Hello 2009

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Let the morning of the first day of 2009 be bliss and that this innate bliss in you continues to surface for the rest of the year.

--- michael

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The Preacher Man Can

I have a friend who calls me regularly for coffee. During that time, she will ask me if I would like to go to paradise or heaven. She would also add that there is not much time left, so I better decide to join them in their journey. Paradise, it is said, is free from attachments in our Earthly existence of illusions. What we experience on Earth is but a paltry comparison (to paradise). She said that once I have been to paradise, I won't want to come back to live on Earth again.

Then, as we were talking, an old lady interrupted to sell us some tissue paper. As I was digging into my pockets, I was shocked that my friend waved the old lady away. Luckily, the old lady persisted and by the time I recovered from the shock she was still there to complete our transaction. Did my friend realise that it is very likely that this old lady needs the money badly and that what she is doing is not begging, but an honorable business? We don't always have to buy tissue papers from them, but to refuse one in the middle of all the preaching just seem out of place to me somehow.

My friend is always preaching to me and yet she says that her practice is not a religion. I find that hard to reconcile. Anyway, her group is not the only one claiming to have exclusive tickets to heaven and that they are not a religion.

Why can't we let everyone live the way they want and walk their own spiritual paths? We are all unique and therefore our paths are all different. Why must religions, spiritual practices, 'fellowships' or call what you may, go out and 'convert' people? Is it so that they score some browny points with their god or merits to get closer to the heavenly gates? If one is so conscious about 'helping' others, does these 'merits' or browny points make any sense? Eventually and inevitably, these browny points will lead to promoting Fear and yet another conscious collection.

Perhaps to be in paradise, we just have to stay away from paradise and live the way we think it is worthy. I think what is worthy is only Love. The basis of all worthy and all we encounter is Love. In fact, if we take away all the sex and money, we will easily see that what is worthy is only Love. Conversely, if you want to follow any crime, follow the money and the sex.

Incidentally, I got this message from the Daily Contemplation (an email subscription):

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One filled with joy preaches without preaching.

-- Mother Teresa

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It's a Dog's Life - Puppy Love

We had new kittens when I was in Europe six months ago, now back in Singapore, we get three new Shetland pups from Cookie. They are just six days old in the picture, eyes still closed and relying entirely on their mother's milk.

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On the first day of their birth, the mother kept herself in the same position till late at night, forgoing her meals, so that her pups can have her milk. It was till the pups were well fed and that she was so hungry that she had her supper that night.

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On the second day, as the maid went to change the towel in her den, Cookie thought that she was going to take her pups away. By the time the maid came back with the fresh towels, two of the pups where missing from her den and hidden elsewhere (under the bed).

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It is fascinating to observe the motherly love instinctive in all animals. Cats do the same caring for their kittens when they are very little, they will let their kittens eat first, and only when her kittens are well-fed that the mother cat will eat what is left.

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Bucky Group 34 - Christmas 2008

Since it is Christmas, we have a feast this Saturday at the Salon. Everyone brought something to share.

After the usual Christmas songs, we switched to Bob Maley's "One Love" video.
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We even connected with one of our Bucky member, Rochele, her two Vietnamese friends doing PhD in Atlanta and another friend working for CNN in Atlanta to join our session. Together we danced and sang across the Internet. Perhaps this marks the start of the Bucky Group's Webcast to people elsewhere or anywhere. Isn't technology wonderful? We did this without any additional costs.
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In 2008, many of our topics pertained to "Happiness". In 2009, we will be focused on "Creativity". To start it off, we watched and listened to Ken Robinson's TED talk on "Do Schools Kill Creativity?"

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Discussion:

Our education system in the Polytechnics seem to prepare our students for fixed vocations and therefore focuses on the implementation specific technical skills rather than conceptual and fundamental skills.

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Some years ago, the government aimed to get into the IT industry in a big way, but they didn't succeed. (We are not cheaper and bigger than the Indians.) Then they tried media, which was also not successful as there were not so many employers hiring journalists in a small country like Singapore. So they went into gaming, which is also not successful. They are now aiming for technology for "Visual Effects". Bureaucrats in their present form of conditioned and constrained thinking will never catch up with the market demand in real time. If only they had focused on the fundamentals of bringing up creative minds, will they be able to adapt to changing needs of industries. Someday they will learn.

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One of my dreams is to start a Buckminster Fuller Institute/University and Cafe in the city centre as a meeting place for entrepreneurs, technologists, artists, musicians and investors. There, we will have a Bucky library, artifacts (like the geodesic dome and isocahedran), Bucky sessions and seminars. Artists can sell their wares by displaying them in the cafe and budding musicians can jam up for added exposure and to entertain. Outside the cafe in the open, we can run exercises to build some of Bucky's artifacts, like constructing the geodesic domes perhaps with bamboo sticks or to play the World Game. These sessions can be webcast via the Internet so that member cafes elsewhere can join in.

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From time to time, entrepreneurs with revolutionary and creative products can also demonstrate them at the cafe premises. Revolutionary products need good sounding boards to test their business models, and meeting other entrepreneurs and artists to debate and synergise will be invaluable.

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Such a cafe will broaden the minds of people who (sadly) have been educated in a highly industrialised, structured, narrow and specialised system; to become more comprehensive in their approaches. Bucky called this type of people, "Comprehensivists". A Comprehensivist is one who considers the Universe as one system obeying a set of generalised principles, and not many human-perceived systems obeying different principles.

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This cafe will also offer life long continuous learning to people who have missed out on education in the earlier part of their life, or are late bloomers. There isn't such a cafe in Singapore so far, so let there be one! Perhaps it is kind of a "Cafe 2.0", akin to "Web 2.0".

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Note:

The Bucky Group is one that anyone can join and there are no formal memberships nor fees to pay, but just the receptivity to life long learning and fun. The Group meets every Saturday and Sundays, and has been doing so for the last 13 years. Please send in your comments and suggestions for the Bucky Cafe above. Thanks.

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For more of what the Bucky Group does in the past meetings, click here.
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Usury 4

I had the good fortune to speak to a wise old man, who was looking for investments into a commerical property development. Investors for properties are hard to come by in a credit crunch. When I asked why he did not look into borrowing money from the bank, he told me that it is not wise to play the 'financial game'. He wouldn't even borrow in US dollars as this will mean exchange risks with his local currency. His grandfather lost billions playing the financial game.

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Too many people are playing the financial game and he thinks that this is fundamentally the problem leading to the current global economic and financial crisis we are in. In other words, we are living in a society of borrowed money, not always used for legitimate investments. A "legitimate investment" is one that essentially creates life supporting wealth. When we move away further and further from creating life supporting wealth and the true objectives of money, an economic crisis will be inevitable.

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"There is money found in the project itself", he said.

"The investor can make his profits in the project and that is better than borrowing from the bank and incurring interests and charges", he continued.

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Not unless if he seek money from an Islamic bank - one that shares the project risks and profits. In Islamic banking, trading of financial risks is forbidden as it is 'haram' like gambling.

Read more about "Usury" here

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In Sickness and In Health 9 - Project Life

I was shocked when I saw Zoe's picture in Today newspaper. She is now in fourth stage of cancer. I met her in May and knew she got cancer then, but she appeared so positive I thought she would have recovered.

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I sms-ed her when I reached Singapore on Saturday, but didn't get any replies.

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She is continuing her fight against her illness and has many close friends and alternative healers helping her.

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Read more about her here

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Staged Magic

I lost my wallet to a pickpocket thief in the train from Brussels to Paris' Charles De Gaulle Airport last Friday. I think it was done by the guy who sat next to me. He was unusually friendly. Then I think he picked my pocket when I stood up to reach for my luggage from the overhead shelf when the train reached the airport. This is the time, when most people are more anxious to pack up and leave quickly.

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When I felt the sudden hollow in my pockets, I thought that I may have lost my wallet in the station or dropped on my seat. Everyone around was very concerned, except the friendly chap who sat next to me. He was no longer friendly nor concerned. But I realised that only later, by that time, he was gone.

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It must have taken him one or two seconds to pick my wallet from my trousers pocket. His demeanour, his hand skills and his patience to wait for the right moment, is no mean feat. Why doesn't he go into stage magic and show business? He could make some decent money legally.

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But that's how it is. Many people do not know who they really are. They often underestimate their self worth. Don't we sometimes? This thief can be a lot more worthy serving and entertaining others in stage magic. But they do not know who they really are and the higher potentials they can reach by serving others and themselves.

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