Whether you are a parent or not, you must have been running into a debate on children being affected by violence on TV or in video games. For myself, being in a milieu of active parenthood, the issue presents itself often in a sensitive way. Actually this is one of the challenges for the actual generation of parents. I say parents, because for the kids it is part of their life, without options or much choice. You might be a parent already, or you will be, or maybe not. But the challenge of giving a response to this issue will reach you. The sooner the better, so, should kids be protected from all violence seen on the monitor?
Archive for the ‘Conscious living’ Category
The violence on the monitor issue
What if the guru is still alive?
The ideal guru is the dead guru. You can just picture him in any way you want. Since he doesn’t affect you directly, you can just imagine him the way you want. He can’t contradict you, you can turn his words in any way you want. You can reference him as you like, as confirmation of your ideas. The worst that could happen is getting into an argument on whether he was right or wrong about that. Sort of a comfort zone. But what if the guru is still alive?
Best Practices for New Year’s Resolutions
Try to remember last year’s resolutions. Did you succeed in keeping them? How many commitments were there? And how many did you keep? Do you remember them at all? After answering yourself to these questions, consider the new ones that just came to life thanks to your enthusiasm at this time. I am sure you are very determined to keep them. Your confidence is at its apotheosis as it should be at every New Year’s resolution time. But just right before it explodes, give a chance to decency. Based on your previous rate of keeping your resolutions, what are the odds for these new ones?
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Shift your perspective on time
Even if we perceive time as a continuous flow of events, originating in the past and unfolding in the future, there is another perspective, a different one, worth considering. A dual perspective delimiting just present and non-present moments. When we talk in terms of time as a flow of unfolding and concealing events, we have the triad of past-present-future. This sequential delimiting is pertaining to our relative existence, thus to our comparative reality. However, if we reorganize our attitude in the context of the existential perspective, herein considering our self developmental potential, the triad can be reduced to the duality of present and non-present. This leads to reorganization of our experience in the self-developmental context, which is the subject of today’s Vertegram post.
On the way to face the absurd
Facing the absurd can become a spring-board for spiritual evolution. This was the final note on the previous post on humor. The absurd is at the root of all jokes. Even if it doesn’t seem obvious. Meeting the absurd is one essential experience that we all have to face, more or less often. The way we are able to deal with it determines how we move on the scale that takes from clarity to despair, form freeing the conscience to suffocation. We are rarely told about this cornerstone of our existential experiences, so I will try to share a few of my thoughts on this.
Enjoying a good laugh
As the good Colonel said, “Nobody likes a good laugh more than I do… except, perhaps my wife… and some of her friends. Oh, yes, and Captain Johnson. Come to think of it, most people like a good laugh more than I do, but that’s beside the point!” In that spirit, today we’ll have a talk on humor. On a serious blog like this one. Feels awkward, somewhat like when you need to explain a joke. You know that feeling, don’t you?
The Autodidacticism Complex
Should self development be considered a form of autodidacticism? How far can one go in relying on his own abilities to learn? My take here is to handle this tough questions on both levels of personal development and spiritual development. Personal development deals with the unfolding of all abilities required for a healthy personality in the current social and cultural milieu. Spiritual development deals with the essential parts of human life and being. But can autodidacticism work well for both developmental quests?
Where the revolt against the older world got us
Regarding personal development trends, I came to notice a paradoxical situation. By definition, it is all about building up a successful person. In time, there were major influences on the discipline, although its major characteristic is to come up with something new and revolutionary as often as possible. Just to be in touch with modern times. Even if it’s the same old recipe, a repackaging makes it shiny and lots of new adepts are gathering around it. Also, some of the recipes are standing strong on scientific grounds, many are simply based on the strong belief of the follower. Thus, approaching such adepts with some regular conversation, I was surprised how easily and normally we handled even sensitive religious matters. But not the ones related to their own, accepted and followed personal success recipes or paths. Seemingly, these systems of personal success beliefs give something more that even religions fail to deliver.
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The Secret starting to be revealed
By the mid of April I wrote an article expressing my concerns regarding the infatuation of ‘The Secret’ ’s concept and followers. It took only 5 months to see some unpleasant facts coming to light about the preachers of this “revolutionary” nonsense. Strangely, this also came as a relief for the discomfort I started to feel regarding quite a few personal development blogs to which I subscribed in time. It was saddening to see how the original ideas behind these blogs on personal development turned slowly into a belief system. All centered around the Law of Attraction, as presented in ‘The Secret’. Reducing it all to the simple minded formula (often verdict) of “this is so ’cause this is what you have attracted”. Almost like ‘The Secret’ and the ‘Law of Attraction’ turned into a religious conviction. So, now there is this situation of “The Secret” ’s David Schirmer being exposed.
Is Self-Definition Easier Today?
In straight accordance with your age, you are now in a distinct phase of your life where you are redefining yourself. Self-definition is an ongoing process, for as long as you live. Our lives are subdued to a historical presence and an existential reality. The historical presence is also subdued to live in a comparative reality. In every time sequence of our lives, the comparative approach is remodeling our identity. And comparative approach is dependent on the cultural, social and historical context. This dependency is what creates the frames for us, mostly in how we can manage to define ourselves. This self-definition needs to be ever reassuring in order to keep our balance. We live now, so is the actual context in favour of this need for self-definition? With all the progress of the modern world, is it easier today to define ourselves?
