Redistribution - to Whom?
In the last couple of days I've gotten two different emails complaining about candidate Obama's tax proposals, referring to it a "redistribution of wealth." I normally try to stay out of these partisan discussions, but this kind of thinking is so thoughtless that I feel like I need to comment.
Now I do have a position on the election, a reluctant one because I don't have too much good to say about either party, but consider my comments as not being partisan, but just simply addressing the sloppy thinking that went into the original emails on redistribution.
The battle on redistribution was lost over 150 years ago. Both political parties are avid redistributionists, they just have different constituents. So redistribution is a fact. It's just a question of - to whom? We've been living with a system over the last 10 or 15 years where the money has been redistributed from us the taxpayers to:
- the multimillion dollar golden parachute for the fired head of Fannie Mae
- ditto Freddie Mac
- ditto heads of Goldman, Watchovia, Chase, AIG, Lehman, etc
- pay and retirement for the worst head of the Fed ever, Alan "I don't see no stinking bubble" Greenspan
- top execs of all the bond rating agencies, who should be in jail for turning junk into AAA with the stroke of a pen
- the heads, both R and D, of the Senate and House financial committees over the last 10 years, who were bought off, or ignorant, or both, and whose oversight ability was effectively zero.
- the bank and hedge fund execs who were paid 7 and 8 and 9 figures to create CDOs and play a shell game with them.
- all the R and D legislators who cheerfully took contributions and lobbyist perks to let the game go on.
So now that the game has ended (actually it's just been redesigned) who will pay for all the fun? Why, the American worker, of course! We'll pay in hyperinflation caused by a 3 trillion dollar deficit and in 10% or higher unemployment. None of this will seriously affect the lifestyle of the
affluent and ethically challenged who caused it, many of whom are being paid big bucks as usual to supposedly correct the problem they caused. The lobbyists, as has been widely publicized, all seem to be busy working for the McCain campaign.
While we were working and paying taxes, the guys on the list above were pocketing $20 million to over $100 million EACH. Total $750 billion and climbing. Our money. Thanks to Bush and Congress. Obama's tax plan is a rounding error compared to the redistribution of wealth that's already going on.
So who do we have to hold accountable for this redistribution by both parties? There's only one answer - US! We the people are responsible because we have made it clear that we will not support any candidate that tells us the truth and refuses to promise us "goodies" from the public purse. Ron Paul tried and couldn't get 10% support. So we've done it to ourselves, as history has predicted we would.
I've already voted, and sadly I had to make my decision based on who I thought would do the least damage to the country I love. I wish it were different.
An Alternative to Separation
One thing I've been very conscious of during the election campaign is the division of groups into warring camps of "them vs us." This is really a low-consciousness and primitive approach to solving problems. I learned a better way from philosopher and writer Ken Wilbur.
When he decided as a young man to undertake to integrate all of psychology, science, philosophy and spirituality (an ambitious undertaking, to put it mildly), he soon realized that it couldn't be done by reconciling different views by deciding who was right and who was wrong. He chose the approach that "everybody's right - about some things" and looked at all points of view as having some aspect of the truth to contribute to the whole.
Imagine what adopting this approach to our politics, and our personal debates, might do for us! We might all learn something, and we'd most likely arrive at better solutions. Even better, instead of living in separation, we could honor the spiritual truth that we are all One, which actually feels pretty darn good!
Politics and Religion
Yeah, those are the two subjects that we're not supposed to discuss in polite company. Today, of course, in the good old USA, they seem to be tied together. Here's my take on it, as a student and teacher of Science of Getting Rich.
First, both political parties have the same platform - "You're a victim and we're here to save you." The details vary, but the message is the same. This is disturbing to me because it creates dependency when we all have the power to create the lives we want. But taking responsibility for ourselves is not popular. It's not taught or modeled to children in schools or families very much, and it looks like work. However, it's the path to freedom.
What seems to be missing everywhere is the skill of critical thinking. When we are told that a politician will lower taxes and increase benefits, how come nobody says, "That's impossible?" We know we can't lower income and increase spending at home, but in politics we want to believe.
It gets worse when religion gets involved. Critical thinking is missing when someone states that no sex education and no birth control will reduce teen pregnancies. Or when they believe that the idea of a 6,000 year old Earth should be taught with a straight face in science classes. And the idea that God takes sides in our wars is childish. As is the idea that we can cheerfully negotiate with psychopaths. Lack of critical thinking is bipartisan.
We are all manifestations of the same Spirit and as Thomas Troward wrote, "Spirit must then be equally for all." But claiming Divine support is convenient. As Bob Dylan wrote, "The reason for fighting, I never got straight, But I learned to accept it, Accept it with pride, For you don't count the dead, When God's on your side." In the Middle East, everyone claims that God's on their side and they can't all be right, can they?
In Science of Getting Rich we learn that we can all have anything we want as long as it's not at the expense of anyone else. Every time someone adopts this belief, the potential for conflict in the world is lessened. If we taught children the power of purpose, vision, faith, gratitude and effective action, they wouldn't look for a political savior, they'd be too busy building the life they want.
We know the Universe is abundant, generous and responsive to us, and that we are all One. Politics is about scarcity, fear, conflict and division. Politics depends on us having poor critical thinking skills, as does some religion. Do your part to raise the consciousness of the planet - THINK!
Remember the Basics
It's easy to come up with lots of cool ways to build businesses and get clients, but why not try the basics first? The first basic is customer service. It's simple, for cryin' out loud. Just treat people the way you'd like to be treated.
Here's a recent bad example. The last two times my wife went to get her hair cut, the beautician was 20 minutes late for the appointment! Not working on another client, either, but late to get to the salon. My wife's reaction? "Two strikes and you're out! Next!" It's just inconsiderate, and thoughtless. My wife also watched as this same beautician turned away a walk-in client because she didn't like the way she looked. "Looks like a Valley girl. Not from around here."
So guess who's always complaining about her shortage of clients? And blaming everyone but herself.
Here's the key to customer service - figure out how you'd like to be treated and then do more! Surprise people with your service and appreciation. One existing customer is worth 50 potential customers. Treat them like the gold they are.
Oh, and always, always keep your agreements.
Personal Growth and Science?
One of the questions that a lot of people have is - how can you use "science" in the same sentence with personal growth, manifesting your dreams or spirituality? It would seem that "hard" science has nothing to do with "soft and squishy" human issues.
For those of you who know me only as a newsletter writer, you should know that I have an engineering degree and spent many years in high technology and science. I have a real need, myself, for scientific grounding in everything I do. So let's look at this question.
First, let's agree that science has nothing to say about beliefs and other subjective experience, whether they are true or not. They cannot be measured. However, science can measure the effects of those beliefs in your life. And that's what I want to talk about - the effects in your life.
What is science? Well, the essence of science, for our purposes, consists of measurement and repeatability. Every new scientific discovery is tested by other scientists who conduct the same experiment and see if they get the same results. If not, the results and theory are not accepted.
Can we apply this idea to success and personal growth? Yes, not only can we, but we absolutely must do that is we want predictable results. In his book, "Science of Getting Rich", Wallace Wattles says, "It is a natural law that the same causes always produce the same effects." So if it's not repeatable, it's not science.
So how would we put this to work in our lives? Let me use a simple analogy - baking an apple pie. Any cook will tell you that there are three things you need to be successful - the right recipe, the right ingredients, and the right process. Every cook tinkers with this formula a little bit to make it their own, but you have to stick reasonably close to the formula or you don't get a decent apple pie. You can see that this is a "scientific process" because it has a repeatable formula.
So let's apply this to our own lives and ask how we can "bake" the life we want. It seems that we will need a recipe, the right ingredients, and a process. There's a lot of people running around with recipes and most leave out what I think are vital ingredients so it's no surprise that people are confused.
Here's what I've found, after 10 years of study. There are six ingredients - a powerful, exciting life purpose, a clear and distinct vision of what living that purpose looks like, strong and complete belief that you can and will have it, continuous gratitude for every part of your life, expelling the limiting beliefs and attitudes that do not support you, and courageous, effective action.
Notice that money, talent, location, connections, being old enough, being young enough, being smart enough, etc, etc are not on the list. If you think those are necessary, that's a limiting belief that you need to clear. If you think you need to know how to do it all to get started, that's a BIG limiting belief that you need to discard. It's not on the list of ingredients!
Discarding limiting beliefs is like purifying the ingredients in the apple pie. You wash the apples and cut out any spoiled spots so you have clean crisp apples to work with. Limiting beliefs contaminate the success recipe, and the number one limiting belief is that there's not enough. Not enough time, talent, money, customers, good employees, etc. There is always enough, and more.
Here's the process that goes with the recipe. You must start with the purpose, then create the vision that expresses it. Many people start with goals,and the pie is a failure. Start with purpose.
You must get so excited and confident about what you're doing that you totally expect it. When you put the pie in the oven, do you wish and hope and pray that a pie will come out? Heck, no! You KNOW it will. And that's the kind of expectation that you need.
Season with gratitude. Gratitude for everything, even the challenges and setbacks. Be grateful for the learning experiences, the people, the events, for all of it. As Wattles says, "Gratitude keeps you connected to the Source of all your good." Gratitude makes your heart sing, and attracts more good things.
When you have these 5 things in operation, then apply effective action. That means putting your purpose, vision and faith into everything you do. You supercharge your activities with purpose. You'll also need to act with courage because you'll be changing and growing. You'll be outside your comfort zone, but you'll realize that everything you really want is always just outside your comfort zone. You become comfortable with being uncomfortable.
An important part of effective action is trusting your inner knowing, your intuition, to guide you in what to do. You don't have to know how, when you start, because your purpose, vision and faith program your mind and the Universe to guide you a step at a time.
But you may need to train yourself to immediately follow your intuitive leadings. Joe Vitale likes to say, "The Universe loves speed." The more sensitive you are and the faster you act, the better your results.
I'm writing this article because I was thinking about science and spirituality while I was cooking breakfast about an hour ago and the article started to form in my mind. I really felt inside that this was important so I put my other projects on hold and sat down to write. Follow your intuition to develop effective action.
Now here's the science conclusion. Follow this recipe with these ingredients and process, and your success will come out of the oven like a delicious apple pie. It's repeatable. As Wattles says, "There IS a science to getting rich." Rich in body, mind and spirit.
Can I guarantee your results for you? No, because I don't know how good a cook you are or how pure your ingredients are. But just like the people who publish cookbooks, I know the recipe works.
Need any cooking lessons? Got the ingredients? You can get the help you need to bake the pie you want here.
The Certain Way To Success
The Number #1 Question
Do you ever find yourself wondering "Why hasn't anything changed?"
That was the #1 question for the preview calls for the Science of Getting Rich program last month. "I'm doing all this stuff that's supposed to create the life of my dreams and nothing's happening. Why?"
If you've ever felt that way, you're not alone. So what's the answer? I spent a lot of time on the call with this issue, and the answer is simple, but not easy. There are four elements you need - strong purpose, clear vision, positive faith or expectation, and constant gratitude. There are two thing you need to do - clear out old limiting beliefs, and take effective action.
I get really ticked off at the large number of people running around teaching only a few of the six points and misleading people into believing that they can get what they want with only half the recipe. I was listening to a CD this week from a self-styled "Law of Attraction" teacher who claimed that all you needed were 3 things - vision, faith, and being clear. No action? Gimme a break!
Many of the questions I was asked revealed that the writers were reading, studying and visualizing, but not apparently taking any action. Well, things don't just fall into your lap. As Wallace Wattles says in Science of Getting Rich, "By thought the thing you want is brought to you; by action you receive it."
Some people said they don't know what to do. That reveals more problems - lack of a clear vision so that you don't know where you're going, and/or failure to trust your intuition which will always guide you to the next step, and/or fear about stepping out.
The third big stumbling block was self sabotage. They would try something and it would be a disaster. This is old beliefs, limiting stories about ourselves, working against us. Joe Vitale is right: if we don't get clear, we won't manifest what we want.
Like I said - simple, but not easy. That's why we take 16 weeks in Science of Getting Rich to work on them.Does anyone else teach all six in one course? Not that I know of. A lot of the important material isn't even in the original book by Wallace Wattles, but it's in the extra material I provide in this course. And I coach each person personally, too.
Are you wondering why things aren't working for you as well as you'd like? Do you have counter intentions that are sabotaging you? Do you have a powerful purpose and a clear vision, or not? Would you like to be part of an elite group of people that are really serious about making their lives work? Do you want someone you can call if you're stuck? You can get more info at the SGR web site -
The Certain Way To Success.If you're looking for the full formula for success, you'll find it in the six items I mentioned above. You can do your own inventory of how well you have each of them handled. Actually you can just look at the results in your life and get a good idea. Then figure out which of the six requirements you think you are weakest in, and get started building it up. It takes all six to get the life you want.
Time Misses The Mark
The cover story for the Jan 28 Time magazine was titled "The Science of Romance" and featured some cutting edge neuroscience about attraction. While much of the science was quite interesting, Time managed to say almost nothing about the real reason we're attracted to the people we are.
I've become somewhat of an expert on the subject, mostly because I spent a lot of time trying to figure out why my relationship history was so dysfunctional. It had nothing to do with neuroscience or the smell of DNA, I found. It wasn't nature, but nurture.
Let me give you an example we're all sadly familiar with. Why do abused women go from one abuser husband to another? It's all in the family background. And it's all in the family background for all of us. In the simplest view, men marry Mom and girls marry Dad. We've all got an image in our mind of the perfect mate, and we are attracted to others who match that image. What makes it hard to spot sometimes is that is often not physical resemblance, but behavioral. And the behavioral can be quite subtle.
Psychologist Harville Hendrix describes the process like this - we all have "issues" with our parents which leave us with unresolved psychological wounds which our minds want to heal. Our search for a mate, then, becomes a search for someone who will recreate the childhood environment in which we were wounded, so that we can heal that wound. For the woman who was abused by her father, that means finding an abusing man and being "good enough" so that he will approve of her.
I didn't say this was logical, I just said this is the way our mind works.
You can see the problem with this. We find someone with a characteristic that was similar to what injured us, and then we try to change them! What are the odds of that? Now for many people who had reasonably normal families, the wounds are shallow enough so that the marriage can be functional. However, even good marriages like that will often have a particular conflict that occurs repeatedly, a squabble or fight over the same issue, throughout the marriage. This is that wound pattern showing up. And you see, it's on both sides. Both the husband and wife have this process going on.
How does this show up when you're dating? Well, if you meet someone and it's love at first sight and you want to get married and settle down even though you've only known each other for 2 weeks, watch out! If you feel like you've known them your whole life, you probably have. They're a good match for that image in your mind.
What about someone you date for a while and really like? You enjoy them, you get along fine, you can't find anything wrong with them, but you have this feeling that "something's missing." Like the spark is not there. That means that they're probably perfect for you, but they don't match that internal image. This could be good, depending on what your image is like.
So this whole process is the major driver in relationships, and Time managed to spend 50 pages not mentioning it. What a shame! A lot of people will go away from the magazine thinking that an instant strong attraction just means compatible immune systems. What it means is strong image match.
Did you ever hear someone (or yourself) complaining "why are all men (or women) like that?" It's the mental image at work. All men or women aren't like that, it's just all the men or women that you are attracted to are like that. And that's something to think about.
