I know there is a lot of stuff floating around with regards to the election in the US on November 4th.

As usual I am very selective about my media intake and while I don’t quite endorse the website I found this article on in general, I really feel this one hits the nail on the head.

So head over to this page and see what it’s all about if you have ever even considered voting for Obama.

Happy reading and have a wonderful weekend.

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Quite often when I listen to the news these days the outlook on so many issues is a rather bleak and pessimistic one. The economy is entering a recession, global warming threatens to change the face of planet earth and violence and crime are on the rise, not to mention terror attacks when you go on a vacation outside of Disneyworld.

Of course I am exaggerating a bit, but you get my point.

The second aspect I want to touch on in this post is the glorification of the past by many of us, because we somehow misremember and selectively delete all the bad and only keep the recollections of rosy days in our mind. Last year everything was better and 10 years ago, ‘Oh My’ gas cost only 35 cents and nobody would talk back to you if you asked them to pick up a piece of litter in the street.

So here is my question: “Are things today really progressively worse? Have we as a society lost the fabric of decency, respect and mutual appreciation?” I think not!

As I was driving home from work I always go through a part of downtown Vancouver that is called the Eastside, and unlike Manhatten, in this case eastside is not where the top real estate values and zipcodes are found.

It’s more of an area where police have a hard time dealing with drug issues and petty crimes as well as homelessness and vandalism to people’s property.

So as I enter this part of town, I am thinking what a warm and dry day it is and how nature is coping with the lack of rainfall we have had for about 2 weeks here. Now I know that this may sound crazy if you live in Southern California, but 2 weeks without rain is a big deal in Vancouver, considering we get about 200 days of it per year.

I drive by a row of newly planted trees that are very dry looking when I spot a rather rough looking individual mucking about with a container they are carrying out of an adjacent Starbucks. It turns out that this homeless man actually took the time to use his water container and ask at Starbucks to have it filled up so he could provide water to the row of trees that are in the street. The glance of caring devotion he had for these young trees was something you would normally see when a mother tends to her child.

As I am instantly feeling a warmth and comfortable feeling in my heart, I paused and thought about what I just saw back there. This man was more connected with creation and cared more about a city tree than he did about collecting pop cans or getting in line at the nearby soup kitchen to care for his own dinner. Instead he provided for mother nature what she couldn’t provide for herseelf at this point.

The key point to me is not the isolated act of caring or kindness, but the underlying proof it provides to show that small acts are still happening, that they are indeed a lot more common than we think.

I also know the other side of karma, for I have experienced it myself in cases of charity. Most people are very sceptical about giving to a beggar in the street for one reason or another. It may be that they are uncomfortable to be solicited for money. Or maybe they believe that even if they gave any change, it would only be wasted on alcohol or illegal drugs rather than food and shelter.

Until a few years ago, I too shared some of those beliefs, but then I read a very powerful book by Deepak Chopra. In that book, the author describes the concept of unconditional giving, or giving for the sake of giving rather than to make a point or further a certain goal.

This concept is one of the most uplifting and liberating concepts I want to share with you here. If you can give any amount or do any favor, not to be thanked or rewarded or even be concerned about the consequences of your action, you have truly experienced what it means to give.

I remember an autumn evening at the Seattle Pike market after the stands are closed and most tourists are gone from the area. We were in town just for the night and had been considering what to have for dinner. At that point my attention got drawn to a scruffy old man who sat alone at the far end of a roofed in area and ate a sparse supper. I couldn’t tell whether he was homeless or just looked that way because of the dirty work at the fish market or the boat docks during the day.

Either way, I felt my inner voice nudging me to give him some money. I actually didn’t have any change or small bills on me, all I had was a twenty and larger. But even that didn’t really phase me as an issue. So I walked over to him and handed him the twenty dollar bill and wished him a good evening as I walked away. I can’t even recall what he said to me at this point, but actually that is not important here anyways.

What was important to me was the tramendous sense of sharing and even accomplishment I received from giving away some of my dinner money. I didn’t care what he spent the money on, or even if he was deserving or not. I had learned to not be attached to my money and to share what was given to me to allow more of it to flow into my life.

Without a doubt, charity and other acts of kindness are one of the key foundations of success in my life because from my own experience, if I actually added up what I have given away and what I have recieved from totally unrelated sources in return, I would come up with at least a ten to one ration in my favor.

This is the way of the universe.  

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Ok, I admit it, I am a metric kinda guy. I don’t do gallons or inches, cups (at least when I am cooking) and Fahrenheit means nothing to me.

 I was raised in Europe and I’m proud of it, but that is besides the point here. I will attempt to convert the above price to roughly US $2.10 per litre of gas. Still lower than in most European countries by the way.

So here I am reading through the daily concerns of the masses on the Internet and I came across a fantastic post by a writer over at the LA Times who took the time to find the positive sides of ‘high’ gas prices. His name is Joel Stein and the complete article can be found here http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-stein11-2008jul11,0,258677.column

So what could possibly be good about a high gas price that would prompt me to write this post for you today? Well, I can think of a few things…

In society change usually happens slowly and from the grassroots level up. Once the desire of the masses reaches a tipping point, extraordinary things are possible. Think for example of the French Revolution, where the people tumbled an empire to found a Republic which served as an exemplary democracy in Europe at the time.

Or take the Decleration of Independence in the US history and its three most quoted principles of:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

 But since then a lot has happened as well that may not be written in a historic document or carved in stone but be just as important for mankind. Change often happens when somebody is slightly out of their comfort zone and the options to adjust to this change are streching our imagination. Luckily, high gas prices are not usually a life or death type of scenario, but are mote subtle in nature because they affect the majority of things that we enjoy in life - at the status quo!

Now what if, just for the sake of argument we envisoned a life that was not so relient on fossil fuels and more focused on the human factor. That, my friends might look something like this:

You get up in the morning and in your Pjs you make some coffee before you go to your office. That office is a laptop on top of your desk in your home office overlooking the yard where your children are playing. It won’t be a very busy day, and that meeting you have scheduled in the afternoon will only require a phone line and some of your great ideas.

Your kids grab their backpacks and walk out the door, but instead of you having to drive them to school in your SUV, they can walk the 3 blocks and enjoy some fresh air and sunshine on their way there.

As your workday winds down, you feel like you need to do some shopping for dinner and maybe have a little workout to keep you in shape. So why not combine the two and get your bike which allows you to reach the neigherborhood store in about 10 easy minutes. You want to make a healthy dinner and visit a few stores which are all side by side on the same street and cater nothing but the feshest local ingredients.

You won’t need a car for this because likely you will be back the next day to pick up the stuff you need for the following days.

As you come home you cook dinner and after your spouse and kids have eaten with you, maybe it’s time for a game or a movie. Whatever it maybe, most likely you can enjoy it from your own livingroom, and chances are the kids in the row behind you won’t throw popcorn at you either.

The weekend arrives and you feel like going out of town. No problem, you load up your Hybrid car and take the family to a destination in the countryside. Quaint, close and most likely a hidden secret which is why you are getting the B&B at a very lovely price.

I’m not trying to recruit for Greenpeace here, because I enjoy the comforts of modern civilization as much as you do, but I am fully convinced that more good will come out of this current trend than bad.

Here is another point you can’t dismiss. Who is most affected by the current rise in prices? The poor and the middle class, right? Mortgage foreclosed, SUV sold, inflation is rising and nowhere to go…

I beg to differ on this one. It may have occurred to you that the rich will always be fine, no matter what the economy is doing and no matter who runs the country. Isn’t that alone an incentive to get marvelously wealthy and simply not worry about gas prices and all the other hype that is surrounding us? All you need is to adopt the thinking and the ways of the rich and you can be on your way.

Lastly, let me conclude with this. The sheer flood of innovation in new greener technology and adapted living for modern societies such as ours will far outweigh the current tipping point of whatever it may be that’s on the news. It’s time to realize that out potential as human beings is truly endless, only curtailed by what our ego tells us we cannot do. But no true leader is going to let that stop him. 

Remember, the leaders will always be fine soaring above the crowd, while the masses will always be complaying like lame ducks that are looking for someone to do it for them. Exercise your divine right to be a leader. Let me welcome you to it…

All the best

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