Something worthwhile on my keyboard...

Someone who has just recently left Facebook for personal reasons said this to me:

"We are all giving away way too much great stuff to Zuckerberg."

I agree with her and will, this year, be doing a lot more creative writing via my blog which does automatically post to my Facebook wall. 

I've noticed, however, that fb friends are much less inclined to take the additional step of clicking the link and waiting for the blog post to open. 

Not that it's hard but we seem to have become so programmed to instantaneous abbreviation that any extra "effort" isn't considered. 

Oh well, your loss. 

I'll be expanding that exposure too. 

By the way: thanks to you all who've bought my eBook, GREY.

Not setting the world ablaze but sales are steadily chugging along. 

There will be much more effort to engage with other creative writing sites and journalists (such as this lady is) as there is much to say and I have a will and, I'm told, a voice with which to say it. 

If you're interested in journalism of an altogether more substantive quality, check out Truth Barrier at www.truthbarrier.com

Happy trails, people.

http://truthbarrier.com

FIDELITY...

Let's be honest - the concept of being "faithful" within a relationship is usually a spillover from the religious tenets of maintaining physical fidelity which in and of itself is surely fundamentally flawed…

If one is lucky enough to partner with another human during our fleeting time on this planet in this material plane of existence and you find yourselves enjoying compatibility across all aspects of your relationship: the physical, the intellectual, the emotional and the spiritual, then fidelity must encompass all those facets….no?

For me, I came to one of those epiphanic moments through (yes, that's right) reading and the simple yet amazingly profound traditions of the Native American cultures through Medicine Wheel teaching (culminated in Kenneth Meadows' book, The Medicine Way ISBN-10: 1862040222 / ISBN-13: 978-1862040229)

It revealed to me how and why the Westernised approach to life had gone so horribly awry and, in a microcosmic sense, why I too was living a life devoid of fulfillment.

In a nutshell the traditional way of perceiving this shared reality in the Medicine Wheel teachings was through the elements, in turn defined by the cardinal directions in the wheel, each one representative of each facet of our existence.

North represented Air / Intellect and where we "receive" information from the universe

South represented Water / Emotions and where we "give" of ourselves

East represented Fire / Spirit (where the sun rises) and where we "determine" / make decisions that shape our pathway in life

West represented Earth / Body (where the sun falls into the Earth) - material physicality and where we "hold" our strength.

When one approaches life in this way, a balance is created in each facet of our lives and fulfillment is attained as the link between the four cardinal directions is through the centre of the wheel which essentially feeds our soul or pathway to God - call it what you will.

In simplistic terms, the Western way of life effectively ratchets the way we interact with life by one notch out of harmony and thus is created a whole different set of defining guidelines:

East becomes North where we no longer "receive" information from the universe but actually make decisions in our lives without that inner integrity - now based solely on intellect and logic devoid of that innate guiding instinct.

West is now South where we "give" of ourselves - no longer from that base of emotional integrity but purely in the physical sense where what would have been emotional love now becomes physical lustful interaction and loses its deeper meaning. And the physical/material aspects of existence become our defining value system thereby diminishing intrinsic human values.

North is now East where we are receiving input from the universe but don't have the capacity to recognise this any longer

South becomes West where we now "hold" our strengths - not physically but emotionally. We hold onto emotional baggage and drama which is debilitating in every sense and manifests in all sort of physical ailments as we cannot get to the root of our issues and process them. The Western answer to this is therapy which once again intellectualises issues which require to be dealt with in an emotional arena, a concept which is almost impossible to do within the value structures to which we've become confined.

When we realise the simplicity of how we can actually exist and we look for those aspects in a partner (and are lucky enough to find them), fidelity isn't really an issue any longer as our means of defining purpose in our lives takes on a different perspective and fulfillment is more readily attained.

And once a person is fulfilled emotionally, intellectually, physically and spiritually, there is little enticement to seek those aspects outside of that relationship - it simply serves no purpose.

And our relationship with others also attains a more meaningful dynamic.

Well, it certainly works for me.

YOU ARE WHAT YOU IS...

If all humans responded to "nutrition" in exactly the same way, there would be a universal diet that worked for everyone. They don't and there isn't. Hence the plethora of "scientific" opinions when it comes to nutrition and what is deemed "essential".

And the opinions vary radically from "you must eat meat as a vegetarian diet doesn't do it for you" to "meat isn't necessary at all" to all incremental arguments in between.

And they are all supported by "facts" and "nutritional science" right?

So it is claimed. 

And then start on the detail: eat carbs and protein separately… no, eat them together…..if you avoid foods with fat, you will not put on weight (fat)…..if you avoid sugars ditto….if you have a certain blood type you should only eat certain foodstuffs….and then there is the raw food - processed foods debate not to mention the exponential upsurge of allergy-related ailments that now beset the Western population of the planet…what was a godsend in human development - agriculture and the cultivation of wheat and other grains has now become a curse in the form of gluten and other natural foods which are now euphemistically referenced as "allergens" making what once sustained us, the enemy within.

What has changed since then? Uh - probably everything, not least of which our own evolution and change in perception not to mention the increase in synthesised products being passed off as food when in truth they are merely food-like products.

Meat eaters love to show how unhealthy a pure vegan diet can be and for some maybe that's true - for others it certainly isn't.

And I do not for one moment believe that we need meat products in any manner or form to maintain balanced health and wellbeing but this argument appeases the carnivores in their meat choices - it is essential, I am told. No, it isn't. But if you want to eat meat because you like it then admit that that's the case instead of using the old "it's essential" chestnut to validate the support of a horrifically cruel industry. We all make choices about what we eat and all that I advocate is that that choice is well informed. In many, many cases it isn't and even sadder - many more don't give a shit either way.

For me, diet, nutritional intake is as much about belief as it is about choice and what you believe (nocebo / placebo) has a very significant effect on your wellbeing - period.

Food choices are the same for me as tobacco usage: if tobacco unequivocally caused cancer through its use then why didn't millions of Native Americans succumb to this dread disease as tobacco has been a sacred part of that culture for millennia? And why doesn't everyone who smokes develop cancer? Genetic proclivity, I hear one say and yet, it's almost universally agreed that lifestyle and anthropogenic influence is more likely to cause cancer than most heredity. 

Nature? Nurture? Permutations of both? The latter, I think coupled with personal choices and personal beliefs.

Perception is everything and our relationship with what we eat perhaps even more significant. But who takes time out nowadays to make a proper and thankful ritual of a meal when we are such busy, important creatures that would rather chomp super-sized shit on the run and suck our coffee through a plastic nozzle instead of touching the liquid with our lips directly from an organic ceramic vessel?

I'll just keep on with my horrible vegetarian diet, thanks very much and be very happy about it - oh and try really hard not to ram it down anyone else's throat. I was a carnivore once and I do believe that (in my case) I evolved but to each his own.

You are what you eat? You betcha - and even more apposite - you are what you believe...

Don't you just hate it when everything you've worked for over a long period of time gets sucked into the hoover of corporate greed and the new kids on the block want to fuck you over for as little as possible?
One of my personal bugbears: at any given time, businessmen are given the opportunity to do the "right" and honourable thing and yet nine times out of ten they elect to try and screw over
a) The client
b) The suppliers
c) Their own people
d) All of the above

Done with this bullshit. Death to this and the birth of new beginnings...

On Mandela's Final Farewell

On Mandela's final farewell

I know much will still be said, much has already been said but watching that funereal procession done military style with the mournful dirge echoing out across the Qunu plains and the accompanying cannon fusillade, this ritual has really brought it home to me quite emphatically.

It stirred within me much more emotion than I've felt up until now.

The liberator of a nation is truly being laid to rest now.

I guess the fact that these are the hills and fields in which the young Rolihlahla played with his friends, before embarking on a life of such magnitude, and to which he now returns, seem so much more poignant than the lying in state or the stadium event that preceded it. Certainly for me.

This is visceral. This is going home. This is saying goodbye.

This is the beginning of a new era should we allow that.

I sincerely hope that we do.

Hamba kahle, Madiba and thank you.

E-Toll Gatvol

THE E-TOLL RAP

Engage the public - we did that - the ANC perception

A lie, of course, another disingenuous deception

And when, at last, we do find out their nasty little scheme

And challenge it they merely say: We don't know what you mean!

What they don't know or won't admit or choose just to ignore

I think they may have bitten off more than they've ever done before 

The topic then, I'm glad you ask, it's packaged as e-Toll

The straw that breaks the camel's back - for us we're just GATVOL! 

 

EMAIL ETIQUETTE..... DOES IT EXIST?

I once thought that it had to be me or perhaps just the calibre of the staff in the companies I dealt with through emailed correspondence, (which, in most countries, is legally binding communication), when it came to atrocious (read: nonexistent) email etiquette.

And it is clear that:

a) No-one in any business school teaches this stuff

b) Common sense is totally absent from the process

Why, for example, when you have taken the time to CC various recipients on a mail, does the primary respondent elect to REPLY rather than REPLY TO ALL when he responds?

Is this just retarded, unconsciously stupid, deliberately obtuse or obliviously ignorant?

I'm never sure...

But when I politely reply (after having added back all the omitted people in the mail trail) requesting that ALL on the mailing list should be included in any responses, more often than not, the fuckwit simply hits the REPLY button again and thus commences the process all over again...

And if you happen to mention a person in the context of a formal communiqué, it is apposite that that person is included in the CC window, otherwise what is being implied if they are omitted?

This is akin to talking behind one's back when transparency should be the order of the day. Besides, if what you are saying about that person in a professional capacity is in any way inaccurate, it at least offers them the right of reply unless, of course, you are intending to sully their name in a private discourse.

Then there is the content of the email itself.

You are generating an enquiry which involves several questions, which, in my usual project management anal-retentive approach, I place into a numbered list requesting that my queries are addresssed point for point.

Lo and behold, in the majority of cases, the respondent might answer 60 or 80% of your queries and omit replying to the rest and thus you sit wondering if

a) They didn't manage to read to the end of the mail (another contemporary disease that besets society in our abbreviated approach to any form of detail)...

b) They did read it all but don't have all the answers...

In either case, it requires yet another email politely (but firmly) asking the twat about the unanswered questions. And if it's a typical contemporary mailmoron, you can bet that you'll be adding in all the omitted recipients which he forgot to include in his incomplete response.

Even if the fucktard has read to the end of the mail (yeah, right!), then surely it makes sense to simply write a reply along the lines of: In answer to your queries 1 - 4, I advise as follows......, however, in the case of 5 & 6, I shall have to research those issues and get back to you (they usually say "revert" which they think means "get back to you" when in fact, it simply means to return to a previous state - interesting when they always seem to exist in a state of permanent opacity!).

But no, there is simply a part answer and no suggestion that they have read, understood and are working on the balance of the unanswered shit and so commences the next round of emails.

What really slays me is when I receive a mail requesting a bunch of detailed information which I send by return mail (to all recipients and more besides if that's apposite), usually embedded below each of the queries in the original text with a covering note in the body of my response. And very often even that fails when the information supplied is deemed to be "too complicated" or too much info to digest!

There is absolutely no doubt that as we "progress"with our technological "advancements" that the facets of common sense, courtesy and the ability to actually process information moves in the opposite direction entirely if there is any type of effort or real thinking involved.

And the cherry for me is when people ask: why do you send so many emails to me?

When the obvious reply would be: Because, you fucking retard, you failed to respond to all of my original enquires in the first place and you omitted the recipients on that email and those which followed so if you are going to adopt a piecemeal approach to dealing with issues then expect an iterative approach in return.

If, however, you elect to answer all queries meaningfully and entirely and include all original recipients in that response then - hey - we would get away with just two emails to address the entire caboodle.

You fucking arsehole!

End of rant