Wendell Berry: The Real Work

The Real Work
 

It may be that when we no longer know what to do
we have come to our real work,
 

and that when we no longer know which way to go
we have come to our real journey.
 

The mind that is not baffled is not employed.
 

The impeded stream is the one that sings.
 
 

~ Wendell Berry ~
 

(Collected Poems)

 

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Tara Brach: In Each Moment

In each moment, what we choose to 

say and do plants the seed of our future. 

Remembering this truth and allowing it to guide 

our actions is essential in opening the heart 

and mind to the inner refuge of truth.
 

— Tara Brach, True Refuge  

 www.tarabrach.com

photo: Shantida 

First Things First: Until We Fix Our Democracy Problem, It's Hard to Fix Any Problem

By Marge Baker

In the four years since the Supreme Court’s infamous Citizens United v. FEC ruling, two things have become abundantly clear.

First, we have a major democracy problem. Citizens United paved the way for unlimited corporate spending to distort our elections. Staggering amounts of money have poured into our political system since the Court handed down that decision.

401(K) 2013/Flickr

Second, and just as importantly, it’s become clear that until we fix that democracy problem, it’s hard to fix any problem. In other words, until we fix the funding of our political campaigns, we can’t fix the individual issues that matter most to everyday Americans.

This has proven true across the board. Whether the issue you’re most concerned about is making your community safer, guaranteeing that your family has access to clean water, or ensuring that workers get a fair minimum wage, when wealthy special interests can buy their way into the hearts, minds, and votes of elected officials, progress on these issues will continue to stall.

Clearly, when moneyed interests can spend virtually without limitation to influence our elections, they can set the political agenda.

The Citizens United ruling gutted the ability of Congress and the states to put common-sense limits on this runaway spending, and the effects haven’t been subtle. In the wake of these campaign finance changes, outside political spending by Super PACs and other channels has reached an all-time high of $1 billion, the Associated Press found.

And now, a case currently being considered by the Supreme Court, McCutcheon v. FEC, could could allow even more money to flood our political system.

This isn’t the kind of “democracy” Americans of any political background want. A recent poll shows that more than nine in ten Americans think it’s important for elected officials to reduce the influence of money in our elections.

Though the problem of money in politics can feel overwhelming, there are a number of workable solutions being considered federally and implemented in the states.

Small-donor legislation is one good option. This type of law provides matching funds for small donations at a multiple ratio (such as 5:1 or 10:1). It also amplifies the effect of small donations, providing a way for them to carry real weight in political campaigns. That encourages political participation by people who may have felt before that their contributions didn’t matter.

For candidates, small-donor public financing provides an alternative for those who don’t want to be reliant on, and beholden to, wealthy special interests to fund their campaigns.

Another is the mandatory disclosure of political spending. Although Congress isn’t likely to pass disclosure legislation anytime soon, many states are responding to the post-Citizens United spending bonanza by closing loopholes so that big, special interest donors can’t hide behind “dark money” groups in elections.

Additionally, the year after Citizens United, a group of law professors asked the Securities and Exchange Commission to require publicly traded corporations to disclose their political spending to their shareholders and the public. Despite the proposal’s immense popularity, the SEC recently took the corporate political disclosure rule (SEC File No 4-637) off its agenda. That agenda, however, isn’t binding, and the SEC could — and should — still adopt the rule right away.

But most importantly, to fix our democracy problem, we have to be able to enact common-sense regulations on political spending. To fix the root problem — in the absence of a change in who’s on the Supreme Court – we must amend the Constitution to undo the damage of Citizens United and other cases that have handed huge power to Wall Street and giant corporations.

City by city and state by state, the people are taking that power back. Sixteen states and more than 500 cities and towns have called on Congress to pass an amendment overturning Citizens United and related cases.

All of these solutions are steps toward a larger goal: putting our democracy back in the hands of “we the people,” and fighting for a more transparent, vibrant democratic system responsive to the needs of everyday Americans.

For the original article, please go here: http://otherwords.org/supreme-court-mccutcheon-campaign-finance/

Christina Feldman: The Language of the Heart

Compassion is not just a feeling, it is a response to pain that is deeply rooted in wisdom. It is a commitment to alleviating suffering and the cause of suffering in all its forms. The human story is both personal and universal. Our personal experiences of pain and joy, grief and despair, may be unique to each of us in the forms they take, yet our capacity to feel grief, fear, loneliness, and rage, as well as delight, intimacy, joy, and ease, are our common bonds as human beings. They are the language of the heart that crosses the borders of "I" and "you." In the midst of despair or pain, you may be convinced that no one has ever felt this way before. Yet there is no pain you can experience that has not been experienced before by another in a different time or place. Our emotional world is universal.

- Christina Feldman, Compassion: Listening to the Cries of the World

Excerpted from The Buddha Is Still Teaching:

Contempory Buddhist Wisdom

Selected and edited by Jack Kornfield

Ram Dass: One Love

Souls love. That’s what souls do. Egos don’t, but souls do. Become a soul, look around, and you’ll be amazed- all the beings around you are souls. Be one, see one. When many people have this heart connection, then we will know that we are all one, we human beings all over the planet. We will be one. One love. And don’t leave out the animals, and trees, and clouds, and galaxies- it’s all one. It’s one energy. It comes through in individual ways, but it’s one energy. You can call it energy, or you can call it love. I like to look at a tree and see that it is love. Don’t you?

 — Ram Dass

from Ram Dass, Love Serve Remember

Martin Luther King, Jr.: You Only Need a Heart Full of Grace

“Everybody can be great… because anybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.”

 

— Martin Luther King Jr. 

 

from Ram Dass, Love Serve Remember 

Rumi: You Are Love

Forget the nonsense of there and here, 

race, nation, religion, starting point and destination. 

You are Soul, and you are Love.

- Rumi

Sundance 2014: Alive Inside: A Story of Music & Memory - Documentary Shows How Music Helps Elderly Remember

I am so very grateful to have heard of this amazing documentary! I am so excited for this new insight into how to more deeply support my mom and for the ability to spread the word about Alive Inside to others. Our elders all deserve the best quality of life, joy, and love possible.

Warmest blessings to all ~ Molly

*****************************************************

By Romain Raymanldy

 
Music can help dementia or Alzheimer's sufferers "wake up" their memories, claims a moving documentary presented at the Sundance Film Festival

It won't cure dementia or Alzheimer's disease, but music can nevertheless help sufferers "wake up" their memories, reveals a moving documentary presented at the Sundance Film Festival.

Alive Inside: A Story of Music & Memory, the debut feature film by Michael Rossato-Bennett, follows the efforts of one man to convince Americans of the benefits of music on people with dementia or Alzheimer's.

Dan Cohen, founder of the non-profit organization Memory & Music, arms himself with headphones and music players as he shows - to the surprise of care-givers - how patients locked in silence and lost in the maze of dementia seem to find some memories and feelings when they hear the music they love.

With the cameras watching on, many patients begin to talk, smile, sing and even dance, as their families look on stunned.

"It's not a cure," stressed Rossato-Bennett, whose film went on show at the independent film festival in Utah, the United States, at the weekend.

"And there is no way to get (back) these memory cells that have been destroyed."

But he says music has the ability to penetrate into the recesses of the brain less affected by dementia, which affects five million Americans.

Cohen's vision when he founded Memory & Music was a simple one: to bring a better quality of life to the elderly through music.

The fate of the elderly and infirm is one Rossato-Bennett shows an intense passion for.

"We live in a time, in a culture, where we're not really sure how much we care about humanity anymore," he told AFP at Sundance, which runs until January 26 in Park City.

"We know we care about industry, progress, commerce. But maybe elders are no longer useful. We're done with them."

He added: "Humanity is at a turning point. With our technology, we're gods.

"I really think we need to rethink almost everything and we'll have to, eventually. If we are creating global warming, at some point, we can't ignore it. If we are overfishing our oceans, at some point we can't ignore it.

"If our elders are not having a human life, at some point we cannot ignore it. So we will change.

"In 10-15 years in the US, we're gonna need to double the beds in nursing homes if we do it that way. We can't do it. We can barely afford what we have now. Double would literally bankrupt this country. People are gonna have to live at home longer, that's the only solution.

"When you have Alzheimer's or dementia, the world becomes overwhelming, you can't differentiate what's happening outside and inside, you can't do it."

******************

For the original article, please go here:  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/film-news/10585977/Sundance-2014-Alive-Inside-A-Story-of-Music-and-Memory-Documentary-shows-how-music-helps-elderly-remember.html

For a short video from Alive Inside, which has been seen by nearly 8 million people, please go here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKDXuCE7LeQ

For the Alive Inside website, please go here: http://aliveinside.us/

Mary Oliver: The Swan

 The Swan

Did you too see it, drifting, all night, on the black river?
Did you see it in the morning, rising into the silvery air -
An armful of white blossoms,
A perfect commotion of silk and linen as it leaned
into the bondage of its wings; a snowbank, a bank of lilies,
Biting the air with its black beak?
Did you hear it, fluting and whistling
A shrill dark music – like the rain pelting the trees – like a waterfall
Knifing down the black ledges?
And did you see it, finally, just under the clouds -
A white cross Streaming across the sky, its feet
Like black leaves, its wings Like the stretching light of the river?
And did you feel it, in your heart, how it pertained to everything?
And have you too finally figured out what beauty is for?
And have you changed your life?

- Mary Oliver

Photo: Swan lake by Nico

William Stafford: Ask Me

Ask Me

Some time when the river is ice ask me
mistakes I have made. Ask me whether
what I have done is my life. Others
have come in their slow way into
my thought, and some have tried to help
or to hurt: ask me what difference
their strongest love or hate has made.

I will listen to what you say.
You and I can turn and look
at the silent river and wait. We know
the current is there, hidden; and there
are comings and goings from miles away
that hold the stillness exactly before us.
What the river says, that is what I say.

 

- William Stafford