More stuff is not enough

It’s now only six weeks away from the launch of my book Discover Your SoulTemplate, which comes out on November 15 via Inner Traditions. This is the first of several short extracts from the book which I will post here from time to time. I think the following is very relevant, given the rocky economic times we live in. It refers of the tendency to disguise unbalanced materialism as spirituality in some current philosophies.

Marcus

More Stuff Is Not Enough

We need to acknowledge the essence of truth that the New Age movement and a “can-do” attitude contain. However, we also have to examine the dangers inherent within these approaches.

The current world crisis is a wakeup call. More money and machines are not enough. Spirit needs the integration of self and soul, in the simplicity of your presence, here and now, fully extant within your body. It is this which will allow your love to shine through into this world.

The materialism of the modern world has created the delusion—the distraction—that what we need is more stuff. This is not just an American problem. It is a global issue, and developing countries like China and India are buying into the mindset. We have slowly fallen into a collective drowsy numbness where consuming products and amusing ourselves with gadgets is the central meaning of life. The current world crisis is a wakeup call, telling us that money and machines do not free the soul.

The truth is that we don’t need all that much stuff. What Spirit genuinely calls for and needs is love: the integration of self and soul, and to express that love in creative ways that allow Spirit to shine through into the world. When this happens, your life will automatically be in alignment with the evolution of the human oversoul template.

           

What I see in some self-help and New Age philosophies is a worldview that provides tools and techniques for manifestation, but often with no concurrent tools for introspection, for integration of self and soul. The truth is that all the cars, houses, and stuff in the world will leave you empty if you do not make the spiritual journey within.

           

Make no mistake. When you stand in your power as a man or woman, you will have a far greater degree of love and power than you can possibly imagine. That love and power, though, is born of Spirit, not the desire of the ego for more stuff, more attention, and more status.

           

An empowered human being is a wise human being, one with depth. Despite superficial appearances, a human being expressing an unbalanced control and power consciousness is not empowered at all. Fundamentally, he is weak, and remains trapped in fear and separation. This is true, regardless of how much he gets what he wants. The total misuse of power by Hitler stemmed from his weakness, the complete absence of wisdom within his personality.

           

Recently I read an article about a certain pop culture figure who has the kind of fame, attention, power, and money most people can only dream of. She has a certain spiritual philosophy herself, although it is heavily centered within the ego. Yet, if you allow yourself to look at her through the eyes of Spirit, a great deal of her energy takes the form of fear. She lives on a refined diet from which she has eliminated all food products that are known to have connections with aging, such as sugar. Her poor partner was forbidden from bringing such things into the house! The writer of the article referred to the woman with the typical judgmental scorn of the popular media. The truth is that this star’s behavior is not particularly surprising. The fears of the decay of physical form, and of death itself, are universal.

           

In part such fears are biologically wired into us, but the fear is also an expression of the ego. If you are honest, you will also recognize this fear within yourself. The ego inevitably identifies with the body and the personality state. The star’s behavior was a typical attempt to establish control and power—over the body, and also over mortality itself.

           

Looking after the body is part of being a responsible human being. It is the intention underlying the behavior that establishes whether the behavior is empowering or not. In this case, the star’s behavior was underpinned by an attempt to preserve the body because of the ego’s identification with it. No attempt to perpetuate an ego state is empowering, as all ego states are born of fear and are impermanent. Empowering behavior is underpinned by the wisdom of Spirit, and part of that wisdom is being aware that fear of death and impermanence can strangle the soul.

Skate or Die Practicing

Bob Bournquist

Imagine falling 40 feet from a building and landing on concrete. You’d probably experience some serious damage, and the prospect of death is a genuine possibility. Yet this is effectively the possibility that top-notch skateboarders face when they attempt the most radical maneuvers on the Mega ramp.

Bob Bournquist is a skateboarder described as taking “Mega-Ramp skating to daunting new heights.

Bournquist spent two hours last Saturday attempting a 900-degree rotation above the huge wall of the Mega ramp at Vista, California.

Eventually he nailed it. Take a look at the video here. The feat was described as "possibly the best trick to date on a skateboard" by Bucky Lasek. Bob Bournquest became only the fifth skateboarder to successfully complete the 900, but the first to do it "fakie to fakie”. He is also the first to do it on the 25 foot Mega ramp – the others did it on smaller 15 foot ramps. He skated up the wall backward – climbing some 40 feet above ground and spinning 900 degrees then landing backward!

Tony Hawk, the skateboarder who was the first to successfully complete the 900 in 1999 commented that: "Bob has upped the ante once again and ramp skating will never be the same, thanks to him. He is unbelievable."

What interests me about this amazing feet is how readily it exemplifies the features of deliberate practice, as I outlined in my last post  here on 22c+. People who succeed at something at levels far beyond ordinary are not typically more gifted than others. They just work a lot harder and smarter.

Geoff Colvin’s Talent is Overrated is a thoroughly researched volume which shows that innate ‘genius’ is not enough for a person to become exceptionally good at something. What unites the greats from Mozart, to Tiger Woods, to Bill Gates to Bob Bournquist is that they practice their craft again and again and again, intelligently and systematically. Let me just recap the features of deliberate practice. They may seem mundane, but they are vital to anyone who has a passion to succeed at something they love.

Deliberate practice is hard work. You need to come out of your comfort zone, and fail repeatedly, and learn from those failures. Mot people just keep doing the stuff they know they can do, over and over again, year after year. That’s not deliberate practice.

Deliberate practice is designed specifically to improve performance. You must carefully analyse your weaknesses, then work diligently to bring them up to scratch.

Repetition is common to deliberate practice. The most successful footballers, violinists and golfers tend to put in far more hours than those who are less successful.

To be most effective, deliberate practice requires feedback. This is best given by someone very knowledgeable in the domain. Self-feedback must be brutally honest.

Practicing something systematically and intelligently is highly mentally demanding. It requires a great deal of focus and concentration.

How well does the amazing skateboard feats of Bob Bournquist conform to the ideal makeup of deliberate practice?

Bournquist doesn’t give up easily. After a recent competition he announced that he was going for the 900. But it proved extremely difficult. He kept failing over and over again. When asked how many times he has attempted the 900, Bournquist answered, "I've tried hundreds of times, probably 900 times, who knows?"

That’s hard work and a lot of failures. His extraordinary performance required an inordinate amount of time spent out in the discomfort zone. When he finally managed that jump, it was after two hours of trying on that day alone.

Bournquist said: "I didn't want it just to be another 900. In my mind I'm like, 'I don't care how long it takes, I'm going to do it differently.' "

In fact, behind that jump of a few seconds lies 15 years of intense competition for the 33 year old Brazilian, and probably more than 20 years of total skateboarding experience. This is consistent with findings which indicate that it takes at least ten years of deliberate practice to reach world class in most fields.

Bob Bournquist is one committed person living his Bliss. The popular t-shirt says "Skate or die", and Bournquist is a man pushing the limits of mortal existence.

Is Education Killing Us?

Thanks to 22c+ member, Karl, for alerting me to this story.

Just how useful is school? According to one now (somewhat) famous recent high school graduate, it's worse than useless - it's actually dangerous! Erica Goldson graduated as valedictorian of Coxsackie-Athens High School just this last month. No doubt she would have been expected to prattle on about how great everyone was and how she became a better person for her years at school. Instead she took the opportunity to trash the system! You can see the video and read the actual speech, below. Here I offer a few insights of my own, taking specific quotes from Erica’s talk, and suggesting some of its limitations.

Erica highlights many of the issues which I have critiqued in my own writings about education and Deep futures. She says that system is dominated by credentialism, and the test has become the focus of the curriculum. Modern education is embedded within an extremely materialistic society, where the dash for cash is the prime motif in many lives (I might point out that I believe this is less so in Australia and New Zealand, where I have also taught high school).

(You should) Demand a setting that will provide you with intellectual capabilities that allow you to expand your mind instead of directing it. 

I would add to what this remarkable young woman has said here. By “intellectual capabilities”, Erica appears to be referring to independence of thought and the ability to individuate as a unique human being. My point is that the analytical mind and intellectual acuity are not enough to empower human beings towards their full potential, to live their Bliss. People also require an enabling of the intuitive mind and Integrated Intelligence.

One crucial issue that Erica fails to address in her speech is that the culture in which her education system is embedded within is often not hostile to individualism and radical thinking. In fact it is one of the major characteristics of the United States as a nation. It's not much different in Australia. I vividly recall the graduating class of my very first teaching post. It was 1992 at Warren Central School in inland New South Wales. The graduates marched into the school hall to the chorus of Pink Floyd's Another brick in the wall ("We don't need no education"). That school was in the tiny town of Warren, with just 2000 people, and in the middle of nowhere. The graduates were basically an unteachable rabble, and this was their way of say “Fuck you!” to the teachers and administrators. This was a phrase directed at teachers at irregular intervals by students expressing dissatisfaction with particular pedagogical processes of which they did not approve.