Recent Thoughts

1. In the belly 

It is deeply fascinating to work inside the system. The experiential learning and visceral reactions of being in the industrial growth society -- the belly of the beast -- are priceless.

I can start to see how it is hard for those who have never worked inside the system to sympathize with those who are toiling in it. I start to experience the bodily reaction when my work inside of the system is being critiqued and criticized. 

There is confirmation bias on both sides: those who are in the capitalist system, and those who believe they are not. Being inside the system, one needs to rationalize and justify their work. One's ego, self-worth, greed and desires all bond him tighter with the system.

Toolkit for Life

So many of our tools these days are life-destructive. There are weapons of mass destruction, and there are massive, destructive weapons on all level and scales.

To dismantle these weapons, and to rebuild a life sustaining society, we need a new toolkit for life. Here are some tools I've come across in recent months that have given me hope and inspiration.

• Mind/spirit tools
• Mindfulness (Vipassana)
• Nonviolence (Gandhi, MLK)
• Intellectual tools
• Systems science
• Ecological literacy
• Activism/community tools
• Great Turning (Work that Reconnects)
• Service (ServiceSpace)
• Communications tools
• Nonviolence Communication
• Earth tools
• Permaculture

What these tools have in common, is a recognition that changes must happen at the mind/heart/soul/spirit level, which will then manifest through our actions and ways of being. These tools help facilitate the heart-shift, and enable us to tap into the deep interconnection to Life.

Will continue to explore and expand the toolkit for life, and dismantle the tools of death -- inside and outside.

Internet, Intelligence, Work, Awakening

Recently, a few themes start to intertwine in my head.

• The Internet Age. It is all the rage in China, with "internet mindset" as the societal buzzword. National TV station came out with 10-episode series on the internet age. Everyone talks about how the web is revolutionizing the way of life, of business, and of living. All my aunts and uncles are glued to their smartphones, sharing stuff around the clock. Everyone is excited (and many are worried) about the disruptions from net.
• Artificial intelligence. Increasing evidence that AI is inevitable, bringing a completely unforeseeable future, throwing into question morality, rights, and all the basic elements of human society and self-perception.
• Technological unemployment. As a result of ongoing automation and AI evolution, more and more of the "secure jobs" are opened up for competition with robots. As the industrial society becomes ever more "productive" with the help of machines and algorithms, Marx's warning on "technological unemployment" (and the resulting over-production and under consumption) as an intrinsic aspects of capitalism seems ever more prescient. What are we going to do with ourselves, when the world doesn't "need" us anymore?
• Inner awakening in an internet age. As the digital walls close in around us, what's psychological and neurological consequences? What new obstacles, and opportunities, for inner awakening lie ahead? As we ramp up the demand on our brains to keep up with the intelligence machines, where do we find space for the soul, and for seeking?

Innovation has always been an arms race with ourselves, a competition between intentions and unintended consequences. Is this time different?