Blessed Mindful Engagement

At the annual meeting of the American economists, "No one questioned their contribution to the current frightening state of affairs, no one humbled by events." - How the Entire Economics Profession Failed, by Jeff Madrick The Daily Beast, 2009-01-08. The profession can start reorienting itself with asking questions like What would be right (wholesome) view of Economy? The right view of Capital? Wealth? Profit? Currency? Growth? Fair Market? Fair Trade? Interest? Employment? Sustainable Economy? Welfare? Business ethics? Responsibility?

Also watch the PBS Forntline "The Card Game" and the unregulated effects of usury on vulnerable consumers.

Listen to the very inspiring words of Paul Hawken, Author and Inspiration behind WiserEarth
The Buddha mentions five specific kinds of livelihood which bring harm to others and are therefore to be avoided: dealing in weapons, in living beings (including raising animals for slaughter, slave trade, human trafficking and prostitution), in meat production and butchery, in poisons, and in intoxicants (AN 5:177). He further names several dishonest means of gaining wealth which fall under wrong livelihood: practicing deceit, treachery, soothsaying, trickery, and usury (MN 117). The United States expanded its role as the world’s leading weapons supplier. Last year the country signed weapons agreements valued at 68.4 percent of all business in the global arms bazaar reports New York Times


As Of December 16, 2009 U.S. Census estimates world population to be 6.8 Billion. The world military expenditure is over one thousand billion dollars. Also see Stockholm Peace Research Institute Figures. Take a pause to reflect on the significance of Now and the synchronicity at play. "To abstain from all unwholesome action, to cultivate the good, and to purify one's mind — this is the teaching of the Buddhas" (Dhammapada, v. 183).

One Woman Warned About Derivatives & Financial Meltdown

FRONTLINE has produced a remarkable documentary titled "The Warning" which documents how Lawrence Summers, Greenspan and Ruben attacked and blocked Mrs. Brooksley Born, who was in charge of the CFTC (Commodity Futures Trading Commission) when she warned of the derivatives danger in the mid 90s and heroically fought to regulate them. The OTC (over the counter) Derivatives market represented a Black Box within the Wall Street, with very little information, reporting, knowledge or understanding by anyone in the Government and its Regulators. The toxic assets of Banks once considered 'too big to fail' consisted mostly of OTC derivatives.

See how Michael Moore tried to get a simple explantion of Derivatives which are complex financial Instruments or rather complicated betting schemes designed to escape regulation. The financial sector has five lobbyists behind every congressman.

Alan Greenspan, the wizard of Wall Street admitted that his worldview and ideology of 40 years about the self-correcting free market and unfettered capitalism is false. This brilliant presentation takes the problem that created the crisis back through the Greenspan, to its origin in his philosophical mentor, Ayn Rand. Watch the PBS Frontline "The Warning" here.

It remains to be seen how Obama fares with his top economic advisors Tim Geithner and Larry Summers! Are we as conscious citizens paying attention or willing to learn and grow in wisdom from our experience?

Buddha spoke about the importance of the practice of 'heedfulness' or the quality of 'appamada' that keeps both kinds of benefit secure — benefits in this life & benefits in lives to come. More on 'appamada'. Also see subtle meaning of 'pamada' and 'mada' in Pali Text society dictionary. Here's Bush's insight off the record.

A site with interesting links and perspectives on 'Physicists Play with Finance".

The Vision & View of Native American Elders

Listen to his comment on leadership and responsibilty and his advice to a CEO. I am enjoying browsing the autographed book 'Blessed Unrest' by Paul Hawken that I received recently from wiserearth facebook passion challenge. When we kill, injure or harm another person we are impacting the entire community around that person.

"There is vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique...You have to keep open and aware directly to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open...no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is only a queer, divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than others." - Martha Graham to Agnes de Mille, Dance to the Piper

Dhamma is the path of truth (self realization through mindful-awareness), freedom (from ill will, greed and delusion) and non-violence (of body-mind-speech) that is aligned with the universal cosmic principle of life. Can we collectively co-create a mindful system that is aligned with dhamma? As intelligent humans, we are not just interested in survival. We are interested in meaningful survival. When we lose meaning, we lose the will to live.

"Believe me when I tell you, after 60 years of personal experience, that the only real misfortune is to abandon the path of truth....Truth alone will endure, all the rest will be swept away before the tide of time. I must, therefore, continue to bear testimony to Truth even if I am forsaken by all. Mine may today be a voice in the wilderness, but it will be heard when all other voices are silenced, if it is the voice of Truth." - Gandhi on Truth

Who are responsible? What can we learn?

The Time Magazine identifies top 25 leaders and their policy decisions leading to the current economic collapse. The top 25 to blame includes leaders of both parties, a wide variety of institutions, and not just white men. And consumers (all of us) also figure at the top of the list.

The following Bill Moyer interview with William K. Black, a senior former bank regulator about the systemic fraud rampant in our financial institutions is worth watching. How do the banksters, CEOs, rating agencies do it - make bad loans (called Ninja loans, liar loans, toxic assets in inside jargons) and get away with it? Bernie Madoff is only a piper compared to the ponzi scheme of major banks that is systemic. The bailout covers up the real situation from the public and violates existing law of receivership (nationalization) of failed banks.



I learned a new thing or two from watching 'Capitalism: A Love Story" the other day. Corporations are busy buying and profiting from big life insurance known as "Dead Peasant Policy" on their workers. Women and young workers are worth more when they die and the worker's family don't get to see a penny of the tax-free windfall corporations receive. This is all done without the knowledge of the employee. When are we going to stand up or sit down and take ownership of our own life, our own mind, our thoughts, prejudices, perception, speech, livelihood, action or non-actions?

See the result of a recent factory sit-in by laid off workers in Chicago. Visteon Auto workers in London and Belfast, UK occupies several plants over a month before ending sit-in. What is the most ethical action we might take as citizens?

We are the world, We make the choice, Lets Start Giving

Life is for~giving.. Just Listen from your heart...



"Give and it shall be given to you..in good measure, well pressed and overflowing. In whatever measure its given, will be given back to you." - Jesus

Buddha nature and Christ consciousness is our deepest nature (spectrum of consciousness). If all human beings are made in the image of 'god', how are we imaging the divine in the mirror of our own mind? Do we have a choice? What is the way out of our personal and collective obsessive compulsive mental habits, unconscious attitudes and reactive behavior that leads to agression, separation and mindless cycle of accumulation, production, consumption, destruction, stress and insanity? Does the external social, ecological, and environmental situation mirror the state of our collective mind and mental pollution?

Mindfulness is the ariya (noble or ideal) way of life, the brahma (sublime) way of life, the Tathagatha's (an epithet for the Buddha) way of life. All reductionist and partisan views and concepts leads to wrong views, error in perception, wrong thinking, unwholesome view of life and world, unsound state of mind, unskillful speech, and harmful actions. Application of correct mindfulness sharpens the power of observation, assists in right thinking, correct understanding, non-dual knowledge, inner peace, joy and freedom. An untrained uncultivated mind is easily overwhelmed by greed, ill will, ignorance, conceit, envy, jealousy, worry, restlessness, and skeptical doubt. These are the driving forces behind all conflicts, sickness and suffering we are witnessing in the world today.

Buddha said, "By protecting self one protects other; by protecting others one protects self". The greatest protection we can give ourselves is by protecting our mind from greed, hatred and ignorance.

"Your worst enemy cannot harm you as much as your own thoughts, unguarded. But once mastered, no one can help you as much, not even your father or your mother." - Dhammapada

Baudda said, avijja (ignorance and obscured awareness) is the root of all dukkha. Greed and confusion arises from taints or unwholesome states of mind with strong attachment or aversion to views, events, objects and phenomena.

Redemption comes from an enlightened choice we can make now. Could we collectively design a currency system from an empty mind without getting mired in any concepts, ideology, theology or dogma or without discounting our human experience now?

Is Sustainability Possible Without Sustainable Currency?

We hear so much about sustainability these days as all human organizational systems - social, economic, political, educational, health complexes and their ecological footprints are becoming more and more unbalanced and unsustainable.

What would a 'mindful economy' look like? Can we use some principles of living systems to create a functional currency and fair economic system based on a creative application of Buddha's wholesome understanding (Right View) of human economy and Right Intention for currency free from greed, ill will and harm?

Could we start a collective appreciative Inquiry of 'Transforming the Capital in Capitalism? Can we see the true as true and false as false and use 'Right Speech' in our financial and business dealings? 'Money as debt' is not freedom yet and State-supported bailout of fraudulent banks and crony capitalism is communism of the rich.

The Chinese President wants IMF to start a new Global currency. But would it be wise for leaders of developing world to rely on IMF or World Bank, when so much of their policies to end poverty and speed up development in third world countries are actually deepening and perpetuating the viscious cycle of poverty, corruption of political leaders and massive transfer of wealth from poor to the rich countries. Ron Paul is for phasing out World Bank.

The EU President, Czeck PM calls the US plan to spend its way out of recession a 'Road to hell.'

Our president Obama is graciously receiving online questions on economy from us today. I asked "Mr president have you watched the Youtube Zeitgeist- On FED? What would you do to free 'we the people' and our governmnet from debt-based fractional reserve currency as Presidents Lincoln, Jackson, Kennedy aspired to give us and world's children?"

Here are two books that are addressing unsustainability of Capitalism as it functions now.
Mindful Economics by Joel M and Agenda for a New Economy: From Phantom Wealth to Real Wealth by David Korten.

So what is the Buddha way? The Buddha Way is to understand how systems like capitalism are constructed within the human mind and perception both at the individual and collective level, so we can create a mindful Wikinomics of compassion, generosity and right understanding.

Here's a playful inquiry of the Bailout Bull Economics & The Cow Economics
And renewed protest against War-economics on 6th anniversary of Iraq war.

And G-20 summit in London takes place amid public protest and pre-summit low expectation of economists.

Pictures of 2009 G-20 summit. Leaders pledge 1.1 trillion dollar to IMF and other Global financial institutions. Other News: Biden's Pre-summit meet. Popular Obama, unpopular plan.

Look which group of plutocrats and technocrats has a summer meetup at Athens, Greece?

Some call them the High Priests and Control Freaks of Globalization. Is our Government bailout succeeding in taking back partial ownership of mega banks by 'Breaking the Bank?'

So how do we stop cooperating with and move away from the war-military-intelligence-prison-big pharma-media-think tanks complex and begin to put our collective attention, intelligence and energy towards creating an Economy of Peace ?

And what role we as engaged buddhists, conscious citizens, women, youth, people of color, LGBT can play? IMAGINE a world living in peace and harmony, no need to kill, die, deceive, delude, persecute or oppress self and others.

Restoring the Spirit of Currency: Loving Kindness

I have been wanting to write something soulful and a positive vision to hold onto this year of 2009, which offers us many wonderful expansive creative energies. We have the opportunity to breakthrough the energies of lack, fear, scarcity and greed! The financial breakdown is heightening stress and anxiety. The best way to counter this constricting energy is to simplify our life, be appreciative of what we have and give a little more than we usually do. Since this collective system change intention experiment and discussion was launched after What the Bleep do we know movie, in December 2006, I have seen wonderful things and co-creation taking place in magical ways.

Just wanted to share with my readers a soul infused book Money is Love: Returning to the Sacred Origin of Money by Barbara Wilder. I came to this book via my soul friend and author Jamie Walters, who recently had a conversation with Barbara.

Humanity and Money Share Common Essence and Purpose

Our Source, Infinite Intelligence and Creativity, is also money's source.

Our Essence, Love, is the same as money's essence.

All of life is meant to remember its Source, and fully express its Essence.

When both Source and Essence are shared, there exists Oneness.

This union makes it possible for understanding, communication, and

cooperation to develop between humanity and money. [source]

Our ego-mind does not want to get into those dark, stuck, lost places of deep anguish, hurt and pain, yet that is the only way to dive deep into the heart. So let us all clear the wounded, stuffy, claustrophobic energies around our soul that has so long confined us, limited us and dimmed the light of our own soul. As a child I was afraid of the dark goddess Kali and identified (still do) with goddess Saraswati . Now I find myself more and more accepting and be ONE with Kali.

Let us release those deeply entrenched habitual pattern of command and control, victimization, mean spiritedness, secrecy, shame, blame, guilt and accumulation of power over others. It is time drop our masks and our need for external validation through power, money, position and irresponsible sex and invite the power of love into our hearts and homes, our communities and heal all our wounded relationships. Money as 'debt' has been responsible for a Century of War, poverty, crime and injustice.

Recent studies find huge rise in male mortality rates in working aged men (15-69 years) in post-communist countries in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union between 1989 and 2002, following policies of rapid privatization of formerly state own enterprises (shock doctrine).

Can we restore the lost spirit of money through mindful inquiry, wholesome view, skillful speech and putting loving-kindness in action? Yes we can and we must. The great thing about a Mindful Revolution is that it is all about a mind-shift and shifting perceptions within our individual and collective mind. Once we see and accept the possibility in our minds, changes start happening like magic in the outside world. All we need is to plant the vision and gain understanding of the root of the dualistic conflict ridden man-made system of 'money as debt'. We just need to direct the power of collective loving attention to this issue, allow our basic wisdom and deep co-intelligence to arise through mindfulness, and this self-emergent process of conscious co-creation can self-organize itself in our communities, sanghas, social networks, peace and justice groups, green enterprises, interfaith groups, fair trade, labor unions, non-partisan groups, independents, artists, activists, human rights, equality and dignity advocates in science, technology, business, banking, and government.

"When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace." - Jimi Hendrix

Some Not So Visible News

• Just gotten a note from a friend that Amero may be coming sooner than you think! Don't count on me. Do your own research starting at Wikipedia
  

Conscious Media network is featuring a video on Amero and Lou Dobbs of CNN
and Dennis Kucinich on bailout and debt-based money system.

As conscious citizens and consumers we are now becoming increasingly aware that political democracy alone becomes meaningless without economic democracy and economic justice. Wait a minute! Do we even have a political democracy? Why Amero is not being as publicly discussed as Euro has been? Who ultimately benefits from such secrecy?

As Ron Paul says, the power to regulate the value of money, does not mean the federal Government can debase the money. Right now our Government is borrowing $2.2 Billion everyday mainly from china and Japan to pay for our overseas empire. As our dollar value declines, we cannot expect these and other countries to hold onto theirs for ever, and when they decide to dispose dollars, our fantasy world comes crashing us. No more empire, no more pledging trillions more in entitlements...if people wants to be free from a state apparatus that that threatens their liberties, squanders their resources on endless wars, destroys their values of dollar and spews forth endless propaganda, there's no force that can stop them...let the Revolution begin. - The Revolution, Ron Paul.

We cannot solve poverty and economic injustice . Yet we seem to have endless supply of debt-currency for the military-intelligence complex, War on Terror exploits, manhattan project, big pharma, destructive derivatives, or adventures in Science like CERN Hadron Collider!

The Buddha Way is the compassionate way of a peaceful warrior, a warrior who has conquered all ignorance, passion and agression through realization of impermanence of all phenomena, interdependence of all life and primordial non-duality of samsara and nirvana. The Buddha way is to be constantly mindful in the way we perceive, think, speak and act in the world and whether our unexamined views, ideas, attention and mindless actions are generating more stress, delusion and dukkha or alleviating them for the well being and happiness of all?

Can we save ourselves from our collective ignorance regarding man-made currecy? Can we make the radical shift from the old invisible, unconscious and false paradigm of 'money as debt' to the new luminous and compassionate paradigm of 'money as trust' through collective learning. YES WE CAN! Reach the Millenium goals and save our planet.

Let us hold that Vision for 2009! May all beings be free from suffering and the root of suffering!

Free Market Theology & Priests of High Modernity

Thirty five years of free market ideology and the many intellectual cross currents and 'isms' of High Tech Modernity (postmodernism) with its common traits of individualism, political liberalism and economic capitalism is failing miserably to improve the human situtaion at the most basic level of collective survival and social well being. Law, regulation, violence, revolutionary ideologies, science and technology are not sufficiently addressing or affecting the roots of injustice in social political structures (including democracy, socialism, communism) and bases of economic system and foundations of society.

Ken Jones in his book the New Social Face of Buddhism comments on high modernity's personal identity crisis and its attendant inner void that insatiably needs to be filled. These needs previously addressed by community, religion [and nationalism] are increasingly being commodified into whole culture of consumerism. Consumerism is winning more converts more quickly than any other previous belief or value system in human history (David Loy).

Ken urges Buddhists to renew their understanding of dukkha (suffering) by looking deeply into our contemporary global society, reflecting on how it can be healed. My sense is we need to go back deep into our collective unconscious and develop a deep understanding of our inner journey and outer social institutions begining with gender based patriarchy and ending with class based elitist supremacist global-imperialistic capitalism. With the advent of internet and web 2.0 history is being rewritten from persperctives not explored and disseminated before.

Listen to this surprising admission from Alan GreenSpan.

Asian and European Markets Fall with Greenspan's remark.

<> G20 Summit was a failure <>

Here are questions posed by engaged Buddhist Robert Thurman in Dropping knowledge

Bloggers Bear Witness to Poverty & Inequality

I am about to leave for a four day dzogchen retreat, and wanted to drop a note in support of Bloggers and Site Owners all over the world bringing attention to the cause of poverty and injustice embedded in and perpetuated by our dysfuntional and fraudulant financial system. The burden of poverty heavily falls on world's women, children, minority and marginalized classes, especially in developing countries.

AT Ariyaratne, Founder of Sarvodaya movement sees the root problem of poverty coming from a sense of personal and collective powerlessness. Money itself is empty, yet not understanding its fundamental nature and function as a collective social agreement, as a medium of circulation and a measure of value through which all human exchange of labor, goods, service, ideas and creative thoughts take place, keeps us from exercising our own power to collaborate and create the sustainable reality we like to live in with basic dignity, happiness and joy assured for all.

If power and wealth is getting concentrated in few despite overall sign of prosperity, could it be that the majority do not see or understand the basis of power or where they have unconsciously given away that power?

Where wealth is concentrated, the people are dispersed. Where wealth is dispersed, the people are brought together. - Confucius

The original Buddhist concept of emptiness and the sanskrit term Sunyata carries the meaning of swollen or pregnant - and it is indeed pregnant with a liberative potential when energizing creativity. it points the way out of the oppressive prison that self-protecting unconscious ego supposes to be reality.

Based on a new understanding of our social and historical and experiential realization the time is pregnant NOW for a new world and a new humanity capable of functioning and creating new systems from the holistic, non-dual and interdependent understanding of the whole living systems. This is a deep Now moment when many things are converging in many dimensions, historically, psycho-spiritually and evolutionwise.

{Listen to Chogyam Trungpa and also see this 2 minute clip from movie zeitgeist addendum] about this NOW moment}. We must unite through our common humanity in basic goodness, courage and intelligence and not give in to panic and fear or deceptive distractions and delusions.

Search Transforming Money: From Debt to Empowerment: Susmita Barua (see comment on sidebar)

On NPR Economists Explain How To Save Capitalism, 10/20/08 . But do we need to save an unjust unsustainable system that rewards greed and speculation by the rich and sucks money away from real people and real economy? Our ignorance is the root cause of "dukkha".

A new film They Come in The Name of Helping

The Chinese word for transformation consists of two ideograms that
translate as - danger and opportunity. There is no question that we
are entering into dangerous times. But there are deep opportunities as
well. The evolutionary question is: will you, me, and we put our
wholesome attention, intention and energy towards birthing a new
dhamma world or keep holding on to the old pardigm that is simply
unsustainable and breaking apart under its own weight of living
contradictions.

Search Transforming Money: Debt to Empowerment: 
Susmita Barua