled by ourselves in society. And, if you have ever yet dealt with a life-threatening or maiming disease, you know that possession of a human body is no guaranteed paradise or refuge. I recently watched a documentary about the removal of radical Jewish settlers from the Gaza Strip. Indoctrinated by theology, these poor human beings went through hellish torment. Not at the hands of the Israeli army, which had the sad task of trying to help these people. In fact, their hell was a result of their religious gullibility and delusions. They simply could not let go without torturing themselves in the process. Learning to tread the Middle Path between possession and being possessed is a very crucial part of my own practice. It requires tremendous will to propel my spirit from the weight of fear, conditioning and the endless pressures of society to conform to the delusion of materialism.

Religion

Religion is segregation. Religion breeds elitism. Religion fosters comparison and conflict. The hereditary nature of religion supports hierarchy, patriarchy and the oppression of the poor. Religion is not an opiate; it is a disease.

Surgery

I have become acquainted with surgery in recent years. An acquaintance I would have gladly avoided. The advancements in surgery have helped me to an extent. However, they have also caused me to reflect on my powerlessness over the deterioration of my own body. This is the greater benefit. I am learning to truly accept what I truly am. I am a finite and physically vulnerable living being. Learning to accept this with heartfelt peace, not mournful resignation, has been one of my greatest accomplishments. I never thought, in my troubled youth, that I would ever achieve such personal peace. Part of my practice is to share this sense of peace in hope that it will ease the fear of aging and death for others.

Insanity

The truly insane are incapable of behaving sanely. This is an important realization for those of us in an overcrowded world. There are subtle and less subtle forms of insanity. Some insanity is brought on by the use of mind-bending drugs or too much alcohol. For those less fortunate, insanity is simply a genetic state of being. And, as people live longer and longer, insanity often comes with cerebral aging and deterioration. The best way to test one's own sanity is in the company of truthful and loving friends. Isolation is a path to insanity for most of us. It is the rare person who can weather isolation with a sane mind. I have worked with the insane for many years. I have also been confronted with insanity in my family and in others, with whom I have had various relationships. Insanity breeds fear and cruelty. Sanity is maintained with love and by loving. Once lost, sanity is extremely hard to recover. I strive to maintain my sanity with my daily practice.