“Happily Ever After?”

Optimism is a drug that New Agey types take daily. Its parent corporation is Fear.

Pessimism is, sadly, realistic—but self-defeating.

Middle way.

~

“I don’t consider myself a pessimist.

I think of a pessimist as someone who is waiting for it to rain.

And I feel soaked to the skin.”

~ Leonard Cohen

elephants and tigers, useless to Capitalism (as opposed to, say, GMOs or SUVs) are going extinct in the wild (rapidly).

We’re literally now spraying our own food with half-strength Agent Orange in 23 states—and this is perfectly legal.

Corporations are People—only they have deep pockets, and We the People are, if we’re not among the 1%, far poorer than our grandparents’ generation.

The American Dream—opportunity if we work hard to join the ranks of the middle class and pursue happiness—is available to those who inherit, or those who can still afford the skyrocketing costs of a first-class education (and, even then…).

Climate change has well surpassed the limit for healthy life (350 parts per million, is it?). Mitt Romney—not a big fan of women’s rights, the middle or lower classes, or our environment upon which we all depend—has a good chance (thanks in part to 80% of all SuperPac money going to GOP) to unseat a Democratic President who, for now, just barely, has delayed the “game over for the planet,” Canada’s dirty, dirty Keystone Pipeline.

As is said in Buddhism,

“This is the darkest hour of the dark ages. Disease, famine and warfare are raging like the fierce north wind. The Buddha’s teaching has waned in strength … and the yogis of tantra are losing the insight of meditation. They spend their whole time going through villages and performing little ceremonies for material gain. On the whole, no one acts according to the highest code of discipline, meditation and wisdom. The jewel-like teaching of insight is fading day by day. The Buddha’s teaching is used merely for political purposes and to draw people together socially. As a result, the blessings of spiritual energy are being lost. Even those with great devotion are beginning to lose heart…”
~ excerpt from The Sadhana of Mahmudra, via Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche.

And yet, as Yvon Chouinard says, “we’re all fucked and I accept that—but I wake up in the morning and just work harder and harder against that reality—what else is there to do?” Well, er, something like that.

And the fact is: there’s magic to the human race when we wake up, and band together out of love and inspiration and compassion, instead of racism, sexism, hate, prejudice.

So who knows: history is written by the victorious, as Churchill said—and it’s up to us to make sure our great grandchildren grow up reading a story that ends happily ever after—in other words, that doesn’t end at all, but begins anew each day with the rising of the golden morning sun.

“The glass is half full. Or, it was. It’s just been poured on your head. Still, there’s nothing to do but keep thinking it’s half full, or all the way full—keep fighting, with a smile.”

 

Relephant:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJTiXoMCppw

We shall fight when there seems to be no point: