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For those of you that know me, you may know Fight Club is one of my favorite movies. It mirrors much of my life in some scary detail...and of course, it's fiction and kinda ridiculous at times too. But still, I used to watch it regularly to work through some of my own stuff.

Anyway, for those of you that have seen it, there's the "homework" scene. Basically guerilla groups do often illegal "assignments" to pull apart the dominant culture. Here's one of those possible assignments, taken from a book ("the book of pages") I got some time ago that I now can barely find. I think it might have gotten lost in the cave of wonders.

Anyway again, I find this idea compelling - a group of folks that take covers off things, perhaps encouraging participation, knowledge, interest, transparency. There ARE groups like this, of course. But I like the sort of physicality of this example, vs. things like documentaries that Also do a good job.

Anybody wanna start a league chapter? :-)

Labels: social justice

A round-about, short story:

Today I'm cleaning and doing various to-dos from my context lists. One of them is to deal with these dance-party CDs given to me as a kind of "thanks" payment for doing the NC Pride book. Thing is, I don't really dig on dance CDs. I had one person in mind for them, but I'm not sure yet if she wants them. Til then I've been using them to raise my monitor a few inches. I've decided to swap them out for a book about the same thickness that I (1) rarely read, and only refer to and (2) would be a possibly helpful subconscious reminder to see it fairly regularly.

I picked "The connected discourses of the Buddha: a translation of the samyutta nikaya." It's thick, I like it, I've read most of it already and will probably only VERY rarely refer to it. Before I swapped it out for the CDs, I noticed a note I left in it a year ago to look at something and take action on it next time I opened the book (which was now). It was to take some sort of note on a few pages (pg 1529-1531) that explained the components of the 8-fold path. So I'll drop it in my blog and on my wall of notes in my bedroom. Here's the outline version of the notes. Maybe they'll be interesting (better yet, applicable) to someone else besides me.

Labels: Buddhism, GTD

I had an interesting conversation earlier today while interviewing a friend/mentor of mine about Equality NC (www.equalitync.org)'s conference happening at the same time as tomorrow's protest in Raleigh. Without getting into it, there's arguments both sides that what's going down isn't united/strategic - given there's a national protest at a certain time AND a local conference that had been organized for a LONG time in advance at the same time - so folks will have to pick.

But I don't think that means both can't coexist meaningfully. Cuz I think they can - there's a role for lots of things at the same time, and a role for diverse opportunities for engagement. I definitely do NOT feel a protest is always the place everyone should be. I mean, there are some people that have been working on marriage equality (or the greater LGBTQA issues as a whole) for 364 OTHER days of the year, and a protest isn't necessarily their tool or at the right time. I think there's often energy around "protests/marches" that if you aren't there, you're not supporting the work. I don't think that's the case. And I also think sometimes protests/marches aren't planned to be strategic with other work being done - can be a somewhat knee-jerk reaction, even if it takes some planning to do their independant event. It's too bad there can't be more strategy sometimes.

Came across a cool collection of articles suggesting that marriage is a dangerous sticking point for the wider lgbtqa movement (which I agree with completely). Check it out here: http://makezine.enoughenough.org/prop8.html

And for some of the relevance of what REALLY just happened with Prop 8, here's the beginngin of Ian's letter to ENC supporters.

Dear Friends of Equality,

We have all experienced a range of emotions since election night last week. The reality of the passage of the four ballot initiatives hit me when my friend Paul Scott at Equality Texas told me about a couple that walked into a California Clerk's office and asked what their marriage license now meant. The clerk broke down in tears and replied, "I'm so sorry, I don't know." Then, I thought about the children in Arkansas that are going to be removed from their foster parents, and the parents that will not be able to provide a safe home for children needing qualified and loving parents. Four amendments that succeeded on a foundation of orchestrated bigotry, lies, and blatant discrimination...

Sad. I don't think many people really know what they're talking about when they talk about "gay marriage" vs. the HUGE collection of peripheral basic human rights that are tied to it...and many that aren't.

Labels: social justice

You know, I think "flow" is a pretty important concept...and not just to GTD. GTDers I'm sure will recognize flow as a state to measure against, in a sense... the dynamic tension of things to do and relaxation in doing it... freely moving to the next thing to be done after freely having decided it was the next thing to do in a world where you can only ever do one thing. Flow runs deep to me, and I won't be able to share all my thoughts on it here... but I think flow is enabled, at least in the beginning, by certain best practices. Here's three of them I consider important for me:

* a balance of structure and organic circumstances. In arts, this would be training scales, katas/named techniques, etc... then finding the "life" in those structures. In life, this would be routines, and finding life in those routines.

* a body posture that balances muscle groups along structural integrity lines while allowing the joints to be open and relaxed while moving or not (see aikido, tai chi, zazen)

* a mindset that neither attaches to conceptualizing something (pretending you know it!) nor pretending you have no idea or experience about it (pretending you don't!)... but meeting it fresh with your memory of your experiences and the pregnant newness of the moment.

Just my two cents, I guess.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXIeFJCqsPs

Labels: aikido, Buddhism, Personal, social justice

Holy cow, laugh out loud funny. You GOTTA see 2:30.



http://www.youtube.com/v/4aAYt2kv-qA&hl=en&fs=1

Labels: social justice

http://www.youtube.com/v/0xJCaw3Pmf0

You know, the funny thing about this to me is that folks I know appropriately can be skeptical of something really being "new." It's like someone saying, "I was once an addict, but I'm over it now" or "I'm not racist ANYMORE, now that I've gone through that training!" In so, so many ways it isn't a new day at all - social injustice abounds in all its usual forms.

However, this is an important example of balance and of holding contradictions. In Tema & Co's sheet sharing what tools maintain supremacy cultures needing to pick one right way and not being able to hold both/and paradoxes is a symbol of a dangerous dominant culture (and in our racial/classist culture, some trainers refer to it appropriately as a "White Supremacist Culture." - more on that later, it doesn't necessarily mean what you think it does.)

Back to US America: it's been a long time since our country collectively could say "yes, we still have all these problems to work on... AND ALSO it's a new day." For me there are some clear Buddhist parallels too in being an individual... and a product of an infinite stream of causes and conditions. Of the face of the external world being created by my mind (by laying condition conceptualizations of WHAT IT IS (secretly: according to me!) on everything I see AND ALSO having a world exist outside of my head that I'm interacting with. Of maintaining that seemingly delicate balance of what is and what may be as a dynamic tension to create around... not to DECIDE WHICH IS RIGHT. It's like an argument between two children, stuck in who's right... and unable to move to putting both people's valid experience on the table and collectively deciding where to go. To say that yes, yesterday is still here in so many ways. AND ALSO:

It's a new day.

Labels: Buddhism, social justice

Check out this indy week article, especially the bottom... where the GOP party's hotel staff cheers. :-)

"Across the room, the hotel staff?a dozen or so African-American and Latino men and women in their 20s?was gathered. Minutes before, in the service hallway that led to the ballroom, the staff erupted into applause, high-fives and shouts of "Obama won!"

One by one, they emerged, smiling and scribbling the name "Obama" onto the small plastic American flags lining the room's tables. By that point, the party was too thin and grim to mind the workers' political insubordination.

One worker rested her hand on the flat-screen TV, over Obama's face. Another talked of her happiness and future. And Stevie Norman, a husky 22-year-old worker in an unflattering hotel uniform, smiled wide and said, "It's just like a dream come true.""

Can it be considered a good thing when folks who are serving others are happy? I think so.

Labels: social justice

I cried. :-)


http://www.youtube.com/v/FrXkBuWNx88


http://www.youtube.com/v/02BV5Zah1Tw

And McCain conceding... Notice how much more "himself" he seems. Some psychological signs of acting other than you are, like his blinking tics, are much fewer... and how sad that he had to represent people he didn't really agree with. Notice his reaction to his "supporters." Finally connected with him as a person here.


http://www.youtube.com/v/24QdO4TGMYc


http://www.youtube.com/v/peDK_HyXbvo

Labels: social justice