Nov 22, 2022·edited Nov 22, 2022Liked by Charles Eisenstein
You are one of the few people I almost completely agree with these days. Thank you for addressing the colonization of space in the full interview: "....Space colonization is much harder than the optimists think. It will require technologies that aren’t really on the radar right now. It will in fact require the kinds of technologies that are inaccessible to the consciousness that wants to escape responsibility for earth." We treat our own planet with utter disrespect and disregard, and then have the arrogance not only to think that there is no life on the other planets we want to colonize, but to even think we can just use and abuse Earth and move on to another planet. It shows a very low level of consciousness.
Perhaps it takes humans hitting rock bottom on what has been our decades, even centuries, of increasing “lack of humanity” progress to allow our spiritual selves to re-member with who we are. The past few years have perhaps even jump-started our collective awareness of this state, on multiple fronts, as I am witnessing in the many voices here on SubStack. We’ve been shown how our creation and embrace of materialism, as our only lifeblood or reason for existence, is so shallow and meaningless and how it can so easily be taken away. Do we have anything left, if that happens? Of course we do; we’ve simply abandoned our “selves” running after the next “shiny thing”. The value of who we are is never outside our self, with what we can create, and while this is our superpower, as humans, created in the image of the divine, the true value of our divine humanness comes from the remembrance of our “selves” as a part of and that reconnection to divine. Without it, we are merely operating as shells of our materialism.
Reading this article, it reminded me of a quote by Buckminister Fuller that I recently discovered and have been cherishing.
"When I'm working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong." - Buckminister Fuller
When solving the problem, maybe not thinking of beauty is necessary. Rather, the little parts and steps of process, the doing—the ordinary perhaps most mundane—is done beautifully, thoughtfully, and with totality .. may lead more fluidly to the beautiful solutions.. spaces.. world in our hearts we seek most.
In the main body of the interview I appreciated your forthright “no” on the probability of millions of humans in space in the next century. Our home here is enough in what can be an enchanting alive matrix of beings. I think of my rural youth embedded in the biosphere with a glorious sky above and sustaining earth beneath me. Let’s terraform this world well, not Mars.
Of all the substacks I read, this is the one I savor most, because it transcends the outrage many of us are feeling, and provides some guidance as we try to do the same.
I am a fan, thank you Charles Eisenstein! I mention you in this piece, about my disappointment in the hypocrisy of “diversity and inclusion” and covid policies:
There's an irritating paradox in distinguishing meaning from the means. There is nothing more immediate than the mean, but the mean isn't meaning. One's understanding doesn't stand under the medium of reality. As soon as one loses contact with reality, the closest approximation is through meaning. We filter reality through our intellect which requires a state of almost constant judgement. We seek knowledge of something rather than the thing itself. We've substituted knowing the truth for the truth itself. People will always ask, "but how do you know that is the truth?" Knowledge cannot validate the truth, but can only acquiesce. Knowledge is not fundamental. The truth is fundamental. The Way is fundamental. Life is fundamental, but as soon as one seeks to possess life, and make it their own, it withers and dies.
For years I was certain that if I just made a bit more money, I would somehow reach some state of perfection. I made idiotic sacrifices. I worked constantly while paying no taxes, no bills, no rent, no mortgage, no loans. I lived on the street, in trees, vans, storage containers, boats, but spent most of my time working, saving, investing to one day find myself sitting in my brand-new home weeping uncontrollably because I had attained my dreams only to discover that none this worthless paper or material wealth would ever make me happy. I had to learn that lesson the hard way. I thought I was different than everyone else. I was sure that I could handle wealth responsibly. I had become an idolater, and the only way out of that horror show was to start giving all that crap away.
I no longer want or need what the technocrats are peddling. I'm not impressed with their skills in the slightest. I don't use their smart gadgets to listen to automated menus tell me things I don't need to hear in the first place. I don't have the transhuman ears to hear their technological meta-gods.
There was a time when playing with some piece of technology was a welcome escape from reality. Now these technologies have become an intolerable burden. A day is soon coming when I will turn on my phone only to make sure that I am far away from techno-hell to have no bars and no means of communicating with anyone other than in person.
The entire interview and the introduction to it that is linked to above is worth reading and not that long to read. It was a excellent overview of your work and thought. And I agree, no more books needed. I think you have covered the big picture quite well in your past books and essays and writing shorter pieces as things come up is the way to go.
Newer reader here. I admire you putting these ideas into the world when there was less of a population that resonated with them which requires deep unconditional trust. Technologies of reunions is amazing language to express the core mechanism that will drive more unity in the world. Bravo! Excited to continue to follow your work
People never have found a paradise on earth, many continue to hope for a Shangri-La here and now; and they seek a shepherd to guide them to it. They long for a god or goddess to dispense the "last word" on social, economic, political, moral, and spiritual matters a source of certitude-a Leader.
We should ever bear in mind that the unknown is infinite. No person, regardless of his pretensions, glimpses more than an infinitesimal fragment of the Truth.
"Reason's last step is the recognition that there are an infinite number of things which are beyond it." ― Blaise Pascal
Thanks once again Charles for your wise words. I read so many beautiful and tuned in comments here below from people living in your ' corner of the world '. May all the corners and forgotten people be folded into the centre of our hearts as we live life together, in our minds eye.
Many great thoughts. About language - yes it helps different perspective. I find Chinese poetic；漂亮 is literally a floating light which means beautiful. Russian is extremely melodic and expressive with its non-fixed accent. One can see the character of a nation closely linked to the language. Especially in literature, music and fine art.
Pandemic was great too. It helped many realize that those "non-essential" activities are in fact fundamental.
Thank you for posting this, Charles. Many voices have intimated, spoken, and written this year on the ending of things to make way for the creation of things. I'm nearing 70 and there are things in this world, and ways of being that I don't want to let go of. But it seems it all must go. I just hope with all my heart that the letting go makes way for Goodness to prevail in the end. It really could go the other way.
Charles, for me you are one of the most important and meaningful thinkers, worth to be connected with the western world. I left Germany to live in the eastern part of of the world.
You are one of the few people I almost completely agree with these days. Thank you for addressing the colonization of space in the full interview: "....Space colonization is much harder than the optimists think. It will require technologies that aren’t really on the radar right now. It will in fact require the kinds of technologies that are inaccessible to the consciousness that wants to escape responsibility for earth." We treat our own planet with utter disrespect and disregard, and then have the arrogance not only to think that there is no life on the other planets we want to colonize, but to even think we can just use and abuse Earth and move on to another planet. It shows a very low level of consciousness.
Wow... those really were phenomenal questions!! Answers were timely soul medicine too, for me. Grateful as ever Charles.
Perhaps it takes humans hitting rock bottom on what has been our decades, even centuries, of increasing “lack of humanity” progress to allow our spiritual selves to re-member with who we are. The past few years have perhaps even jump-started our collective awareness of this state, on multiple fronts, as I am witnessing in the many voices here on SubStack. We’ve been shown how our creation and embrace of materialism, as our only lifeblood or reason for existence, is so shallow and meaningless and how it can so easily be taken away. Do we have anything left, if that happens? Of course we do; we’ve simply abandoned our “selves” running after the next “shiny thing”. The value of who we are is never outside our self, with what we can create, and while this is our superpower, as humans, created in the image of the divine, the true value of our divine humanness comes from the remembrance of our “selves” as a part of and that reconnection to divine. Without it, we are merely operating as shells of our materialism.
Reading this article, it reminded me of a quote by Buckminister Fuller that I recently discovered and have been cherishing.
"When I'm working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong." - Buckminister Fuller
When solving the problem, maybe not thinking of beauty is necessary. Rather, the little parts and steps of process, the doing—the ordinary perhaps most mundane—is done beautifully, thoughtfully, and with totality .. may lead more fluidly to the beautiful solutions.. spaces.. world in our hearts we seek most.
In the main body of the interview I appreciated your forthright “no” on the probability of millions of humans in space in the next century. Our home here is enough in what can be an enchanting alive matrix of beings. I think of my rural youth embedded in the biosphere with a glorious sky above and sustaining earth beneath me. Let’s terraform this world well, not Mars.
Of all the substacks I read, this is the one I savor most, because it transcends the outrage many of us are feeling, and provides some guidance as we try to do the same.
I am a fan, thank you Charles Eisenstein! I mention you in this piece, about my disappointment in the hypocrisy of “diversity and inclusion” and covid policies:
https://open.substack.com/pub/thecriticalmiddle/p/diversity-equity-and-exclusion?utm_source=direct&r=1sr0c7&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
Laziness is the mother of efficiency
There's an irritating paradox in distinguishing meaning from the means. There is nothing more immediate than the mean, but the mean isn't meaning. One's understanding doesn't stand under the medium of reality. As soon as one loses contact with reality, the closest approximation is through meaning. We filter reality through our intellect which requires a state of almost constant judgement. We seek knowledge of something rather than the thing itself. We've substituted knowing the truth for the truth itself. People will always ask, "but how do you know that is the truth?" Knowledge cannot validate the truth, but can only acquiesce. Knowledge is not fundamental. The truth is fundamental. The Way is fundamental. Life is fundamental, but as soon as one seeks to possess life, and make it their own, it withers and dies.
For years I was certain that if I just made a bit more money, I would somehow reach some state of perfection. I made idiotic sacrifices. I worked constantly while paying no taxes, no bills, no rent, no mortgage, no loans. I lived on the street, in trees, vans, storage containers, boats, but spent most of my time working, saving, investing to one day find myself sitting in my brand-new home weeping uncontrollably because I had attained my dreams only to discover that none this worthless paper or material wealth would ever make me happy. I had to learn that lesson the hard way. I thought I was different than everyone else. I was sure that I could handle wealth responsibly. I had become an idolater, and the only way out of that horror show was to start giving all that crap away.
I no longer want or need what the technocrats are peddling. I'm not impressed with their skills in the slightest. I don't use their smart gadgets to listen to automated menus tell me things I don't need to hear in the first place. I don't have the transhuman ears to hear their technological meta-gods.
There was a time when playing with some piece of technology was a welcome escape from reality. Now these technologies have become an intolerable burden. A day is soon coming when I will turn on my phone only to make sure that I am far away from techno-hell to have no bars and no means of communicating with anyone other than in person.
The entire interview and the introduction to it that is linked to above is worth reading and not that long to read. It was a excellent overview of your work and thought. And I agree, no more books needed. I think you have covered the big picture quite well in your past books and essays and writing shorter pieces as things come up is the way to go.
Oh, and cheers to you and your family for a happy and restful Thanksgiving.
Newer reader here. I admire you putting these ideas into the world when there was less of a population that resonated with them which requires deep unconditional trust. Technologies of reunions is amazing language to express the core mechanism that will drive more unity in the world. Bravo! Excited to continue to follow your work
Thank you, your last answer sums it up.
People never have found a paradise on earth, many continue to hope for a Shangri-La here and now; and they seek a shepherd to guide them to it. They long for a god or goddess to dispense the "last word" on social, economic, political, moral, and spiritual matters a source of certitude-a Leader.
We should ever bear in mind that the unknown is infinite. No person, regardless of his pretensions, glimpses more than an infinitesimal fragment of the Truth.
"Reason's last step is the recognition that there are an infinite number of things which are beyond it." ― Blaise Pascal
You melt my body in a nodding yes. Thank you for being so truthful and clear in everything you say! It’s heartfelt!
Thanks once again Charles for your wise words. I read so many beautiful and tuned in comments here below from people living in your ' corner of the world '. May all the corners and forgotten people be folded into the centre of our hearts as we live life together, in our minds eye.
Love Pete
Many great thoughts. About language - yes it helps different perspective. I find Chinese poetic；漂亮 is literally a floating light which means beautiful. Russian is extremely melodic and expressive with its non-fixed accent. One can see the character of a nation closely linked to the language. Especially in literature, music and fine art.
Pandemic was great too. It helped many realize that those "non-essential" activities are in fact fundamental.
Please continue to share your thoughts, Charles!
Thank you for posting this, Charles. Many voices have intimated, spoken, and written this year on the ending of things to make way for the creation of things. I'm nearing 70 and there are things in this world, and ways of being that I don't want to let go of. But it seems it all must go. I just hope with all my heart that the letting go makes way for Goodness to prevail in the end. It really could go the other way.
Charles, for me you are one of the most important and meaningful thinkers, worth to be connected with the western world. I left Germany to live in the eastern part of of the world.