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May 31, 2007
Massage of the Week: Soothing Abdominal Treatment
Have you ever noticed if your abdomen carries tension? If so, how does it affect your body? How’s your digestion? How’s your level of anger?
It’s obvious to me, from the work I do at the Chopra Center, that a lot of people carry stress in their gut. If you or someone you love is one of those people, here’s something simple you can enjoy at home that will relax the muscles and organs of the abdomen, and bring more balance to your whole being as a result.
Supplies needed:
1-2 tsp. oil (any kind of massage blend, or even olive oil from your kitchen)
1 drop lavender essential oil (available at any health food store)
Hot water bottle or an old sock filled with uncooked rice (or flaxseeds)
An old towel or piece of cloth that you don’t mind getting oily
Optional: some hot chamomile or peppermint tea
Make a cup of chamomile or peppermint tea and set aside, but keep it within reach. Fill your hot water bottle with hot water. Alternately, fill an old sock (a large one) with uncooked rice or flaxseeds, tie off the end into a knot, and heat in the microwave. Try heating for a minute, and see if that’s hot enough. It will depend on how much rice or flax seeds you have in the sock.
Add the drop of lavender essential oil to the massage oil. Lavender’s been used for centuries as a comforting abdominal tonic – for babies, pregnant women, children, women with menstrual cramps, upset stomachs - you name it. (If you don’t have lavender oil, you can still do the treatment. Your body will still benefit from the love and attention you give it.)
Lie down comfortably on your back and rub the oil into your abdomen with long soothing strokes. It’s nice to do a circular pattern, flowing in the same direction as your digestion flows through your large intestine. So start on your right side by the hip bone, work across the upper abdomen to the other hip bone, (moving under the ribs but above the navel), and then work back across the lower abdomen, (under the navel and above the pubic bone). Keep going around and around, rubbing the lavender oil into the pores of the skin.
You can rub your belly as long as you like (30 to 60 seconds is fine). When finished, place the hot water bottle (or hot sock) on the old towel and place over your lower abdomen (under the navel & above the pubic bone). Close your eyes and relax for at least five minutes, sipping some warm chamomile or peppermint tea. Afterward, you’ll feel calm and centered.
If you have any massage-related questions for future blogs, please send me an email at massage@chopra.com
Posted by Grace Wilson at 11:39 PM | Comments (2)
Battle at Kruger
Battle at Kruger...
Posted by Saira Mohan at 12:48 AM | Comments (7)
May 30, 2007
Recipe of the Week - Babaganoush
This week’s recipe is Babaganoush. It is a roasted eggplant dip with many different contrasting flavors that goes well with just about everything. Serve this with pita bread, crackers, vegetables or on top of rice cakes. You can also use this as a spread in a sandwich or wrap. Enjoy!
2 whole eggplants
2 Tablespoons Roasted Tahini
1 Tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons olive oil
2 Tablespoons fresh Pomegranate juice
1 teaspoon ground cumin
Pinch red chili flakes
2 teaspoons roasted garlic (optional)
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
Cut the eggplants lengthwise, brush olive oil on inside, sprinkle with salt and pepper and place down side in a roasting pan.
Roast in the oven for about 25 minutes or until eggplants are soft. Remove from oven and let cool. When cool and ready to handle, remove the seeds and skin. In a food processor or blender add all the ingredients and blend until smooth. Taste for salt and pepper.
Garnish with fresh parsley or cilantro.
Posted by Teresa Long at 10:42 PM | Comments (1)
Cyber Warfare: Beyond Estonia-Russia, Rise of China's 5th Dimension Cyber Army for the 21st C
Victor Hugo (1802-1885), French poet, writer and playwright, who witnessed the revolutions in France that succeeded 1789, ie, 1830, 1832, 1848 and 1870, has said, "There is nothing more powerful than an idea whose time has come!"
In January 1999, after three years of research and development, the mi2g Intelligence Unit published an internal memorandum titled, "Cyber Warfare: The Threat to Government, Business and Financial Markets." In the internal memorandum, released in the public domain post the NATO-Serbia first cyber war in April 1999, it was stated, "Historically war has been classified as physical attacks with bombs & bullets between nation states. It was beyond the means of an individual to wage war. Today, in the Information Age, the launch pad for war is no longer a runway but a computer. The attacker is no longer a pilot or soldier but a civilian Hacker. An individual with relatively simple computer capability can do things via the internet that can impact economic infrastructures, social utilities and national security. This is the problem we face in moving from the industrial world to the Information Age, which is the essence of Cyber War."
Eight years after the mi2g initial forecast, and 11 years after we began to do research into the vulnerability of the fragile digital environment, the world has arrived at the predicted precipice with a quantum jump via the Estonia-Russia Cyber War in May 2007, with a significant degradation to the Estonian digital eco-system and infrastructure for a protracted period of nearly one month. During this period of cyber war, the native defence forces, government departments, businesses and individuals all suffered over and beyond their imagination by way of expectations for digital services' reliability, availability and sustainability in the event of adversity.
In November 2002, almost five years before the debilitating Estonia cyber attacks, the mi2g Intelligence Unit released a public briefing titled "Government backed counter-attack-forces necessary in future," which stated, "As the damage done by radical, criminal and intellectually motivated hackers continues to rise, about six Billions Dollars of economic value was destroyed worldwide by overt and covert digital attacks including viruses and worms in October alone. As a result, the mi2g Intelligence Unit predicts there will be a growing requirement for Governments to intervene and to mobilise counter-attack-forces that protect economic targets and critical national infrastructure constituents on a 24/7 basis."
The 2002 mi2g Intelligence Unit briefing continued: "Historically, politicians in civilised Western democracies have challenged their defence forces to provide adequate defence capability within limited resources. The focus has been on the four physical dimensions - land, sea, air and outer space - and not on the new 5th Dimension, which is cyberspace. There is no real digital defence capability deployed so far -- other than occasional simulations and exercises which are to uncover gaps in the national critical infrastructure's digital defences. The redressal lies primarily in developing counter-attack-forces, which would begin to arrest the imbalance of power between ill-motivated hackers on the one hand and little-prepared businesses on the other. It is unrealistic to expect that any defence department can provide 'counter-attack-forces' against digital attacks for an entire nation's economic targets immediately and, in any case, the expertise needed is relatively fast moving and cannot be 'trained' into would be combatants in a short period of time."
Fast forwarding to May 2007: When Estonian authorities began removing a bronze statue of a Second World War-era Soviet soldier from a park, they expected violent street protests by Estonians of Russian descent. What followed was the second major war in cyberspace, a month-long campaign that has forced Estonian authorities to defend their Baltic nation from a data flood that they say was set off by orders from Russia or ethnic Russian sources in retaliation for the removal of the statue. The Estonians assert that an Internet address involved in the attacks belonged to an official who works in the administration of Vladimir Putin, Russia's President. Computer security experts from NATO, the European Union, the United States and Israel converged on Tallinn in May to offer help and to learn what they can about protracted cyber war in the digital age in the 21st Century. Attacks on Estonia continue albeit at a slower pace as measured against the peak at the start of May.
The Russian government has denied any involvement in the cyber attacks, which came close to shutting down the country's digital infrastructure, clogging the websites of the President, the Prime Minister, Parliament and other government agencies, staggering Estonia's biggest bank and overwhelming the sites of several daily newspapers. "It turned out to be a national security situation," according to Estonia's Defence Minister Jaak Aaviksoo. "It can effectively be compared to when your ports are shut to the sea."
The attackers used a giant network of bots (enslaved computers) on 9th May -- perhaps as many as one million slave computers in places as far away as North America and the Far East -- to amplify the impact of their assault. In a sign of their financial resources, there is evidence that they rented time from trans-national criminal syndicates on Botnets. The combination of very, very large packets of information streams -- generated by tens of thousands of machines -- provide the mechanism for very damaging Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attacks. In the early hours of 9th May, traffic spiked to thousands of times the normal flow. It was heavier on 10th May, forcing Estonia's biggest bank to shut down its online service for more than an hour. Even now, the bank, HansaBanka, is under assault and continues to block access to 300 suspect Internet addresses. Finally, on 10th May, it appears that the attackers' time on the rented servers expired, and the botnet attacks fell off abruptly.
China's 5th Dimension Cyber Army
In the meantime, a US military report into the future of geo-political relations with China has claimed that the Chinese government is developing a cyber (5th Dimension) warfare division for use in possible future conflicts.
"The Military Power of the People's Republic of China 2007" report suggests that, in addition to the Red Army's army, navy, air force and rocket arms, the Chinese government is putting together a team to deal with "electronic and online arenas." According to the report, "People's Liberation Army authors often cite the need in modern warfare to control information, sometimes termed an 'information blockade'... China is pursuing this ability by improving information and operational security, developing electronic warfare and information warfare capabilities, denial-of-service and deception... China's concept of an 'information blockade' likely extends beyond the strictly military realm to include other elements of state power."
The same US defence report suggests that the People's Republic of China is developing teams to handle computer network attack, defence and exploitation with a separate section handling electronic countermeasures. It cites logistics systems and satellite communications as possible targets, and claims that exercises have been held in cooperation with other Red Army wings since 2005. The report also mentions an article on the subject which appeared in the November 2006 Liberation Army Daily.
Solutions for The Cyber Warfare Paradigm Shift
The Pandora's box of full scale cyber war is open now, post Estonia, and the world is even more dependent on digital networks than it was eight years ago, when the mi2g Internal Memorandum was placed in the public domain in the wake of the NATO-Serbia cyber war. Where are the solutions? Going back to the mi2g Intelligence Briefing from November 2002, governments and large businesses are still in need of following the recommendations made nearly five years ago:
"In the future, when seeking to protect the critical infrastructure constituents and business digital systems at a national level, the economically prudent way forward would be to combine knowledge management, analysis and counter-attack tools with on-the-ground human intelligence sources. Surveillance and reconnaissance dashboards of digital systems would need to be managed by experienced counter-attack-forces on a 24/7 basis. mi2g believes that this war on digital terrorism can be won decisively and effectively. As in all wars, our collective national defences must excel enemy aggression. We will therefore need to understand that:
. Defence has always been about securing trade routes and markets. Given that several Trillion Dollars of trade is routed digitally, counter-attack-forces with electronic weapons that can disable attacking systems from various parts of the world will ultimately need to be deployed with Governments' backing as part of their 5th dimension defence shield. Counter-attack-forces will save businesses a lot of lost time and money in dealing with rogue, politically motivated, electronic attacks from radical and criminal groups scattered across the world and within the nation(s)....
. Mobilisation of resources including new investment will become necessary on interoperable distributed knowledge management and analysis systems, which allow data to be shared easily from and between different sources and agencies collecting intelligence. Also, investment in more local human intelligence across the globe will be essential. The expertise of the very few available people who are proficient in the technologies of the 5th dimension would need to be utilised to train the counter-attack-forces through the establishment of national centre(s) of excellence for digital defence. Nothing significant can be achieved without this cohesive sharing capability being made available to the future counter-attack-forces, who would be able to ensure reliability, availability, maintainability and scalability of business systems in the event of protracted hacker attacks."
[ENDS]
For a more in-depth look at this subject, please consult my keynote speeches delivered at:
1. The First International Conference on the Information Revolution and the Changing Face of International Relations and Security in Lucerne, Switzerland on 24th May 2005, organised by ETH Zurich's Centre for Security Studies (CSS) & Comparative Interdisciplinary Studies Section (CISS) of the International Studies Association (ISA):
Holistic Solutions to Counter Asymmetric Threats: The Pivotal Role of Technology;
and
2. The Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, Inaugural Industry Lecture on 10th February 2005:
Cyberland Security: Organised Crime, Terrorism and The Internet
With love and warm wishes to you and family
DK with family
DK Matai
The Philanthropia, ATCA, mi2g.net
A new Holistic Quantum Relativity Group is being set up here.
Holistic (H) E8 Vector Visualisation in String Theory (Q+R) like the 1,000 Petal Sahasrara Lotus in Spirituality
| Visit the HQR Group |
Posted by DK Matai at 02:15 PM | Comments (5)
Open Thread
May 30, 2007
Posted by Intent at 03:25 AM | Comments (332)
May 29, 2007
Do you have a minute to save the world?
Every time I walk out of my local Whole Foods, there is a young, wide-eyed, optimistic activist asking for signatures on a petition. It just takes a minute to save rainforests, whales, protect the ozone, etc. Just sign here! Likewise, I get
emails daily to sign something, pass it on to others, send it to Congress, etc.
Generally, it is an enthusiastic college kid outside Whole Foods or knocking on my door. The foot soldiers determined to make our world a better place. I used to be one of them, but alas, I feel now it takes more than just a minute, a signature... I am always rushing somewhere and cant take that minute!! Should I feel totally guilty?
Does it really just take a minute to save the planet?
Posted by Mallika Chopra at 01:07 PM | Comments (41)
May 28, 2007
Buddha and the World (Part 4)
In the end, how does Buddha fit into the world? I think we will have an answer only after the question is put a bit differently. How does Buddha's purpose fit into the world? His purpose was to bring a kind of spirituality that frees people to live in peace. Right now we desperately need secular spirituality. God has been hijacked by fundamentalism to the point that seekers who don't want to be coerced by a fanatical concept of faith have few places to turn. Buddha opens a path to truth without a church.
Most importantly, Buddha's truth is not packaged. You can't turn it into dogma that authorities enforce or a catechism that the devout memorize. Packaged truth is a trap. It can deepen the illusion it was meant to dispel and wind up making us even more separate. Take a spiritual value everyone believe in, like love. People have killed in the name of love and suffered terribly in countless ways. The positive is always woven in with the negative. Does the good of love outweigh the bad? Buddha didn’t measure truth that way. If it were enough to tell people to go and be good, to love and cause no harm, the human disease wouldn’t keep spreading. Buddha wanted to pluck out the seed of illusion, not feed the mind with new ideals that would succumb to corruption in the inexorable working of time.
He aimed for nothing less than an “inner revolution,” as one commentator has called it. Coming in from the cold, people yearn for this inner revolution because there is a hole inside them where God used to be. But in many ways that God was only an image, as Buddha would see it. Most people fail to find what they want from spirituality because they remove one image of God only to fill in another (they even turn Buddha into a god, the very thing he denied).
Inner revolution, opening a path to liberation, is what Buddha holds out. Nothing less will cure the human disease.
If people could see that the human disease is temporary, the whole world would be transformed. Despite the burden of past beliefs that underlie a horrific conflict like the one in the Middle East, Buddha's cure is taking hold, although we don't know on what scale. Secular spirituality forms a separate subculture in every country where people have begun to seek a new way and a new set of beliefs. Their way doesn't have to travel under the name of Buddha. The essence is about moving ahead, not about labels. Where the growth of consciousness is being nourished anywhere in the world, the following trends are evident:
--Meditation will become mainstream.
--Healing, both physical and psychological, will become commonplace.
--Prayer will be seen as real and efficacious.
--Manifestation of desires will be talked about as a real phenomenon.
--People will regain a connection to spirit.
--Individuals will find answers inwardly to their deepest spiritual questions. They will believe in their private answers and live accordingly.
--Communities of belief will arise.
--Gurus and other spiritual authorities will wane in influence.
--A wisdom tradition will grow to embrace the great spiritual teachings at the heart of organized religion.
--Faith will no longer be seen as an irrational departure from reason and science.
--Wars will decline as peace becomes a social reality.--Nature will regain its sacred value.
There is no spiritual path that can succeed without confronting the here and now. Buddha wanted us to be mindful of who were are at this moment because in the midst of disorder and confusion, which dominates every moment, there is the seed of Buddha nature, of awakening.
If you notice these seeds and give them value, they will expand, and in time they will fill the holes of isolation and meaninglessness. The path is subtle but natural, and open to everyone. To notice who you are is simple, not difficult. You can be gentle with yourself. There is no timetable, no need for rigor or discipline.
Your job is to notice that there is light within you, however small. A small candle is only different from the blazing sun by a matter of degree. Both are light by nature. Whatever makes your light grow will serve you. Meditation will not be a practice set apart in your day; it will become the normal state of self-awareness, of being awake instead of asleep. For two thousand years nature has held the cure for aloneness in its heart. When you realize yourself as Buddha, you are still alone, but your aloneness fills every corner of creation as far as the eye can see.
Deepak Chopra’s latest book is Buddha: A Story of Enlightenment
Posted by Deepak Chopra at 01:43 PM | Comments (241)
The Walrus and The Carpenter: Probable Answer(s)
Dear Friends
Thank you for your sterling contributions. The Walrus and the Carpenter is one of my favourite poems and a deep affair over time. Of course, it would be churlish to ask you for your views without having some of my own to begin with. However, in the interest of not colouring your thoughts, it seemed prudent to wait a little.
Christ Curch College Portrait (Founded in 1524), University of Oxford
Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832 – 1898) is the real name of Lewis Carroll, who was an English author, mathematician, logician, Anglican clergyman, and photographer who taught at Christ Church College, University of Oxford.
Dodgson's most famous writings are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass as well as the poems The Hunting of the Snark and Jabberwocky.
Christ Church College Hall with several motifs of Lewis Carroll's works
Dodgson's facility at word play, logic, and fantasy has delighted audiences ranging from children to the literary and scientific elite. But beyond this, his work has become embedded deeply in modern post-industrial culture. He has directly influenced many artists and thinkers across the world over the last two centuries.
The College Hall is now famous for the shooting of The Harry Potter films
To me, personally, The Walrus and The Carpenter, is a deep treatise on human society and how we must remain permanently on our guard because "trust" and "loyalty" can be artificially created and exploited by some so-called-leaders over a short time window of two decades or less. The poem boils down to 8 'P's:
1. Promotion (sweet side first, bitter side later);
2. Politics (promises of happiness, delivery of misery);
3. Power (nature of the shimmering beauty to begin with and the corruption via the ugly beast);
4. People (their gullibility, crowd behaviour and total capacity to believe the untruth);
5. Product (based on new science, new gimmicks);
6. Placing (how?, what?, by whom?, and when? creates weightings for engendering trust);
7. Pricing (everything is on offer and sold for a bargain price, the trick lies in knowing what it is); and
8. Propensity (to believe half-truths, nonsense and lies).
Over the longer term of 50 to 100 years or more, it is a bit more difficult to fool all the people all the time!
In case you are wondering what all this is about, please click here.
With love and warm wishes to you and family
DK with family
DK Matai
The Philanthropia, ATCA, mi2g.net
A new Holistic Quantum Relativity Group is being set up here.
Holistic (H) E8 Vector Visualisation in String Theory (Q+R) like the 1,000 Petal Sahasrara Lotus in Spirituality
| Visit the HQR Group |
Posted by DK Matai at 02:00 AM | Comments (16)
The China Juggernaut's Soft Landing; US v China
We are grateful to our distinguished and long standing ATCA contributors Ashutosh Sheshabalaya from Brussels, European Union, and Bassilly, Belgium, for "The China Juggernaut's Soft Landing"; and Andrew Leung -- en route to Shanghai from London -- for "'Irrational Exuberance' in China's Stock Market, US/China Relations: Rational Economics or Irrational Politics?"
Dear ATCA Colleagues
[Please note that the views presented by individual contributors are not necessarily representative of the views of ATCA, which is neutral. ATCA conducts collective Socratic dialogue on global opportunities and threats.]
We are grateful to our distinguished and long standing ATCA contributors:
. Ashutosh Sheshabalaya from Brussels, European Union, and Bassilly, Belgium, for "The China Juggernaut's Soft Landing"; and
. Andrew Leung -- en route to Shanghai from London -- for "'Irrational Exuberance' in China's Stock Market, US/China Relations: Rational Economics or Irrational Politics?"
in response to "China and Global Financial Risk -- The Key Strategic Question of a Decline in China's Stock Markets and Global Investor Psychology."
Ashutosh Sheshabalaya is the author of 'Rising Elephant', which is a heavily-researched bestseller about India's rise and long-term opportunity and challenge to the West, published in the US, India and Europe. Described as a "tour de force" by the Director of UBS bank's Wolfsberg think-tank and as "highly provocative" by former Indian Deputy Prime Minister LK Advani, 'Rising Elephant' has been reviewed worldwide. He has worked in Brussels as an accredited foreign correspondent, in public affairs (for the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries), and as a strategic consultant -- both for private corporations as well as the European Commission, Invest in Sweden Agency and others. In total, he has led research projects for over 65 studies covering a wide range of industries. Now heading Belgium-based India-Advisory, he is a frequent speaker at conferences and seminars in Europe, India and the US, a columnist for the Indian online news portal Sify and an occasional contributor to Yale University's Center for Globalisation and Washington's Globalist. A winner of the all-India National Science Talent Scholarship and the Wien International Scholarship, he studied at a leading Indian engineering institution, the Birla Institute of Technology and Science, and at Brandeis University in the US. Mr Sheshabalaya is married to a Belgian and is part of New and Old India. His parents were both university Vice Chancellors, and his family includes an Industry Minister in the Nehru government, a Commissioner in British India and representative of the Tata industrial group, one of India's first women legislators, senior military officers, diplomats and seven members of the elite Indian Administrative Service (IAS). He writes:
Dear DK and Colleagues
Re: The China Juggernaut's Soft Landing
Those cautious about Potemkins cannot help noticing growing parallels between today's China and Southeast Asia of the late 1990s, albeit on a much larger scale.
While non-performing loans in the Chinese banking system remain a parody of the Emperor's New Clothes (anywhere upwards from 40%), China lacks the sophisticated, soft/systemic sub-structures to reassimilate them -- without an unwelcome and global-scale Big Bang. Such a situation is especially alarming, given that bank deposits account for anywhere between two-thirds and three-quarters of China's entire financial stock. China has instead proved incapable of even managing a revaluation of its currency to recalibrate its changing position in the world economy.
Instead, as China begins to deploy its massive foreign exchange holdings to buy financial assets overseas, it requires a good deal of faith to see the above factors adding up somehow to a virtuous cycle. The metamorphosis from communism to capitalism may be easier than that from a repository of foreign-invested export surpluses to a global private equity player.
I believe it may be crucial for policymakers to prepare -- politically and economically -- to manage or even force the Chinese juggernaut into a soft landing, before it risks bringing the world economy down like a house of cards.
Kind regards
Ashutosh Sheshabalaya
[ENDS]
-----Original Message-----
From: Intelligence Unit
Sent: 25 May 2007 07:56
To: 'atca.members@mi2g.com'
Subject: Response: Leung -- 'Irrational Exuberance' in China's Stock Market, US/China Relations: Rational Economics or Irrational Politics?; China & Global Financial Risk - Decline in China's Markets
Dear ATCA Colleagues
[Please note that the views presented by individual contributors are not necessarily representative of the views of ATCA, which is neutral. ATCA conducts collective Socratic dialogue on global opportunities and threats.]
We are grateful to our distinguished and long standing ATCA contributor:
. Andrew Leung -- en route to Shanghai from London -- for his submission to ATCA "'Irrational Exuberance' in China's Stock Market, US/China Relations: Rational Economics or Irrational Politics?"
in response to "China and Global Financial Risk -- The Key Strategic Question of a Decline in China's Stock Markets and Global Investor Psychology."
Andrew Leung has over 40 years of experience in a number of senior positions working closely with mainland China, including Hong Kong, with a focus on commerce, industry, finance, banking, transport, social welfare and diplomatic representation. He has addressed numerous local and international business and strategic fora, groups and organisations on China, including making regular television appearances. He has written many key commentaries on China for various organisations including ATCA. His target audience includes finance and investment houses, institutional investors, large businesses, think tanks, senior officials and business schools. Andrew was twice sponsored personally by the US Government on briefing visits to the United States, including a month-long visit to brief Chairmen and CEOs of multi-nationals in regard to China, post-Tiananmen Square. He was also sponsored by the Economist as a speaker at the China conference in Berlin with the German Foreign Affairs Institute. He was invited to brief personally the Duke of York and the Lord Mayor of London prior to their China visits.
Andrew is on the Governing Council of King's College London; the Advisory Board of Nottingham University's China Policy Institute; and the Executive Committee of the 48 Group Club with historical and working links with the Chinese leadership. He has been appointed as a Global Representative for Changsha City, China. He chairs the China Interest Group of the Institute of Directors' City Branch. He is a Visiting Professor of the International MBA Programmes of China's Sun Yat-Sen and Lingnan Universities. He will shortly begin lecturing as a Visiting Professor at NIMBAS University, Utrecht, Holland. Andrew is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA). He was awarded the Silver Bauhinia Star (SBS) in the 2005 Hong Kong's Honours List. He has qualifications from the University of London, Cambridge University, The Law Society and Harvard Business School. He speaks Cantonese and Mandarin and practices Chinese calligraphy as well as fine art. He writes:
Dear DK and Colleagues
Re: 'Irrational Exuberance' in China's Stock Market, US/China Relations: Rational Economics or Irrational Politics?
Tightening measures notwithstanding, there seems no stopping in the surge of 'irrational exuberance' in China's stock market. Ordinary people continue to ferret their money from low-interest bearing deposits or borrow more to play in what increasingly looks like Musical Chairs. Seasoned investors highlight hidden values in certain shares many did not realise existed. This is hardly surprising with the less than perfect disclosure of corporate data. Others are betting on a continuing upswing to last even after the 2008 Beijing Olympics and the 2010 Shanghai Expo. The Shanghai and Shenzhen stock markets are seeing 140,000 new private accounts opened each day.
A large proportion of such 'exuberance' comes from state-owned conglomerates which are seeing rising profits from their expanding globalisation. The repatriation of funds raised in the world's largest overseas IPOs adds to the already huge liquidity.
Underpinning it all is the continually booming economy. According to the National Bureau of Statistics, China's first-quarter GDP was up 11.1 %, fixed asset investment up 23.7%, total trade up 23.3% and foreign exchange reserves up 37.36% to USD 1.2 trillion. A closer look, though, reveals some USD 74 billion 'hot money' and increasing use of Transfer Pricing by exporters.
Apart from tightening against speculative exuberance, China's Ministry of Commerce announced in April that China will further increase imports, particularly mechanical and electrical machinery. At the same time, it has reduced tax rebates on exports from energy-intensive and less environmentally-friendly industries.
Tao Dong, Chief Economist of Credit Suisse First Boston, expects that China's imports will continue to grow robustly, at around 21- 25% pa, while exports will grow at the 16 -17% range from a much larger base, leading to a trade surplus of 17.7% over 2006.
On 18th April this year, Premier Wen Jiabao chaired a meeting of the State Council to discuss the economic development of the first quarter. While recognising that the overall macroeconomic situation remains sound and positive, the need was emphasized for continuing structural reform with priority given to energy and resource conservation, better economic balance, innovation and people's livelihood.
The overall level of confidence was highlighted by Nicholas Lardy, senior fellow of the Institute for International Economics based in Washington DC (Beijing Review, April 19, 2007). Already the world's third largest trader, China is set to overtake the US in exports in 2007, to become the world's second largest trading economy in 2007 or 2008. Foreign-invested enterprises produce a third of China's manufactured output (compared with the EU's 25% and the US's 20%). The value of China's imports in 2005 was 30% of GDP, compared with the US's 17% and Japan's 10%. China is now the fourth largest US export market. US sales to China in 2005 were nine times more than in 1990. This compares with four times for Mexico (NAFTA notwithstanding) and 15% for Japan, over the same period. Likewise China is the largest trading partner for virtually every country in the Asian region and is a huge importer of agricultural products from both developed and developing countries. Barring unforeseen circumstances, China's dramatic growth stands a good chance to continue, at least until her rapidly aging profile begins to bite from 2015 onwards.
China's global footprint is already everywhere. But this has taken on an even more exciting dimension since 20th May, when news broke on China's first-ever deal to take an equity stake in Blackstone, one of the world's largest private equity funds based in the US. During two consecutive TV interviews with CNBC Europe and BBC Asia, I hinted that this was more than a sweetener for corporate America to pave the way for the current Sino-US Strategic Economic Dialogue. At USD 3 billion, it was only a drop in the bucket of what the newly set-up State Foreign Exchange Investment Corporation is expected to manage by way of diversifying the investment of her gigantic foreign currency reserve - the annual growth of 20% or USD 210 billion. The Blackstone venture was a trial balloon for the much needed global outlet for China's pent-up savings, which stand to benefit from the international business savvy and agility of these funds. With greater alertness to geopolitical sensitivities, these funds would provide a comfort zone for China's overseas investments. The CNOOC/UNOCAL saga is still fresh in people's minds.
The US has flagged up five areas for the Strategic Economic Dialogue - Services, the RMB, Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), Energy and Environmental Cooperation. With varying degrees of success, China has been trying very hard to clamp down on IPR violations in a decentralised continental-size country. As for the RMB, China has recently widened the daily trading range for greater currency flexibility. Moreover, it is becoming increasingly clear that the RMB appreciation argument could be turned on its head - that it would instead hurt America and benefit China (Lost in Translation, The Economist, May 19, 2007). But for China, the key is financial stability and the avoidance of speculation. The process of appreciation and eventual international convertibility needs to be very carefully managed.
More interesting about China are two recent key developments: her growing domestic consumer market and signs of a 'Green Partnership' with the US. A report in China Today (April 2006) has lent support to the remarkable Chinese consumer story. Since 1994, over 90% of the state-owned housing stock in large and medium-sized cities has been sold into private ownership. In addition, new stylish apartments with high-ceilings and split-level luxury condos are becoming popular. Middle-class executives are waxing lyrical about their China dream of personal tastes, preferences, and lifestyles associated with their new-found home ownership. The National Bureau of Statistics data of 18th April 2007 show that retail sales of consumer goods nationwide grew 14.9% compared with last year, ahead of the increase of per-capita disposal income of 10.4% in urban areas and 7.4% in rural areas. The consumption growth in 2006 was 6.7 times the volume in 1990, including household goods, automobiles, hi-tech products, culture and entertainment.
Recent research shows that 16.5% of middle-income urbanites switch to a new mobile phone within one year and 26.1% to a new MP3 player within two years. Online shopping (especially for cosmetics and mobile phones) is in vogue, accounting for one quarter of China's internet user population, which is the second largest in the world. Healthcare products are also attracting increasing demand, with 86.1% of those surveyed naming them as their top priority. Most of these consumers are the products of the 'One Child Policy' with relatively high education and income security. Some of them are known as the 'yueguangzu' (wage spenders who don't save anything), the 'xingguizu' (the young nouveau riche) or the 'kenlaozu' (those who spend their doting parents' income).
In 'The Rise of the Chinese Consumer: Theory & Evidence' (2005, John Wiley and Sons Ltd), Jonathan Garner with his colleagues at Credit Suisse conducted consumer surveys in 10 tier-1 cities in China and projected the growth of consumerism in China by 2014, using econometric modelling. Assuming continuing economic growth of 7% and a gradual RMB appreciation from the current 0.2 of PPP exchange level (as estimated by the IMF) to 0.55, there emerges a high probability projection that the US Dollar-size of China's economy will almost quintuple to about 90% of the US economy with an expected annual incremental consumer spend twice the level of USD 262 billion obtained in the US. The pendulum of global incremental consumer growth looks poised to shift to China.
Topping the consumer growth rates will be such product categories as personal computers and autos. Although the expected growth rates of other product categories such as televisions, mobile handsets, radios, fixed-line telephony and air travel are much lower, they are still expected to represent 36 to 50% of total incremental demand of the world's 15 large countries surveyed (including China).
This consumer evolution is put into sharper focus in a 2006 Special Edition of The McKinsey Quarterly 'The value of China's emerging middle class'. This highlights that while 77.3% of urban households in 2005 were still in the 'poor' category (annual income up to RMB 25,000), by 2015 this category is expected to be replaced by a richer cohort. This comprises a lower middle class of 49.7% (up to RMB 40,000), an upper middle class of 21.2% (up to RMB 100,000) and a 'mass affluent' class of 5.6% (up to RMB 200,000). This profile is expected to change further by 2025 when the upper middle class will outnumber the lower middle class threefold with five times more total disposal income. The mass affluent and the global affluent (7.7% and 3.3% respectively of urban households) will increase their proportion of total disposal income from 23.6% in 2015 to 36.4% in 2025.
The continuing growth of a more consumer-oriented economy would address some of China's problems of over-dependence on exports. However, before one is carried away, it must be remembered that in per capita GDP terms, China still ranks below 100th in the world alongside some of the poorest countries in Africa. The majority of China's peasant population is still struggling with basic daily needs, such as access to essential healthcare, provision for children's education and their old age. Although China has switched to a more balanced development model since the 11th Five Year Plan, it is likely to take some time before the majority of her peasants could aspire to the level of consumption of the urbanites.
Nevertheless, while China's upper middle class and above is expected to increase from the current 9.4% to 26.8% of urban households by 2015, this proportion is forecast to leap to 70% by 2025. These numbers speak volumes on how investors in the consumer business in China should position themselves for the future.
The second key development is the promise of a 'Green Partnership' between China and the US. Before President Bush's latest State of the Union address, Senator Lieberman in his 2005 address to the Council on Foreign Relations underscored the need for US and China cooperative international policies and R&D to mitigate oil dependence and mutual competition. At a press briefing on September 19th, 2006 following the China-US Energy Dialogue in Beijing, Assistant Secretary for Policy and International Affairs Karen Harbert pinpointed energy efficiency, clean coal, nuclear and biofuels as priority areas for cooperation (Beijing Review, May 3, 2007).
The Jackson Hole Centre for Global Affairs identified 10 areas for US-China clean energy cooperation: natural gas technology, combined cooling, heating and power, clean coal, hydrogen and fuel cell vehicles, eco-buildings and transportation systems, air and water quality, solar photovoltaics, and a Beijing-Chicago Friendship Cities initiative to promote local environmental efforts.
Clean Coal is particularly important as it is common knowledge that China is building a new coal-fired plant every week while the US directly follows China in adding more coal plants than India. So it is encouraging that the US may consider partnering with China in a USD 1 billion experimental project to build an emissions-free coal-fired plant. There are other related technologies or ideas such as the capture and utilization of coalmine methane and other wastes, combined heat and power, and SO2 emissions trading.
Indeed China is already cooperating with the US in making the 2008 Olympics a Green Olympics. For example, a hydrogen park is planned in the Olympic Village to showcase five buses operating on a blend of hydrogen and natural gas.
China has set a national goal of boosting her 2003 level of 3% of power generation from renewal sources to 12% by 2020, including solar, wind, hydro and biomass, supplemented by a vigorous programme of building two additional nuclear power plants every year for the next 15 years. To realise her goal, she needs all the help and cooperation she can get in terms of research, technologies and international business savvy from the West, including the US, EU and Japan.
I have heralded prospects for international cooperation in developing responses to Climate Chaos in my previous ATCA articles 'Energy Security and Climate Chaos: China's Approach and Global Impact' (ATCA, 8 August, 2006); China and the Middle East: an Eastern Alchemy for Global Harmony' (ATCA, 17 February, 2007) and 'China's Confucian Harmony with Nature: Timeless Wisdom and Boundless Opportunities' (ATCA, 29 April, 2007). In particular, I have proposed that China could make use of some of her huge foreign exchange reserve to invest in such cooperation. Hopefully, China's recent Blackstone venture would open doors in this direction.
Thus a fast changing China presents huge challenges as well as exciting business opportunities. However, the looming US Presidential Election in November 2008 and Capitol Hill's increasing penchant for China bashing, already armed with an arsenal of punitive draft bills against China, do not augur well. Moreover, many of China's continuing developmental challenges come in handy for finger-pointing, including her perceived relentless exports, unbalanced economy, slow pace of RMB appreciation, stifling environmental degradation, IPR infringements, corruption, and alleged human rights, freedom and democratic deficits.
Whether and how the US sets out to engage China with rational economics or irrational politics remain to be seen. But with US's Soft Power increasingly under stress, an imaginative and positive engagement could well present a powerful platform for America to regain her global Soft Power leadership.
Best regards
Andrew K P Leung, SBS, FRSA
[ENDS]
-----Original Message-----
From: Intelligence Unit
Sent: 21 May 2007 12:15
To: 'atca.members@mi2g.com'
Subject: ATCA: China and Global Financial Risk -- The Key Strategic Question of a Decline in China's Stock Markets and Global Investor Psychology --
Dear ATCA Colleagues
[Please note that the views presented by individual contributors are not necessarily representative of the views of ATCA, which is neutral. ATCA conducts collective Socratic dialogue on global opportunities and threats.]
China and Global Financial Risk -- The Key Strategic Question of a Decline in China's Stock Markets and Global Investor Psychology --
Chinese authorities moved on Friday, 18th May, to take some pressure off their accelerating stock markets, raising benchmark lending and deposit rates, lifting bank reserve ratios and widening the trading band of their currency, the Yuan. This move and further ones, could spark a market correction according to some ATCA sources.
The Shanghai Composite Index (SCI) is up more than 50 percent so far this year, and has climbed almost 250 percent since the beginning of 2006, leading to fears Chinese stocks are in a bubble. Since the SCI has risen so high so quickly, many ATCA colleagues think China runs the risk of a more meaningful or longer lasting correction in the Chinese financial markets, something far more longer lasting than what occurred back in February this year. Even though China is an engine of global economic growth, its linkage with global stock markets is minimal, making some investors question why a Chinese downturn could drag other markets down.
For investors, China represents a more psychological than real connection with the rest of the world, aside from any cross-over effects from slower economic growth that might result from a slide in Chinese stocks. Investors hunting for a barometer for risk appetites are increasingly looking to China, whose frothy stock market has become like the canary in the coal mine. Investors fear a sharp decline in Chinese stocks could again roil world markets and cause a global pullback like the one sparked by a plunge on the Shanghai stock market on 27th February, extensively analysed on ATCA. The collective psychology among many investors works on the basis that they will stay in equities for as long as they feel comfortable with China as the canary in the coal mine. Those investors work on the understanding that if there is a meaningful correction then that will signal the precise time to move to higher ground and to safer assets.
The key strategic question for many international investors is how much weight to give to the Chinese stock market, where few foreign investors own shares, and how much of an impact on global markets would a disruption in China cause? There are many concerns, all related to China's increasingly dominant economic and geo-political status. The China specific risk of public unrest, conflict between the Communist party and capitalist-style prosperity and need for freedom, and the requirement to keep fast-paced Chinese economic growth from overheating are issues that make investors nervous as the world fears a domino effect.
The temporary drop in the Shanghai market in February this year in reaction to Chinese government policies to try to slow growth raised short-term concerns, which shook markets around the globe. This occurred because the rapidly growing economic engine of China -- the world's most populous country -- is especially important to the US-centric global economy from China-led debt financing through to off-shore production of a wide array of vital industrial and retail products. For many investors equity prices not just in China but across the globe have become overextended. They believe a correction must occur but they also don't want to be on the wrong side of a bull market that has pushed world stock prices significantly since the start of the year, delivering double digit growth and more.
[ENDS]
We look forward to your further thoughts, observations and views. Thank you.
Best wishes
For and on behalf of DK Matai
Chairman, Asymmetric Threats Contingency Alliance (ATCA)
____________________________________________________________________________
ATCA: The Asymmetric Threats Contingency Alliance is a philanthropic expert initiative founded in 2001 to resolve complex global challenges through collective Socratic dialogue and joint executive action to build a wisdom based global economy. Adhering to the doctrine of non-violence, ATCA addresses asymmetric threats and social opportunities arising from climate chaos and the environment; radical poverty and microfinance; geo-politics and energy; organised crime & extremism; advanced technologies -- bio, info, nano, robo & AI; demographic skews and resource shortages; pandemics; financial systems and systemic risk; as well as transhumanism and ethics. Present membership of ATCA is by invitation only and has over 5,000 distinguished members from over 100 countries: including several from the House of Lords, House of Commons, EU Parliament, US Congress & Senate, G10's Senior Government officials and over 1,500 CEOs from financial institutions, scientific corporates and voluntary organisations as well as over 750 Professors from academic centres of excellence worldwide.
The views presented by individual contributors are not necessarily representative of the views of ATCA, which is neutral. Please do not forward or use the material circulated without permission and full attribution.
____________________________________________________________________________
Intelligence Unit | mi2g ATCA The Philanthropia Φ
Posted by ATCA at 01:01 AM | Comments (0)
May 27, 2007
What is the demarcating line of EGO and SELF-RESPECT?
Asked by Sumiran
Have a question for Intentbloggers? Email it to intentblog+question@gmail.com
(Please put Question in the subject line and send us your Name and URL, if any).
Posted by Intent at 11:12 PM | Comments (16)
The Walrus and The Carpenter: What does it mean?
The Walrus and The Carpenter by Lewis Carroll
(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, 1872)
The sun was shining on the sea,
Shining with all his might:
He did his very best to make
The billows smooth and bright--
And this was odd, because it was
The middle of the night.
The moon was shining sulkily,
Because she thought the sun
Had got no business to be there
After the day was done--
"It's very rude of him," she said,
"To come and spoil the fun!"
The sea was wet as wet could be,
The sands were dry as dry.
You could not see a cloud, because
No cloud was in the sky:
No birds were flying overhead--
There were no birds to fly.
The Walrus and the Carpenter
Were walking close at hand;
They wept like anything to see
Such quantities of sand:
"If this were only cleared away,"
They said, "it would be grand!"
"If seven maids with seven mops
Swept it for half a year.
Do you suppose," the Walrus said,
"That they could get it clear?"
"I doubt it," said the Carpenter,
And shed a bitter tear.
"O Oysters, come and walk with us!"
The Walrus did beseech.
"A pleasant walk, a pleasant talk,
Along the briny beach:
We cannot do with more than four,
To give a hand to each."
The eldest Oyster looked at him,
But never a word he said:
The eldest Oyster winked his eye,
And shook his heavy head--
Meaning to say he did not choose
To leave the oyster-bed.
But four young Oysters hurried up,
All eager for the treat:
Their coats were brushed, their faces washed,
Their shoes were clean and neat--
And this was odd, because, you know,
They hadn't any feet.
Four other Oysters followed them,
And yet another four;
And thick and fast they came at last,
And more, and more, and more--
All hopping through the frothy waves,
And scrambling to the shore.
The Walrus and the Carpenter
Walked on a mile or so,
And then they rested on a rock
Conveniently low:
And all the little Oysters stood
And waited in a row.
"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes--and ships--and sealing-wax--
Of cabbages--and kings--
And why the sea is boiling hot--
And whether pigs have wings."
"But wait a bit," the Oysters cried,
"Before we have our chat;
For some of us are out of breath,
And all of us are fat!"
"No hurry!" said the Carpenter.
They thanked him much for that.
"A loaf of bread," the Walrus said,
"Is what we chiefly need:
Pepper and vinegar besides
Are very good indeed--
Now if you're ready, Oysters dear,
We can begin to feed."
"But not on us!" the Oysters cried,
Turning a little blue.
"After such kindness, that would be
A dismal thing to do!"
"The night is fine," the Walrus said.
"Do you admire the view?
"It was so kind of you to come!
And you are very nice!"
The Carpenter said nothing but
"Cut us another slice:
I wish you were not quite so deaf--
I've had to ask you twice!"
"It seems a shame," the Walrus said,
"To play them such a trick,
After we've brought them out so far,
And made them trot so quick!"
The Carpenter said nothing but
"The butter's spread too thick!"
"I weep for you," the Walrus said:
"I deeply sympathize."
With sobs and tears he sorted out
Those of the largest size,
Holding his pocket-handkerchief
Before his streaming eyes.
"O Oysters," said the Carpenter,
"You've had a pleasant run!
Shall we be trotting home again?'
But answer came there none--
And this was scarcely odd, because
They'd eaten every one.
[ENDS]
What does The Walrus and The Carpenter mean?
With love and warm wishes to you and family
DK with family
DK Matai
The Philanthropia, ATCA, mi2g.net
A new Holistic Quantum Relativity Group is being set up here.
Holistic (H) E8 Vector Visualisation in String Theory (Q+R) like the 1,000 Petal Sahasrara Lotus in Spirituality
| Visit the HQR Group |
Posted by DK Matai at 07:12 AM | Comments (32)
May 26, 2007
Weekly Intent - Mark Germine
Consciousness and the Experience of the Divine
In 1996, while sitting in my parlor chair, I had a kind of spiritual experience. I experienced the very real, palpable Presence of God, both in the world around me and in my deepest being, giving rise to my deepest thoughts.
It was as if a veil was lifted in my mind. The experience was unbidden and not related to any event in my life, and lasted about a half hour. It all seemed quite natural, and I wondered why I had ever or would ever perceive reality any differently. I identified God as both the collective consciousness of humankind and as the Universal Consciousness, which seemed to be one and the same. I was being called by God, but I didn’t know why. I wondered why it was me who was being called. I later realized that the experience itself was the calling, and began to relate the experience to others, along with the knowledge that Universal Consciousness is within our grasp and is one with the collective consciousness of humankind.
All systems are part of an organic unity; the separate parts of a system are all internal to each other. The widespread belief that relationships are strictly external, that things are strictly related by contact across an otherwise impenetrable boundary between them, is a relict of classical or Newtonian physics. The outcome of this widespread belief has been a disconnection of people from each other, from humankind, from earth, and from the universe, bringing about the breakdown of the collective psyche.
Consciousness is simply awareness, which is brought about through the process of attention. Consciousness includes the more subtle levels of intuition as well as the more explicit awareness of thought, feeling, and experience. Ego consciousness or personal consciousness is our awareness of our self image and how it relates to the world that we perceive. Transpersonal consciousness or higher consciousness is awareness beyond ego or personal consciousness. Collective consciousness is awareness of the experience of others, individually and in groups. Universal consciousness is awareness that encompasses the universe of experience.
Mark Germine is psychiatrist who practices in Northern California who has a background in neuroscience and the physical sciences. His interests include the nature and evolution of consciousness. He is the developer of the Holographic Principle Theory of Mind, and of the One Mind Model of quantum reality.
Posted by Intent at 11:53 PM | Comments (23)
May 25, 2007
Buddha and the World (Part 3)
One reason that people revere Buddha but don't follow him is that they don't feel motivated enough to seek change. They hold an image of Buddhist monks perpetually meditating, observing strict discipline, and avoiding the world. The images aren't false, but they aren't complete, either. Like every great spiritual teaching, Buddhism turned into an organized religion, and in so doing it offered a way of life to ordinary people as well as renunciant monks.
"Yet I was struck by one comment that these posts received: " I know many Buddhists from Asian countries. They can recite the entire Heart Sutra from memory. But they never meditate. They don't know how to quiet the mind, what the nature of their thoughts are, and they don't have any spiritual practice. Sometimes they go to the temple as a social event, to meet and talk with people, or because their family expects them to.
In other words, Buddha's teachings have suffered the same fate as Jesus's. Yet also like Jesus, Buddha set the truth before his listeners so that they could choose it as a means to freedom. It's an inescapable fact that Buddha was a master diagnostician of the human condition. No one has more rightly deserved the title of physician to the soul. Yet he refused to use words like spirit, soul, or God. He realized that the disease of separation and isolation had progressed so far that spirituality itself was infected. “Soul” and “God” are labels. Labels fit things you already see before you, things you already know. I can label myself an Indian male, a husband and father, a breadwinner, a citizen, and so on.
All these are things I see and know already. Can I label my soul the same way? No. To Buddha, God and the soul were question marks, not things with labels. They were unknowns. They had to be, because if someone seeks solace from God and communion with the soul, they can’t know in advance what their goal is. Otherwise, they’d simply be seeking themselves in disguise. Buddha understood that when people prayed to the gods, they were praying to creations of the mind, and what the mind creates has no substance or truth except as a projection. Anything I can label is a projection of a concept I know all too well. Maybe I can be clever enough to disguise my ego and project it as an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-present deity. But whenever the known is projected into the unknown, something false is happening and the truth moves further away, not closer.
Buddha was a radical surgeon, and he cut out all labels that put a name on the unknown. Naturally, people who came to him for comfort and solace were shocked that Buddha proposed major surgery. They saw themselves as humble seekers after truth, which they would hear from his lips. Buddha knew better than to satisfy them--instead, he overturned their expectations about how truth works.
Truth isn’t found in words but through insight and self-discovery.
Truth isn’t taught or learned. It is wrapped inside consciousness itself.
To reach the truth, you must become it. Your consciousness must change until what is false has been left behind. Then truth will exist by itself, strong and self-sufficient.
These are simple, universal statements. Yet they became easy prey for the ego-personality. Let’s say that Buddha wanted us to be non-violent, to revere all forms of life, to extend compassion even to strangers. In the context of the religion that Buddha knew as a child, this truth already existed and went by the name of Ahimsa, often translated as harmlessness. A physician still acknowledges Ahimsa today as a medical duty to first do no harm. But Ahimsa can easily turn out to be part of the human disease rather than the cure. I can feel superior to violent people because I am non-violent. I can occupy the moral high ground and feel safe. I can avoid conflicts and step away when arguments turn into aggression and war.
In subtle ways, then, Ahimsa gets co-opted by the ego, which wants to feel superior and to think well of itself without getting involved. (As an example, we only need to look at the widespread indifference to the Iraq war that is masked over by socially approved disapproval of it. The attitude may be right, but nothing really changes.) Truth can also get you into trouble. Following where Ahimsa leads, I may become a pacifist who finds himself hated by his society for refusing to protect it from enemies. This hatred may lead to persecution, and so I become a martyr to the truth. I get thrown in jail–or in extremis I become a monk setting himself on fire in Vietnam to stir the conscience of the world–and in the end I suffer more than if I hadn’t learned this truth called Ahimsa.
We face such riddles every day, which is why the promise made by Buddha and Jesus, that the truth will set us free, hasn't been fulfilled. How can this situation change?
(To be continued)
Deepak Chopra's most recent book is a novel:Buddha: A Story of Enlightenment
Posted by Deepak Chopra at 11:09 AM | Comments (57)
Massage of the Week - Lower Back Relief
So many people have asked me to post a blog helping them deal with lower back pain. This can be difficult – don’t expect a quick fix. If you haven’t gotten a diagnosis from a medical doctor, you need to do that first. Lower back pain could come from many different sources, including serious medical conditions such as slipped or herniated discs which need to be treated by a professional.
But if you find it’s a simple matter of over-exertion, chronic stress or tension, perhaps from years of heavy physical labor where you’ve relied on your lower back to carry an extra load, there are things you can do to bring balance back to your back, which should relieve some or all of the pain.
I would absolutely recommend getting on a core strengthening program (such as Pilates) and work on it regularly to see results. Having been bent over a massage table for more than ten years, I’ve experienced the benefits of core strengthening on my lower back. It was the only thing that worked. If your doctor approves it, start with at least 15-20 minutes a day, and keep at it. You may not feel the benefits right away. I didn’t notice the benefits until about the fourth week. That’s how long it took for me to release the tension built up in my lower back over years and years. Hire a personal trainer if you need to, but don’t skip this step if you really want to heal.
Once your core/abdominal muscles are stronger, you need to be conscious of engaging them (using them, or tightening them) when doing any kind of work that might tax your lower back. Retrain yourself to share the burden between the back muscles and the abdominal muscles.
Here’s something simple you can do with a partner to supplement your core workouts. It may help provide some relief and a gentle stretch to the lower back area. In any event, it does feel really good:
Have your partner kneel down on the floor and come into child’s pose. Follow this link if you’re not sure what child’s pose is:
http://www.yogajournal.com/poses/475_1.cfm
(If your partner isn’t able to relax his/her forehead on the floor, give him/her some folded blankets or a bunch of pillows to lean against.)
Stand or kneel behind your partner’s hips and place your palms on your partner’s lower back – one on each side of the spine. Lean all of your upper body weight into the palms of your hands, pushing your partner’s hips into the floor. This creates a lengthening effect in the lower back, dropping the sacrum and hips down and away from the middle and upper spine. Go into the stretch slowly, and ask your partner for feedback – make sure it feels good and doesn’t hurt at all. With most people, you’ll be able to put your entire body weight into your hands and they will love the lower back relief! You could even turn yourself around and sit on their lower back for about twenty seconds or so.
Now try alternating your upper body weight back and forth between your two hands. First lean into the right hand, then lean into the left hand, right, left, right, left … a simple and effective way to compress & massage those lower spinal muscles.
Have a great week!
If you have any massage-related questions, feel free to send an e-mail to me at massage@chopra.com.
Posted by Grace Wilson at 12:01 AM | Comments (6)
May 24, 2007
IF...Yours is the Earth and Everything that's in It!
IF by Rudyard Kipling
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream -- and not make dreams your master,
If you can think -- and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings -- nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And -- which is more -- you'll be a Man, my son!
[ENDS]
With love and warm wishes to you and family
DK with family
DK Matai
The Philanthropia, ATCA, mi2g.net
A new Holistic Quantum Relativity Group is being set up here.
Holistic (H) E8 Vector Visualisation in String Theory (Q+R) like the 1,000 Petal Sahasrara Lotus in Spirituality
| Visit the HQR Group |
Posted by DK Matai at 02:48 PM | Comments (24)
Bush and Iraq
Bush said today that "We'll Leave Iraq If They Ask Us".
...so why can't the world convince Iraq to ask?
Posted by Saira Mohan at 12:13 PM | Comments (51)
Funding and Crying: Why the Dems Capitulated to one of the Least Popular Presidents in US History to Support one of the Least Popular Wars in US History?
A response from the Religious Left -
When I lived in Jerusalem and worked with the Israeli peace movement, we described our spineless Labor Party and some of the allegedly pro-peace intellectuals as "shooting and crying"?first they'd support military action, then they'd lament how terrible it felt to be "forced to stoop to the level of violence" (allegedly by "the enemy").
Nancy Pelosi and her colleagues are now "funding and crying"?first they fund the war, then they say that they are not implicated because having abandoned their promises to not allow the Bush Administration to go ahead with another year or more of war, they now say they'll "personally vote against the bill" that they've approved as a caucus.
No options? They could have mastered a majority of the caucus to agree to not call up the bill, demanded party loyalty on the issue, until the Bush Administration agreed to set a time table (remember, they were asking not for an immediate end of the war, but for an end a year from now!). And they could have mobilized their friends and allies around the country to engage in a media campaign in all districts where they worried about support?focused on why it was keeping troops in Iraq that is "abandoning the troops," while bringing home was the only sane way to protect them.
Too many critics of the Dems will reply: "They just don't have any backbone." But why don't they? The answer is not that Dems are less decent human beings or less principled than their Republican colleagues who, even in the minority, keep disciplined focus on their own principles (in this case, militarism until Iraq is safe for our oil companies and other corporate bandits).
It's rather that the Dems lack a coherent vision and ideology from which they could derive strength of purpose that would provide the foundation on which they could easily develop a moral backbone to fight for what they believe in. Thus, for example in relationship to the war in Iraq, they talk about the inability to win, rather than about the moral failure of the paradigm of trying to bring about safety and security by military or political domination of other countries.
While Republicans proudly cling to their own ideology, Dems have allowed the term "liberal" to become a political curse, not because they ever lost an intelligent argument about liberalism, but because they have been unwilling to fight for it. They are liberal about their liberalism. So why should anyone trust the country's defense to people who won't fight for themselves or their own views?
As it happens, we in the now-reviving Religious Left want to encourage Dems to embrace a somewhat different, but coherent, worldview, appropriate for the 21st century in which it is increasingly clear in economic, political and environmental arenas that our own well-being depends on the well-being of everyone else on the planet. We understand that the only way the human race is going to survive the next hundred years is if we overcome nationalist chauvinism and embrace our common humanity. And the first step to do that is to reject the 5,000 year old, and frequently disproven, "strategy of domination" with its misguided assumption that Homeland Security is best achieved by military, political or economic domination over others (hard version: wars like that in Iraq; soft version: diplomacy backed by military threats and economic boycotts).
Instead, we need to embrace a new paradigm: Homeland Security can best be achieved by Generosity and winning the hearts and minds of the people of the earth to the view that the US really wants the wellbeing of everyone, not just of our own corporate and political elites.
Last week The Network of Spiritual Progressives, an interfaith alliance of both religious and non-religious but spiritually atuned secularists, bought a full page ad to apply this strategy to Iraq (read it at www.tikkun.org/iraqpeace). Recognizing that many Americans want to know what would happen after the US troops were withdrawn, the ad implored the peace movement Dems to explicitly call for an international force to replace American troops and to conduct an election in which the people of Iraq could determine their own future without being under the rule of an occupying power. It also called for a Global Marshall Plan, not only to rebuild Iraq once it was safe to do so, but to dedicate 1-2% of the GDP of the US each year for the next 20 to eliminating domestic and global poverty, homelessness, hunger, inadequate healthcare and inadequate education and to repair the global environment.
The Religious Left is putting forward here a vision that could answer the misgivings that many Dems hear from their constituents about what will happen next. The NSP plans to back their ideas with a national moratorium against the war plus a "Iraq Summer-2008" in which it will seek volunteers to go door-to-door in "red" (pro-war) Congressional districts to present its alternative. For Dems to advoca