The Starfish

From The Lifespring Foundation

A small boy lived by the ocean. He loved the creatures of the sea, especially the starfish, and spent much of his time exploring the seashore. One day he learned there would be a minus tide that would leave the starfish stranded on the sand.

The day of the tide, he went down to the beach and began picking up stranded starfish and throwing them back into the sea. An elderly man who lived next door came down to the beach to see what he was doing. "I'm saving the starfish," the boy proudly declared.

When the neighbor saw all of the stranded starfish, he shook his head and said, "I'm sorry to disappoint you young man, but if you look down the beach one way, there are stranded starfish as far as the eye can see. And if you look down the beach the other way, it's the same. One little boy like you isn't going to make much of a difference."

The boy thought about this for a moment. Then he reached his small hand down to the sand, picked up a starfish, tossed it out into the ocean and said, "I sure made a difference for that one."

Everybody Goes © 2003 - 2005

Free Energy Of The Heart

Looking carefully around at how people generally behave I began to consider is human behaviour a product of the society, or is the society a product of human behaviour? Leaving the philosphical for a moment, I walked into town to buy a loaf of bread. Practical and simple in execution, one would imagine ...

The lady serving was alone and I waited patiently in line, behind the two people ahead of me. I am not the kind of person who tramples and boxes others out of the way. I have and show a respect for life, living according to an ancient principle: "Do unto others." And, no! I am not and have never been a soldier for religion or religious practices. I simply am!

Life is all around us. A living intelligence. A mirror. Actually life is a living holographic mirror. We walk around in bodies, but we are more than the sum of our parts. I was not thinking about the implications that we make society and that society is a product of who we are. I was waiting for bread. Life had other ideas in mind. Within its holographic mind, which is also part of our consciousness.

The lady serving the bread was a bit stressed, as she had to serve people coffee and heat snacks. Plus she was alone and more people were arriving. New people arriving began to push forward and a string reaction followed of everyone wanting to be first. That was when I began to pay attention and consider who we are, what are our values and why does brutality exist at all?

This world is a pretty brutal place. To get ahead one has to push and elbow ones way to the top, especially when one does not have the skills to make things work any other way. Sort of like the new German Government that is presently trying to form a "coalition". Nikola Tesla dropped into oblivion, while scientists like Albert Einstein were hailed as "geniuses". I wonder if truly skilled and gifted men elbow their way into position? Probably not!

As I waited to buy my bread the small amount of people grew to nine and then ten. They came from all sides and they all wanted to be first. So, I waited. I was watching the woman trying to serve them all under stress. No one seemed to question their behaviour, none of the people seemed to be aware of themselves. No one seemed to be aware that the woman serving was a human being. I watched the fanatical crowd of: "I want", and I was looking at society broken into its individual parts.

I sense that the only fanatical religion is: "I want." Give it what clothing and ideology you want, but the fundamental motivation grinding the mind into fanatical obediance is - I want!

There came a point where the lady serving the bread was able to turn to me and ask me what I want. In that moment an ugly voice screamed over from a far corner that it was to be served next. An argument was about to ensue, but not from me ... when I suggested that the ugly voice be served and finished and that we all remain calm ... after all why get upset and argue? At which point I said to the lady serving it is best to be of good heart and not get drawn into others peoples misery. In other words: "Stay out of it". In this way I was able to deactivate violence with good spirits and a calm mind.

The fact is that stress and causing stress in others, can and does cause disease. Not only psychological disease, which is obvious, but physical disease. I would imagine that one person with goodness in their heart can transform sickness into health. The current problem for mankind is that there are so few of us around. The difficulty for most people is that goodness is not the word and is not an intellectual concept, but is a state of mind arising out of a state of heart.

When goodness and a gentle heart can bring peace to a situation, why do we choose violence? It was the same sickness at work when Tesla was working to create what he called: Free energy. By this he meant that his inventions could store natural and abundant supplies of energy from the earth and transmit that energy to every house. The energy is available. It is everywhere and all around you. It is the same energy we humans gather in order to do good. But because people have separated themselves from the earths intelligence, otherwise known as love, their behaviour and unlimately that of society has fallen into disrepair.

Humans have become so mean and so greedy that everything is dying around us, fresh water supplies are drying up, farmland is turning to desert ... and the physical earth conditions are beginning to reflect (or mirror) the humans themselves. Towns and cities have become cancerous growths on the face of the earth, rather than places of beauty. It seems to be a touch of irony that the one creature on earth that has glass mirrors in every home has grown to be the ugliest of all the earths creatures. Beatuy is a harmonic of the heart. Dis-resonance can only be corrected by the entity feeding the signal out into the aether.

Behind the eyes of the brutal people I saw fear, and a kind of madness. I saw trapped spirits gorging themselves on material wealth and forgetting that the soul exists. I saw beings walking through life in human bodies, who have forgotten that they are first and foremost beings of spirit and that the physical reality is the vehicle allowing them to experience these worlds. We are time travellers who periodically inhabit physical existence. Who periodically forget that we are who we are.

Crystal Bones

Atlantis According To Plato

O Solon, Solon, you Hellenes are never anything but children, and there is not an old man among you. Solon in return asked him what he meant. "I mean to say," he replied, "that in mind you are all young; there is no old opinion handed down among you by ancient tradition, nor any science which is hoary with age. And I will tell you why."

"There have been, and will be again, many destructions of mankind arising out of many causes; the greatest have been brought about by the agencies of fire and water, and other lesser ones by innumerable other causes. There is a story, which even you have preserved, that once upon a time Paethon, the son of Helios, having yoked the steeds in his father's chariot, because he was not able to drive them in the path of his father, burnt up all that was upon the earth, and was himself destroyed by a thunderbolt. Now this has the form of a myth, but really signifies a declination of the bodies moving in the heavens around the earth, and a great conflagration of things upon the earth, which recurs after long intervals; at such times those who live upon the mountains and in dry and lofty places are more liable to destruction than those who dwell by rivers or on the seashore. And from this calamity the Nile, who is our never-failing savior, delivers and preserves us.

"When, on the other hand, the gods purge the earth with a deluge of water, the survivors in your country are herdsmen and shepherds who dwell on the mountains, but those who, like you, live in cities are carried by the rivers into the sea. Whereas in this land, neither then nor at any other time, does the water come down from above on the fields, having always a tendency to come up from below; for which reason the traditions preserved here are the most ancient. The fact is, that wherever the extremity of winter frost or of summer does not prevent, mankind exist, sometimes in greater, sometimes in lesser numbers. And whatever happened either in your country or in ours, or in any other region of which we are informed ~ if there were any actions noble or great or in any other way remarkable, they have all been written down by us of old, and are preserved in our temples.

"Whereas just when you and other nations are beginning to be provided with letters and the other requisites of civilized life, after the usual interval, the stream from heaven, like a pestilence, comes pouring down, and leaves only those of you who are destitute of letters and education; and so you have to begin all over again like children, and know nothing of what happened in ancient times, either among us or among yourselves. As for those genealogies of yours which you just now recounted to us, Solon, they are no better than the tales of children.

"In the first place you remember a single deluge only, but there were many previous ones; in the next place, you do not know that there formerly dwelt in your land the fairest and noblest race of men which ever lived, and that you and your whole city are descended from a small seed or remnant of them which survived. And this was unknown to you, because, for many generations, the survivors of that destruction died, leaving no written word. For there was a time, Solon, before the great deluge of all, when the city which now is Athens was first in war and in every way the best governed of all cities, is said to have performed the noblest deeds and to have had the fairest constitution of any of which tradition tells, under the face of heaven."

Solon marveled at his words, and earnestly requested the priests to inform him exactly and in order about these former citizens. "You are welcome to hear about them, Solon," said the priest, "both for your own sake and for that of your city, and above all, for the sake of the goddess who is the common patron and parent and educator of both our cities. She founded your city a thousand years before ours, receiving from the Earth and Hephaestus the seed of your race, and afterwards she founded ours, of which the constitution is recorded in our sacred registers to be eight thousand years old.

Siriusly! We Are Not Alone!

THE FOUR WINDS RETURN

High upon a mountain peak, not seen by the world below, sat the Four Winds. Long had it been since the council had met. The job of watching over The People had kept the Winds busy for uncountable years, but now the days were drawing to a close, and the council convened.

Unole Sakonige-i, the North Wind, was first to speak, “True were the words of Creator, wise was His counsel to withhold our anger. I did not foresee that the people would grow so strong in a land once dark with their blood,” said North Wind, standing with his gaze taking in the American Continent, black cloak flapping in the breeze. He sat down enveloped in a dark cloud.

East Wind, Unole Gigage, stood next to speak. She was dressed in dancing flames of light, a smile streamed from her face, “I would not have thought it. In the end our people are more numerous than in the beginning, they are proud, and they are strong.” From her eyes shot out great beams of light. Flashing from one scene to the next: a gathering of elders on the Navaho reservation, a large pow-wow in Kansas, an Indian family setting down to dinner in Missouri, a light-skinned Indian in Michigan sending smoke and prayers up to the Creator, a group of Indians camping out in Kentucky, an American Indian rally in New York, another in Washington, and a Convention in Delaware. These and many more images flashed across the minds of the Four Unole, as East Wind spoke not only out loud, but into their minds as well.

After a time, Unole Unega, South Wind, arose to speak to the other Winds. “Brother and Sisters,” he began, with flames dancing about his feet and playing in his hair. “Once I wished nothing more than to kill every white-skin on Turtle Island, I now stand astonished and abashed. Who would have thought these whites who once wished to drive our people into the sea, would come to love the Red People, to write books, tell about them in more ways than can be counted. Others would champion the cause of the People, some would risk life and wealth for the People—and these the children of those who once wanted only to steal from The People.” Unole Unega said, smiling a great glaring smile that soon washed out his face with its bright light.

Last to arise was Grandmother West Wind, Unole Gvhage-i. “My heart once was broken by the tear-stained faces of my children. How I longed to take them into my arms, and to wash away their grief,” she said, leaning upon a curly black stick as her long gray hair swam around in the currents of air. “Creator is truly wise. He could see this time, the time beyond our grief and anguish. The people have gathered, and dispersed across Turtle Island, they have blended into the colors of the rainbow—yet I can recognize them, whether their skin is black as night, or pale as flour. I watch them grow and smile, holding their heads high in knowledge of who they are, and no man takes this from them. I have dreamed of this time when Turtle Island will

All four Unole arose at the sound of a mighty horn. All four smiled as the sky was alight with their kindred Winds that swept the Earth and Turtle Island. All four raised hands in worship as Unehlanvhi descended upon the world.

BLUE SNAKE SAPONI CHIEF
He sat high upon a rocky shelf on a cold spring morning. The small, hot fire burned nearly smokeless beside him. The fire was unable to take away the chill; it certainly had no power to remove the chill from his heart.

Blue Snake (Asoti Wageni1), chief of a band of about thirty Saponi Indians, tried to draw strength this cold morning from the Great God (Itani Einga). Blue Snake needed strength for his people; he did not have any for himself—much less for his tribe.

Last fall, in the time of falling leaves, his band had numbered nearly one hundred and fifty members. Sickness and disease over the winter (wanei) had decimated his people.

Blue Snake liked to come to this sacred place to pray, he liked to watch the eagles soar over the valley below. Somehow coming here gave him hope he did not feel when looking into the faces of his dying people. He banished that thought, it had no power to help him, hope was what he needed today. First he took his decorated flute out of the leather bundle he carried. He placed the appropriate fingers upon the holes in the cedar flute, and played away the melancholy he felt within. That mournful sound rose upon the gentle morning breeze, melting away the sadness of the chief, even as the rising sun took away the chill in his body.

He was silent then for a time, but smiled as he saw an eagle drifting upon the warming air currents in the distance. He stoked the fire that had nearly gone out, then replaced the flute in the bundle, and took the sacred pipe out of the bundle on the rock ledge. He held the sacred pipe up toward the Sun above: “Great God (Itani Einga), I hold this pipe, the sacred “mouth stone—ihenstek” up before you. I am the chief of a small people, a tribe that has fallen like the leaves at the end of summer. I seek your blessing as we leave this place, and look for a new home on Mother Earth (Ina Amani).” Blue Snake, chief of his Saponi people lit the pipe and drew smoke. He sent the smoke to carry his prayers to the Creator above.

He sat for he knew not how long. But just as had happened once before, a vision came to the chief. He sat in a trance and watched the vision scroll before his eyes: White people floated upon the water as pollen. Like pollen from every tree in the forest they covered the vast lake that the chief looked upon. He could see some tiny Islands on the lake, upon those Islands were a few scattered cedar trees. In his vision he watched the sky darken, a storm quickly rose up and pounded the lake with a hard rain. The White pollen upon the lake danced around as the rain struck. The cedar trees bent beneath the fierce winds that swept the lake and the Islands. The White pollen began to cluster about the edge of the Islands as if for protection from the storm. For a time Blue Snake feared the cedar trees might topple over in the storm, but they stood fast. As quickly as it came, the vision ended.

Chief Blue Snake pondered the vision for awhile upon that rocky ledge. The birds were singing around him, and the sky was bright and clear over his head. He nodded in understanding as he gathered his sacred bundle and made his way back toward his tribe below. The Great God (Itani Einga) had showed him what he feared, and had given him courage to face it.

It was time to join the other remnant bands at Roanoke. His people gathered their few belongings, they prayed at the gravesides of the family and friends they had to leave behind in Mother Earth. Then as always, The People set their course to face the challenges before them, and to fight for their place on Turtle Island.

Copyright © 2001 Karlton Douglas. All rights reserved

A Society Built On Water

Regardless of individual political, social and religious belief, each of us lives in a world where we need air to breathe, water to drink and food to eat. Against the backdrop of these basic needs humans struggle to hold onto and control the basic essential resources on this earth. Wars are fought to maintain control of these resources. Although fights break out over the ownership of gold reserves, oil and gas fields ... without water you can own all the oil fields you want and you will soon die.

For example, if an invading army suddenly faced a drought so vast that not a drop of water could be found anywhere, there is no invading army - they will have to leave or die together with the local population. If oil and gas reserves were found worldwide and food harvests fell by two-thirds, food would become more important than oil. We can live without oil and gas, but we cannot live without water, food and air.

It does not matter whether a tribe calls itself Isra, Araba, Scotia, Hindra or Akkada as they all need water and food regardless of the tribes name. The struggle to have water reserves and arable land have nothing to do with the name of your tribe. At the end of the day air is air, water is water and food is food. At the end of the day the collective are simply humans who will die without basic resources. I can carry a banner announcing that I am Mar from the planet Mars and still I am simply an individual with basic needs. I need a shelter built from the bones of the earth to protect me, I need to be able to feed myself and without water I wont even have the energy to build myself a shelter never mind go out and find food.

Without water the food I need wont grow. Without water those who depend on animals wont find any animals. The armies of Rome would not have walked very far if they were starving to death. War is the privelege of those who have the energy and the reources to fight. When Napolean marched his armies into Russia the people fled and hid, taking their food with them and destroying the crops before they left. The Russians then cut off the supply lines behind the invading army. They had no food.

If the pollution from petrolium dependant technology is creating some kind of imbalance to the planet (not global warming). An imbalance that is so severe that continuing to use petrolium is the most deadly thing we can do. Let's say because it is a killer, but we do not know all the facts. And even as global powers fight over the petrolium addiction the scales have tipped against us and the food chain has been broken ... and we are at the end of the food chain. Which in laymans terms means: First the plankton dies, and the coral, the little fish and the shrimps. The crabs die and the lobsters, the flounders and the cod ... then the bigger fish, the dolphins and the whales. Seabirds die, ducks and the geese. Then other animals get sick: The deer, pigs and cows. Then the land gets sick on top of weather so severe no farmer knows the seasons anymore. Don't forget we are at the end of the food chain, so when the natural chain dies we die too.

Right around the globe people may be called one tribe or another, and argue basic philosophical, social and political ideologies one amongst the other. But we can do that because we still have enough food in our stomachs and enough water to drink. It is more difficult to argue with a dry mouth and no food for the past month.

Our planet is changing its dynamics and to understand what is happening we have to understand the reality of the situation and get in touch with the facts. The chaos that will ensue is not ideological or political, it is a question of the management of resources. The intelligent management of resources is not related to political, ideological or financial gain. The intelligent management of resources is an essential componant of our future survival, and if we do not learn how to balance out our needs in an intelligent way then the human species will not survive, it will go extinct and the earth will get along just fine without us.

Global Warming
It exists, but not due to greenhouse gases. Oceans are heating due to hot spots rotating in the earth's core ... Gary Novak: Nov55

The Myth Of Democracy

Only those societies aspiring to a greater spiritual understanding of the nature of life can balance physical needs with the intelligent management of resources. Seeking material wealth simply for its own sake will not create a society that embraces liberty and cross cultural respect. If humans do not respect the diverse cultural patterns on this planet, then war will always be the result of racial intolerance. Rather than share resources, humans will seek to own the resources of the earth and eventually hold each other to randsom rather then cooperate and survive.

... From the beginning of human history, as we've seen, nations have been ruled by small groups. Unscrupulous persons discovered that one of the easiest ways to rule a country was to make the people think that they, the people, were ruling, when in fact a small cabal was controlling all poltical and economic events for their own interests.

Few such rulers have been forthright enough to admit that they were using the myth of democracy (rule of the people for the people) to institute and perpetuate an elite form of government. One such ruler who spoke in straightforward terms was William Penn (1644-1718), the English religious leader and founder of the colony of Pennsylvania. In his book Some Fruits of Solitude (1693), he said that the way for an elite to rule was to:

"Let the people think they govern and they will be governed."

One of the reasons why ignorant and ill-intentioned thinkers have attacked Plato, is because he was forthright enough to reveal the reality of democracy--that it is in actuality the manipulation of the masses by an elite who fools the common people into thinking they are ruling when they aren't.

"These will be some of the features of democracy. . . it will be, in all likelihood, an agreeable, lawless, parti-colored society, dealing with all alike on a footing of equality, whether they be really equal or not.

Plato, The Commonwealth
Plato had seen this form of swindle practiced on the citizens of Athens, and had seen the deadly results of such a fraud when a pseudo-democratic group sentenced his teacher and friend Socrates to death on trumped-up charges.

Plato understood that a society must have either of two basic forms of government:
Oligarchy: a government in which a small elite group rules for its own benefit.
Plutocracy: rule of those with wealth
Tyranny: rule of a criminal cabal
Commonwealth: a government in which politcal and economic principles and practices accrue to the benefit of all members of society.

This form of government is ruled by some type of aristocracy, those with some kind of special knowledge and skill.

Plato believed that a commonwealth should be ruled by those persons who were seekers of wisdom--philosophers.
One of Plato's major works was entitled Politeia (πoλιτεια), the Greek word for Commonwealth. The title of this work has been mistranslated as The Republic when its actual title is The Commonwealth.
Plato saw clearly that the swindle called democracy quickly degenerates into tyranny--as we have seen throughout American history.

The Demonic Cabal

Water Wars Loom in Middle East

Although most conflicts between states would appear to be of an ideological nature, the reality is that brutal force is the drive to obtain natural resources and ideology is the leverage tool to justify the attacks. What is it that animals compete over? Territory, areas where food is gathered. Blackbirds are easier to observe in this struggle because they are on the ground searching for their food. In towns and cities food gathering areas for these birds has been reduced to small plots of grass between walls and concrete roads. In those tiny spaces there is only so much to eat. The birds have to keep others off their ground in order to feed, and feed their young. It is no different with humans, only human beings take more than they need.

Throughout the Middle east you have ever increasing populations and a rapidly dwindling supply of water. The small patch of grass is drying up and the birds have to find new feeding areas. These confllicts may be be clothed in the feathered dress of irreconcilable Religious and Ideological divisions, but these ideas are merely to give us the appearance that we humans are of a higher intelligence, using reason to discern rather than basic need. The bright feathers justify the war and are part of the war dance, rational avoidance of our fragile animal dependance on the earth and its scarce resources.

Current row between Ethiopia and Egypt over Nile water may spark military action. by John Bradley

It is common knowledge that oil and territorial issues spark conflict in the Middle East, but there is now growing alarm over the risk that water could be the catalyst for the next war in the region.

Middle East nations record some of the highest birth rates in the world but have only 0.4 per cent of the world’s recoverable water resources. Some 80 per cent of people in the region rely on water that flows into their country from at least one other.

The potential for disputes over this scarce essential resource is obvious, a risk clearly illustrated by a currently escalating row between Ethiopia and Egypt over access to the waters of the River Nile.

Former United Nations secretary-general Boutros Boutros-Ghali said last month that if no solution is found, the disagreement will ’certainly’ spark military confrontation.

Dr Joyce Shira Starr, author of the influential book Covenant Over Middle Eastern Waters: Key To World Survival, has been warning along with Dr Boutros-Ghali for years that the region is on the brink of war over water.

She says that the ’21st-century challenge for the international community is to harness and link technological advances with water-sharing agreements’.

The quote: ’The next war in the Middle East will be over water’ came from Dr Boutros-Ghali. It was that single sentence that launched my own ’mission’ over water,’ she adds.

Ethiopia plans to draw more water from the Blue Nile. Although the river’s source is in Ethiopia, an agreement in 1929 between Britain and Egypt gave Egypt most of the Nile’s water, and Cairo has already made clear that any attempt to alter the waterway’s status will be deemed an act of war.

Another reason for some observers’ growing concern over the potential for war is an alarming report issued this week by Friends of the Earth. The international environmental organisation says that the River Jordan - depleted by huge water diversions by Israel, Jordan and Syria - will dry up within two years.

The potential for ’water wars’ has long loomed large over the Middle East. When former Egyptian president Anwar Sadat signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1979, he said Egypt would never go to war again - except to protect its water resources.

The late King Hussein of Jordan made a similar declaration.

While Dr Boutros-Ghali’s warning of ’certain’ war may seem alarmist, there are precedents.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has said that the Six Days War started because Syrian engineers were working on diverting part of a shared water flow away from Israel. And Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon was planned, in part, as a way of gaining control over Lebanon’s Litani River.

Access to water is also a stumbling block for any permanent settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

However, not all experts agree that water wars are inevitable.

Dr Jan Selby, lecturer in the Department of International Relations at the University of Sussex and the author of Water, Power, And Politics In The Middle East, believes that the problem is not allocation of water per se but rather uneven socio-economic development. He cited the Palestinians to illustrate his point that there would be nothing to gain from confrontation.

’Even if the Palestinians were granted their fair share of regional water resources, it is very unlikely that their water problems would go away unless they had the economic and institutional capacity to manage water adequately - to desalinate, treat, conserve and distribute it well,’ he said.

It is in the interest of all parties who need water resources to cooperate, this contrary view concerning the risk of war goes.

Dr Daniel Hillel, author of Rivers Of Eden: The Struggle For Water And The Quest For Peace In The Middle East, adds that a decision to go to war over water would be ’based on a mistaken perception of the problem and a failure of positive vision’.

’So mechanisms are needed to address those issues in a spirit of cooperation and the quest for peace,’ he said.

River Jordan 'nearly running dry'

The Golden Chainsaw

You may wonder what finding what you love and sticking to it has to do with Socrates and the cave?

Socrates was one of the few teachers who did not charge money for his teachings. His opponents and critics made a good killing charging their students to study with them. Later they also killed Socrates!

"Socrates married Xanthippe. She is said to have resented the fact that he charged no fees for his teaching."

"Socrates devoted most of his adult life to the development of a philosophy and to teaching those followers who attached themselves to his dialogue discussion groups. Socrates was distinctive for:

* Devotion to Ethics an attitude which influenced all later Greek philosophers.
* Development of the Inductive Method of reasoning.
* Linking Knowledge to Happiness. He believed that knowledge, or insight, was the foundation of virtue and happiness.
* Rationalism. Socrates believed that man was capable of arriving at truth through the use of reason."

A great part of the social and economic problems facing society today arise directly from our own individual actions and choices. What is society other than the sum of its parts? Most people have given up love for "security", and in doing so have created insecurity. By losing personal ethics and mindlessly following the outer authority of the corporate, political and religious autocracies, we have given away the one thing that makes us human. Our freedom.

I know exactly what Steve Jobs is talking about, because I have stood in front of countless obstructions and I have faced them down alone. I have faced working situations where managers and organisers have ordered me to destroy my own values of honesty, integrity and honour ... and I have refused.

Unfortunately the vast majority of our society go along with the moral destruction of our basic values, just to get a wage. Not seeing that the loss is effecting our abilty to live, be happy and love. Later down the line the exploited become exploiter as the sickness spreads.

The Northern continents are the richest in the world, and yet people are living in misery. Money does not make people happy, but doing what you love does. Instead humans have become slaves to the system and all creativity is buried under a pile of ...

Why does this matter?

Because we are creative entities. That is the power we are born with and when that creativity dies we die with it. Lumbering around as human zombies carrying a pot of gold is not why we are here on this earth.

Greenpeace Gives Golden Chainsaw to Brazil Tycoon

The Celts survived in Scotland, Ireland and Wales over hundreds of years, and yet this modern culture of slaves has destroyed these countries in the span of 50 years. But slaves to what? To their own weakness? You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink.

Unfortunately we drink the poison willingly; but if we truly loved life I doubt that this would be the case. The overall loss of collective integrity has damaged society to the extent that society has become a danger to us. But this is what happens when you pollute the waters you drink from.

It will probably take an asteroid landing in the ocean to waken people to the truth, when things are no longer easy and one has to cooperate to survive. The present climate of take what you can get will not survive a real disaster. But then again, maybe that is what disasters are here to teach. Asteroid Socrates!

Find What You Love

'You've got to find what you love,' Jobs says

This is the text of the Commencement address by Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, delivered on June 12, 2005.

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, its likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something - your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky – I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation - the Macintosh - a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me – I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I retuned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope its the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of other's opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.
Stanford Report

Socrates - The Cave Dwellers

SOCRATES: And now, let me give a parable to show how far our nature is enlightened or unenlightened. Imagine human beings living in an underground cave with an opening upward towards the light, which filters into the depths of the cave. These human beings have been here since birth, and their legs and necks have been chained so that they cannot move. They can only see what is directly in front of them, since they are prevented by the chains from turning their heads to either side. At a distance above and behind them is a raised path. And if you look closely, you will see a low wall built along the path, like the screen used by marionette players to conceal themselves from the audience while they show their puppets.

GLAUCON: I see.

SOCRATES: And do you see men passing behind the wall carrying all sorts of objects, such as figures of animals and humans made of wood, stone, and various materials, which they are holding above the wall? Some of the men carrying these objects are talking, while others are silent.

GLAUCON: You have shown me a strange image, and these are strange prisoners.

SOCRATES: They are similar to us. For, initially, how could they see anything but their own shadows, or the shadows of each other, which the fire projects on the wall of the cave in front of them?

GLAUCON: That is true. How could they see anything but the shadows if they were never allowed to turn their heads?

SOCRATES: And wouldn't they see only the shadows of the objects that are being carried by the men?

GLAUCON: Obviously.

SOCRATES: And if these prisoners were able to talk to each other, would they not suppose that the words they used referred only to the shadows that they saw on the wall in front of them?

GLAUCON: Of course.

SOCRATES: And if one of these prisoners was able at last to free himself, and explore to the upper world, would he understand what he saw?

GLAUCON: Not immediately.

SOCRATES: He would have to grow accustomed to the sights of the upper world. First he would be able to see the shadows best, next the reflections of men and other things in the water, and then the things themselves. Afterwards he would be able to gaze upon the light of the moon, the stars, and the spangled heaven. Would it not be easier at first for him to look upon the sky and the stars by night than upon the sun or the light of the sun by day?

GLAUCON: Certainly.

SOCRATES: Last of all he would be able to see the sun, not merely as it is reflected in the water, but in its true nature and in its own proper place.

GLAUCON: Absolutely.

SOCRATES: He will then begin to conclude that it is the sun which causes the seasons and the years, which is the guardian of everything in the visible world, and which, in a certain way, is the cause of all the things that he and his fellows have formerly seen.

GLAUCON: It is evident that he would first see the sun and then reason about it.

SOCRATES: And when he remembered his old habituation, and the wisdom of the cave and of his fellow-prisoners, do you not suppose that he would be happy about his change and pity those who were still prisoners?

GLAUCON: Certainly he would.

SOCRATES: And if they were in the habit of honoring those who could most quickly observe the passing shadows and decide which of them went before others, which came after, which occurred simultaneously--being therefore best able to draw conclusions about the future--do you think that he would care for such honors or envy the possessors of them? Would he not say with Homer, "Better to be the poor servant of a poor master," and to endure anything, rather than think as they do and live after their manner?

GLAUCON: Yes, I think that he would rather suffer anything than accept these false notions and live in this miserable manner.

SOCRATES: Indeed, imagine what it would be like for him to come suddenly out of the sun and to return to his old place in the cave. Would he not be certain to have his eyes full of darkness?

GLAUCON: Most assuredly.

SOCRATES: And while his eyes were filled with darkness and his sight still weak (and the time needed to become re-accustomed to the cave might be very considerable), if there were a contest in which he had to compete in measuring the shadows with the prisoners who had never been out of the cave, would he not be ridiculous? Men would say of him that his ascent and descent had destroyed his eyesight, and thus that it was better not even to think of ascending. And if they caught anyone trying to free another and lead him up to the light, they would put the offender to death.

GLAUCON: Without question.

SOCRATES: You may append this entire allegory, dear Glaucon, to what I have said before. The prisonhouse or cave is the world of sight; the light of the fire within the cave is the sun. And you will not misapprehend me if you interpret the journey upwards to be the ascent of the soul into the intelligible world, which, at your request, I have described. Only God knows whether or not my description is accurate. But whether true or false, my opinion is that in the world of knowledge the Form of the Good appears last of all, and is seen only with an effort. When seen, however, it can only lead us to the conclusion that it is the universal author of all things beautiful and right, that it is the origin of the source of light in the visible world, and the immediate source of reason and truth in the intelligible world. Without having seen the Form of Good and having fixed his eye upon it, one will not be able to act wisely either in public affairs or in private life.

GLAUCON: I agree, as far as I am able to understand you.