World-Wide Depression

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"Mysteriously and in ways that are totally remote from normal experience, the gray drizzle of horror induced by depression takes on the quality of physical pain ... it is entirely natural that the victim begins to think ceaselessly of oblivion."

WILLIAM STYRON, Darkness Visible

From Wikipedia:

"Styron's influence deepened and his readership expanded with the publication of Darkness Visible. This memoir was a description of the author's devastating descent into depression, the 'despair beyond despair'. By examining an illness that affects millions but is still widely misunderstood, Styron offered an intimate and very personal portrait of the agony of this ordeal, revealing the anguish of a mind 'desperate unto death'."

I'm writing this post (from the most personal perspective) because I had a rough time getting along with a good friend today and it's got me pondering myself into a depressive state...

I'm writing this post ( from the most global perspective ) because our World is caught-up in a downward spiral of Depression that has sporadic bouts of Mania thrown in to keep things from getting downright deathly boring.

I'm being slightly tongue-in-cheek right now but I'd rather be that way than stick my tongue out (at what's happening in our poor, sick World) and risk having it bitten off (by me or another fellow traveller...).

Check out this list of stages of Depression and think about our World:

• low mood
• low self-esteem
• pessimism
• fatigue, reduced energy
• disturbances of sleep (insomnia or hypersomnia)
• disturbances of appetite (anorexia or hyperphagia)
• agitation or retardation
• guilt
• sense of worthlessness
• hopelessness
• helplessness
• poor motivation
• poor concentration
• indecision
• loss of interest or pleasure in normal activities
• low libido
• recurrent thoughts of death

Far too many people ( and Organizations!) are expressing far too many of these traits...

What's the Spiritual Commentary on this "Current Event"?

We're very far from God . . .

Waging Peace

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Social Networks are all the rage.

MySpace, FaceBook, Orkut, Gather, etc. Spaces where people of "like-mind" can meet and share.

So...

Up steps Ning, a site that lets you create your own Social Network.

So...

I created one: Waging Peace !

In the blog on that site, I posed an issue and got a surprising and slightly mind-blowing response:

Where Is Everyone?

Started by Alexander M Zoltai on Mar 9, 2007, 7:12am –

Peace is a good thing...
So, why do you think more people aren't supporting it?

Posted by Dar Mar 10, 2007, 8:26am –

That is a very good question but the answer is as complex as people themselves. History is rife with war, many seemingly justifiable. Who among us would stand by, in the name of peace, and watch our livlihoods stripped from us, our homes taken from us and our families murdered? Who among us didn't feel we were watching honor and courage incarnate when we watched Mel Gibson in "The Patriot" or "The Lord of the Rings"? While the line between good and evil may seem black and white to some of us, that is only because we are comfortable and not living in war. Innumerable smaller situations innundate every day in chaos, making that line between black and white blur to gray. This is what has happened to so many of our soldiers in Iraq.It is the nature of all beings to survive. Humans have an extra piece to that; they want to survive and conquer- greed is inherent in human nature. If a war for greed can be disguised as a war for honor or homeland, more is the support for it. Attaching people's emotions to a cause is vital. It has always been those very qualities that we admired in William Wallace and Aragorn that, when combined with any number of personal belief systems can wreak havoc on the world. Some of the most heinous mass murderers in history went to their graves feeling much as William Wallace did-like they died fighting for a cause they knew to be true. The suffering and the glory are but 2 sides of the same coin. People are expert at rationalizing their beliefs--to the greater good or the greater peril--of us all. SO why don't people support peace? That is a question that will garner a billion individual answers.

Posted by Alexander M Zoltai Mar 10, 2007, 8:37am –

Dar!!!!
Extremely insightful and poignant analysis!
Nearly poetic in its power!!
Worthy of prominent display!!!
~ Alex
P.S. Can I put it in my blog?

Reply by Dar Mar 10, 2007, 8:58am –

Alex! You are so very kind! Of course--feel free to put it in your blog--I would be honored!!

A Gathering of Eagles

I've tried to be "global" in my approach to posts in this blog. Yet, I did define the theme as Spiritual Commentary on Current Events - from the Personal to the Global. This post is quite personal.

I'm a Veteran of the U.S. Navy.

I don't like the current war the U.S. is engaged in...

I respect the men and women who are "doing their duty", many of whom do it under duress, since to not do their "duty" would mean being locked up and the key getting misplaced...

If you look down two posts ago, you'll also see that I'm getting quite involved in non-violent solutions to world problems.

So...

I'm posting information from the Gathering of Eagles site. I don't agree with #9 in their mission statement but I really like the event they're currently promoting:

What: Gathering of Eagles

When: March 17th, 2007
0700-1600 (7 AM to 4 PM)

Where: The Vietnam Veteran's Memorial Wall, Washington D.C.

Why: To stand silent guard over our nation's memorials, in honor of our fallen, and in solidarity with our armed forces in harm's way today. Read our mission statement.

Head Count:

Petition 1: Sign if you are attending on March 17th

Petition 2: Sign if you cannot attend but will be with us in spirit.

A Spiritual Mystery . . .

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O.K., help me out here:

Egypt has recently been suspected of persecuting Shi‘ite Muslims.

Egypt has recently been accused of persecuting Baha'is.

Iran has a predominantly Shi‘ite population.

Iran has been persecuting Baha'is.

The Baha'i Faith arose from a transformation of "...a heterodox and seemingly negligible offshoot of the Shaykhi school of the Ithna-'Ashariyyih sect of Shi'ah Islam...".

Is this some kind of Spiritual Merry-Go-Round?

Are certain humans just profoundly perverse?

Are all religions from One God?

Are we really just One Human Family . . . that's horribly dysfunctional?

Is there any end in sight for such madness?

Will prayer and meditation really calm me in the midst of this storm and help me carry on?

I think I'll only answer the last question:

Yes!

A Force More Powerful

I've Recently Fallen DEEPLY Into This Non-Violent SPACE . . .

clipped from www.aforcemorepowerful.org

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Our World's "Situation" - #1

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I've put out a call for folks' opinions about the current "Situation of Our World". From time to time, as people send me their responses, I'll post them here.

The first response quotes the man pictured here, Jiddu Krishnamurti. I went to Wikipedia and found: "For nearly sixty years he travelled all over the world, pointing out to people the need to transform themselves through self knowledge..." which made me aware of the constant synchronicity in the universe, since the second response stresses education. And, even though education from the news isn't necessarily real close to self-knowledge, my second respondent links to CommonDreams.org which is a news site that respects and encourages self-knowledge...
This universe can be very friendly!

1st Response:

The following has been excerpted:

==========
1. SPR

Nothing can change a thing dynamically regarding the situation of The World if that thing must enter human beings through the mind and not exclusively the Heart. Nothing. The World (specifically, its “situation”) is the collective product of what is wrong with our individual hearts.

— from _Even More Graffiti_

© 26 February 2007, Sugarpie Rabbit

SPR | In the Face of Love

2. J. Krishnamurti

Questioner: What is the work of man?

Krishnamurti: What do you think it is? Is it to study, pass examinations, get a job, and do it for the rest of your life? Is it to go to the temple, join groups, launch various reforms? Is it man's work to kill animals for his own food? Is it man's work to build a bridge for the train to cross, dig wells in a dry land, to find oil, to climb mountains, to conquer the earth and the air, to write poems, to paint, to love, to hate? Is all this the work of man? Building civilisations [sic/British] that come toppling down in a few centuries, bringing about wars, creating God in one's own image, killing people in the name of religion or the State, talking of peace and brotherhood while usurping power and being ruthless to others — this is what man is doing all around you, is it not? And is this the true work of man?

You can see that all this work leads to destruction and misery, to chaos and despair. Great luxuries exist side by side with extreme poverty; disease and starvation, with refrigerators and jet planes. All this is the work of man; and when you see it don't you ask yourself, 'Is that all? Is there not something else which is the true work of man?' If we can find out what is the true work of man, then jet planes, washing machines, bridges, houses will all have an entirely different meaning; but without finding out what is the true work of man, merely to indulge in reforms, in reshaping what man has already done, will lead nowhere.

So, what is the true work of man? Surely the true work of man is to discover truth, God; it is to love and not to be caught in his own self-enclosing activities. In the very discovery of what is true there is love, and that love in man's relationship with man will create a different civilisation [sic], a new world.

— from _This Matter of Culture_, Chapter 17 Reproduced in _On Right Livelihood_, pp.39-40

© 1992, Krishnamurti Foundation Trust

2nd Response:

To begin with, I think political education is important for people who wish to more fully grasp the situation of the world. In the age of the Internet, self-education is easier, but still requires a lot of work. I read about an hour or more of news each day from different resources. I've found the most educational resource to be www.commondreams.org. I also check up on CNN, and I've started reading Le Monde so that I can get news from an alternative perspective.

I've read about the advent of the citizen blogger as a new source for news items, but as of yet I haven't integrated checking blog sites out into my news gathering routine.

Cheers,

Kathy
[ Kathy's Space on the Web...]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
So...

Two responses to "What's the Current World Situation?"

Would You like to weigh in with Your opinion?

A Journalist In Darfur

This is Awatif Ahmed Isshag.

She's been a journalist for the last ten years.

She lives in Darfur.

When events like the ongoing crisis in Darfur come to the attention of relatively secure people like me (resident of the USA, not starving, and not seeing death and destruction every day), we feel particularly helpless.

It's going to take more than the combined efforts of all the aid organizations there are to help people in that country [not to mention the horrible happenings in other countries].

It's going to take a massive change of heart--massive change for each individual who could help in any way and massive change for every government and political person who has any influence on secular happenings--a thorough spiritual transformation.

Can you hear it?

The world is crying, screaming for change...

The Dynamist Blog carried a short article about Awatif Ahmed Isshag. Here's just a taste:

"Nearly a decade ago, at 14, Isshag started publishing a handwritten community newsletter about local events, arts and religion. Once a month she'd paste decorated pages to a large piece of wood and hang it from a tree outside her family's home for passersby to read.

"Her grass-roots periodical has become the closest thing that El Fasher, capital of North Darfur state, has to a hometown newspaper. More than 100 people a day stop to check out her latest installments, some walking several miles from nearby displacement camps....

"Isshag complained that despite international attention, the suffering of Darfur remained vastly underreported inside Sudan. There are no television stations in the area, and most newspapers operate under government control or are based hundreds of miles away in Khartoum.

"'The local media don't cover the issue of Darfur,' she said. 'We hear about it when one child dies in Iraq, but we hear nothing when 50 children die' in Darfur."

She is, in a way, blogging without a computer.

If you need some background on the bigger picture, the BBC News has Q&A: Sudan's Darfur conflict and Wikipedia has Darfur Conflict.


A more complete story on Awatif Ahmed Isshag can be had at the Los Angeles Times. Here's a telling detail from that article:

"An advocate for women's education, Isshag credits her parents for allowing her to avoid being tied down by housework and pursue her interest in writing.

"But she occasionally uses her columns to lecture other women on pet peeves. A recent 'For Women Only' article lambasted those who took off their shoes on the bus. 'It's wrong,' she said with a laugh."

True Love

Not sure what year that picture was taken (early 1900s to be sure) and I sure wish I could have found a different one...

I'll go with what I've got [seems like a possible attribute of "True Love", eh?].

Check out the two people in the extreme upper right. It's a white woman and a black man and they're married.

Louis George Gregory and Louisa Mathew showed true love in spite of the fact that their "marriage was a challenge to the social convention of that time, and was even a criminal offense in some states."

Now, let's move rapidly ahead in time (though we surely won't out run prejudice...).

This picture is from a BBC News article, Star-crossed lovers quit West Bank.

This is Jasmine Avissar and Osama Zaatar. She's a Jewish Israeli and he's a Palestinian Muslim.

I'll share just a few quotes from this heart-wrenching True Love Story:

"First they tried to live in Israel, but the Israeli authorities would not allow Osama to join his wife there.

"Then they tried living in the occupied West Bank, but some Palestinians made life difficult for them.

"Now they've given up and are moving to Europe....

"Jasmine already has permission to go. Osama hopes to follow her soon....

"Neither Israeli nor Palestinian society has accepted their marriage....

"They turn and walk the short distance to the checkpoint that leads out of the West Bank and into Israel....

"Osama cannot go through the checkpoint with Jasmine. They don't know when he will be able to join her in Europe.

"They are still a couple caught in the middle of the Israeli Palestinian conflict."

I want to leave this post on True Love with a quote from the Greatest Human Lover I've ever known:

"Know thou of a certainty that Love is the secret of God's holy Dispensation, the manifestation of the All-Merciful, the fountain of spiritual outpourings. Love is heaven's kindly light, the Holy Spirit's eternal breath that vivifieth the human soul. Love is the cause of God's revelation unto man, the vital bond inherent, in accordance with the divine creation, in the realities of things. Love is the one means that ensureth true felicity both in this world and the next. Love is the light that guideth in darkness, the living link that uniteth God with man, that assureth the progress of every illumined soul. Love is the most great law that ruleth this mighty and heavenly cycle, the unique power that bindeth together the divers elements of this material world, the supreme magnetic force that directeth the movements of the spheres in the celestial realms. Love revealeth with unfailing and limitless power the mysteries latent in the universe. Love is the spirit of life unto the adorned body of mankind, the establisher of true civilization in this mortal world, and the shedder of imperishable glory upon every high-aiming race and nation."

---

1. Selections from the Writings of `Abdu'l-Bahá (Haifa: Bahá'í World Centre, 1982), p. 27.

The god of War

"The god of War" is the title of this post. I had to write the word "god" with a lower case "g" because it's my firm belief that God wants All of Us to stop making war.

Strange that God is so Forgiving and Merciful.

He's also completely Just:

If we make war, He'll forgive us; but, His Justice gives us massive suffering during and after the war...

How does one explain the Creator of All That Is?

Best way I know of (that won't drive one plum crazy) is to look at what He created (and, even looking at these creations can make one Wonder...)...

Still, these days, we must look Very Deeply into what He's created to see HIM...

The { image credit } is a site with sights you may not want to see, like:
"She Survived Iraq — Then Shot Herself at Home"

Other Spaces you might look into, to give you more to ponder about what God may be up to with us humans, are the related studies listed after this explanation on scienceblogs.com:

"A few recent psychological studies about religious beliefs presented seemingly contradictory results: One found that reading violent biblical passages made readers more aggressive; two others concluded that mentioning "God concepts" made people behave less selfishly. ScienceBloggers dig into the nitty gritty of these experiments, and discuss how the results might apply to phenomena like terrorism."

Here are the study links:

In smite of my own thoughts on religion...

Psychology and Religion

Does Religion Make You Meaner or Nicer? Inquiring Minds, Etc.

Obey God — Kill!

Two Americas: Past, Present and Future

Happy Pondering...