Clarion

Grounding: My Operational Realities – Ken Hood

Jan 1, 2023 |

 
Screen Shot 2023-01-01 at 2.48.35 PM
Ken Hood
OPERATIONAL REALITIES
 
We all live by, and within, our own realities. Most of the time, we all share these realities. We all act as if the chair we sit in is real, and will hold us. We believe, and in this case, it’s “true” based on empirical and replicable evidence. It works.
 
But what about Philip K. Dick, one of the most famous science fiction writers in history. He was also a philosopher, who posited that we may all be living in someone else’s dream. The “matrix” before The Matrix. He wasn’t convinced at all that the chair was “real.” Neither is the schizophrenic when off their meds. And let’s add, neither were some notable philosophers through the ages too.
 
So even something so “true” as the chair is not true to everyone.
 
Now let’s take it one more step. Why do you or I get up in the morning to live yet another day?
 
There are truly countless answers to this question. Many are based on well-thought-out “realities.” But others are hardly thought through. Some deep. Some shallow. Some complex. Some very simple. Some only unconscious.
 
But our individual realities, beliefs, and values, whether consciously thought of or not… they guide us (I would suggest they may drive us) to get up, live our lives, go to bed, get up, and do it all again. We breathe, we eat and drink, and we carry on in our realities. Until some of us don’t. Because, for whatever reason, their reality no longer worked to keep them alive.
 
Many brilliant people, many creative geniuses, many “successful” people… they choose not to carry on any longer. People who had value to us and many others… their “reality” no longer worked for them. They ended their lives because their reality did not work for them anymore. Robin Williams is the most painful example of that to me. You likely have a name in your mind right now too.
read more…

Review of Brian Zahnd’s ‘Farewell to Mars’ – by Wayne Northey

Aug 29, 2015 | ,

The author not only believes in Jesus in an “orthodox” way, he believes in Jesus’ ideas in a “radical” way. For that is who Jesus is, when it comes to the political: radical. When we fail at embracing Jesus’ political ideas, we inevitably recruit him in support of the (national) status quo. The author claims this has plagued the church since the fourth century. The church forever (almost) has separated Jesus from his ideas.

Getting the Enemy Right – Walter Thiessen

Aug 24, 2015 |

It seems to me that if we want to find any passion and determination inside of ourselves (collectively or individually), we need to have some clear and shared sense of which enemy we are really wanting to fight. If we can find a common enemy that crosses political (or...