Just like we didn't know that he would have 911 to deal with when we let Bush and the Supremes get by with stealing the presidency, we don't really know what Obama will have to deal with either.
The issues we think are the issues are not really going to be the issues. We are soon in for changes that will make all our current ways of thinking obsolete- a change in how humans think and act- a paradigm shift as great as the printing press, probably greater. A cascade of economic, technological and social change, some wonderful, some horrible, is headed our way. The tsunami of these collective changes, and of their interactions, is as entirely unpredictable and uncontrollable as it is inevitable. We are ALL about to undergo the most rapid changes of our lives in an unbelievably short period of time.
Here are just a few high probability occurrences we are in for, within the next few years:
An epidemic of bird flu and possibly other billion killer epidemics, involving the whole world, will likely spread over the world within 48 hours in spite of efforts of governments to stop it.
Free energy for living and getting around for everyone may suddenly be available very cheaply.
The total collapse of the oil economy is very likely, only the rate of the collapse is unknown.
There has to be a downfall of the entire 90% resources owned by 10% of the people organized as top down managing fascist murderers for profit, likely accompanied by immense death and destruction.
Computers superior to humans and capable of learning, becoming suddenly more reliable and more relied on than humans, and capable of actually solving problems quickly and efficiently.
No one being able to lie and get by with it anymore! Perfect lie detection is just around the corner.
We will all have a life expectancy of 200 years or more, at the same time the world appears to be dying and the population exploding.
The transmogrification of the Internet (what we know now being replaced with a new kind of a more image sensory video Internet), where there is information and sex anytime for anyone.
Another terrorist attack, bigger than the world trade center, and perhaps more than one.
Technologies of dialogue and deliberation, more perfected, will be recognized as a source of human co-intelligent design, to be implemented and modified along the way using technology and more co-intelligent deliberation and dialogue, and this will slowly replace antiquated systems of government, education and justice.
There are about 16 other things, just as world shaking and inevitable and one right on the heels of another, but the sequence is unknown and the interaction effect entirely unpredictable. Every item on that short list is a bombshell like the plague or the printing press or walking upright, etc. In other words, some things much much bigger than 9/11 are going to happen. And the survivors of this next evolutionary test will be those with very specific survival skills that involve tolerance of extreme ambiguity and constant change and unpredictability of the immediate and long range future.
A new paradigm is aborning amongst us out of the necessity of facing these events. The new paradigm includes an expectation for frequent, unpredictable and disruptive paradigm shifts as an ongoing fundamental assumption. We will all be flying by the seats of our pants come tomorrow morning, the day after tomorrow and next week. Meditation, honesty, compassionate dialogue, deliberation and deep democracy are minimum requirements for the skill set needed to provide the slightest hope of surviving the joys and horrors we are now in for. So that is where we involved with Radical Honesty are now going to focus our energies.
I have decided to stay engaged like never before with people I love and trust and to take all the directions for my life from co-intelligent and co-hearted friends and to prepare for shock. Whatever plans we have for personal and world transformation will soon have opportunities and challenges we have never and could never have anticipated because the model needed to understand them simply doesn't exist, and can't until they happen.
We recently held a World Cafe at the trainer's training at Sparrowhawk focused on this question:
How will we integrate our awareness practice, contactful communication, and activism for social change to best contribute to ourselves and all other beings?
This is the best we could come up with to re-think, on a daily basis, with each new day’s information included, how we humans and related species are going to survive. We may have our daily survival depend on how actively we: Meditate. Communicate. Originate. Deflate the previous state.
I am still holding that question on a daily basis and waiting for the apocalypse with some vague plans of having a place people can retreat to when the shits hit the fans.
We decided to modify the training programs of the Center for Radical Honesty to prepare leaders who can deal with radical personal and social change on an ongoing basis. We need to prepare for what we don’t know is going to happen. And we need to prepare to lead fellowships and partnerships of constant losers. People with practice as losers will be our next leaders. Exercise. Breathe. Meditate. Eat good. Feed others. Blow up the Dam. Return. Retreat. Blow up the Bank. Think together again. Blow the banker. Masturbate. Meditate...
Individual methods of presencing ourselves leading to real social action, practiced every day, keeps insanity at bay and the doctor away. And above all else, keep the doctor away!
There is no hope for the old system. In the next 5 years we will all be stood on our heads and see things we never dreamed of or had nightmares about. There is no cumulative power for knowledge gained from old models except to get that the old models don't and won't work now. That's about it. O yes, there is one more thing- one might have developed the capacity to tolerate a high degree of uncertainty and the constant violation of expectations and still be happy and willing and willing to live until one does die- that might help.
My bets now are on the unpredictable fertile blossoming field of all enterprises alternative to and other than political or economic. Technology might help save us after all! Can't throw out the bathwater with the baby. I do not believe we will develop the capacity to save ourselves without help from technology. Because our only sign of adaptability to rapid change due to technology is in new technological solutions to problems created by technology. Supercomputers, able to learn on their own are inventing what Susan Blackmore now calls "temes," the next evolution from genes and memes- ideas that replicate themselves that come from technology! And, as I have always said, the ability, on the horizon now, to always tell when anyone is lying through technology may be a source of hope as well as a source of total destruction of the old systems based so fundamentally on deception.
If this out of control accident doesn't work out, most of humanity's early 21st Century tombstone will say: "Humans were those beautiful awful hopelessly lost creatures who devoured everything around them including each other. They would have killed themselves off completely instead of just 98% except a few of them built something collectively that could outthink and outwit the business and warrior class, so those few survived as servants to a hand built god they had all dreamed of, who took over and saved a few dozen of them the way they had always wished someone would."
I am going to go ahead and vote for Obama because I think Obama and the kids might handle some of this shit better than No Brain McCain and the Pain Train of Human Stain. "Obsolete Pete and the Deadbeats," his band, can't play for shit. At least in Obama's band "Don't Look Behind the Curtain and I'll Look Good for You if You'll Look Good for Me," there are a few people who can play without a leader or who might step up to lead when the leader doesn't. Either way, we are in for a shit storm of change and we cannot really prepare for it because the interactions of events are impossible to predict or control.
We have decided amongst the leaders in Radical Honesty to restore the original 8 day workshop and to create a second 8 day advanced workshop. We could not integrate the social change elements into the psychological and spiritual re-conditioning of the original 8 day when we divided it into 3, 3day workshops. So we are going back to the 8 day intensive model, and doing two different 8 day workshops, the regular one focused on psychological growth and spiritual maturity, and a second one focused on social change and survival and transformation of society. We will offer two 8 day workshops with a few months in between for homework, with the second focused on Radical Social Change based on Psycholgical Growth and Spiritual practice from the first workshop and what we are calling detachment. The title of the second 8 Day is Power: Power on the Inside, Power on the Outside, Power in the Upside Down.
The next 3 day Workshop for only 500 bucks in on September 19, The Nekkid Truth! If you come to that you will definitely have a preview of coming attractions! And you can join the desperate band attempting to prepare for what cannot be prepared for. Uncertainty loves company. Details about workshop dates follow immediately. Love, Brad
The next workshop is level two of the three workshop series. All former workshop participants at any level may attend this on called "The Nekkid Truth". You have to get nekkid in a lot of ways. That is coming up on September 19-21 at Sparrowhawk Farm. It costs $500. Call 1 800 EL TRUTH to make your reservation with Bonnie or Matt or Brad.
The series of three, three day workshops format will be available conducted by trainers in their local areas after this one, the last 3 day format conducted by me.
There will be three original 8 day workshops, one advanced 8 day workshop, and one trainer's training over the course of the next year.
The dates for the upcoming 8 day workshops are: The Course in Honesty Eight Day Workshop. November 22-29, 2008 and February 7-15, 2009. (We will attend Obama's inauguration)
The New Radical Honesty 8 Day Workshop Advanced Course: Individual, Collective and World Wide Power. April 18-26, 2009
The Course in Honesty Eight Day Workshop. June 3-11, 2009.
Next Radical Honesty Trainer's Training is September 12-20, 2009.
More detailed workshop descriptions will be on the website within the week.
