Seeing the Light at Christmas

Actually, the best use for the LED "Christmas" lights, are for the heat of the summer -- when one wants light without producing any unnecessary heat. But since each string of 50 bulbs only consumes 5 watts of electricity, or as much as a night light, they make excellent 24/7 year-round ambient lighting so that one can always see well in the dark -- which is the greatest danger in one's household, especially if one needs to get up at night. They work well as minimal security lights by providing inobtrusive visibility.   

But what is most overlooked, is that the LED provides far superior lighting -- especially if one uses the "cool white" or "daylight" regular bulbs -- which is superior to the old Ott light bulbs used in light therapy -- because they just make one feel good, and see better. In this respect, LED is a tremendous upgrade well worth paying a premium for but prices have come down dramatically so as to become the most economical option as well.

LEDs are a game-changer. 95% of the stimulus of the brain is light -- and when that is superior, people live and become healthier, and safer, more efficient. Everything previously, is caveman technology.

Where Did This Country Go Wrong?

You can't ENABLE people to get worse -- you have to EMPOWER them to get better, so that they don't need MORE health care.

That's where the "progressives" have gone wrong.  We need to dedicate this society to producing healthier people -- rather than more health care for people who aren't, and will live indefinitely in that declining state of health.  That's the whole orientation of the present health care system -- to keep dysfunctioning people alive for as long as possible in that condition -- because the money is just too damn good that way.

Meanwhile, there is very little money in really healthy, independent people.  The lesson to be learned, is from the 10% who are so healthy they never need to see a doctor -- and find out what those people do -- rather than extrapolating the sickest 10% onto the entire population -- because that becomes the self-fulfilling prophecy.

That's where the nation lost its vision -- in people becoming better, rather than simply worse, and justifying that as "normal aging," and all its attendant afflictions.  Most people's problems are not caused by aging -- but rather dysfunctions and dependencies, and the solution is not how do we pay for more caregivers, but how do we create people who are their OWN best caregivers -- so we don't have to pay for prohibitively expensive "professional" caregivers to do what each could do best for themselves?

That vision has all but been abandoned, and is now even being "outlawed" and penalized -- with the propaganda that such people don't pay for their own health care if they actually need it, and so should subsidize those who are totally dependent on it, as they are for everything else.

But even then, a rare few will choose to be as healthy and self-actualizing as they can be -- as what the human enterprise and evolution is meant to be -- despite societal mandates to do otherwise.

The Future Will Be Different

History doesn't just repeat itself -- as many unobservant people think.  Life is always changing, and never staying the same.  How that life changes, has not been predetermined -- but is the reason for our being and living -- and not despite all our efforts.  That is what makes lives meaningful -- and not simply the dysfunction and despair many think it is.

Human beings "age" when they fail to adapt -- but continue to make the same mistakes that aren't working, obviously -- and then think they always have to be that way.  And so their problems and difficulties become irresolvable -- rather than the focus of all their efforts -- to get better, to overcome their problems and difficulties.

But if one is always learning, trying new ways, and not just repeating the same ways that aren't working, there is a chance for an entirely different outcome than their present course.  Yet their conditioning and habits, makes them do the same things -- that aren't working, and that is their dying to each day and new opportunity for change.

That change of understanding, is the difficult part of conditioning -- not just for once, but for everyday of one's life -- and that is what keeps one young and vital, sensitive and responsive -- and when one no longer is that way, decline and deterioration will set in.  Life is the choices one must make.  Dying is the thinking that one no longer can make those choices that affect one vitally.  Many live that way -- their entire lives, and so that end, is unavoidable.

The future will be different, if one makes it different -- in the very thinking of it, but can never do so, thinking the same and simply repeating what one has always done before.  One doesn't improve by simply doing MORE of what one has done before, but in doing it BETTER, than they've ever done it before.

Thus it is the movement itself that is important, and not the resistance to such movement -- done increasingly badly, that one should not be reinforcing -- until ultimately one fails in the various ways -- injury, disinterest, and the lack of favorable results.  Conditioning doesn't have to be all those undesirable side-effects -- with little or no positive benefits.  Yet many will simply do what they have done before -- even without the hope of any improvement, simply because that is their conditioning -- to simply repeat regardless of the outcome.

One can be conditioning wrongly, as well as rightly, and not that any and all conditioning, is good.  Obviously, that is not true -- and that is the difference one experiences in the world and life.  So first, it is important to discern and discriminate such differences, rather than follow the advice of those who do not know what they are talking about, except to claim to be the "experts" on such matters.

Inevitably, we find out that they have no idea of what they are talking about -- despite repeating it mindlessly all their lives.  They've never questioned that authority -- as their condtioning -- to get beyond to the truth of that matter, and find out it can be different from the only way they've been told, and unfortunately taught, by poor teachers and the culture of those environments.

They go on that way until it is "too late," and they can no longer change.  They are simply resigned to their fate -- that they can no longer get better, but now and forever more, can only get hopelessly worse.  So while one is young, or at any time in one's life, one must recondition oneself to the thinking that one can change -- fundamentally and thorougly, and not just the hope that they can change only one thing, while everything else remains the same.  That is not how change works; real change, changes everything -- so much so, that one doesn't have to change everything.  It produces its own momentum and life of its own.

But most people don't want real change, or change enough, to produce such a profound movement -- and that doing, is their very being -- the form they express and exude, and not simply how they wish it were different.  If one is observant in the gyms, and in the schools, and in all the activities of life, one sees these forms manifested in all the behaviors as well as the forms they take.  Form confirms function.  What one sees, is what one expects.

So if one can see without these preconceptions of what they think they are doing, one sees the truth of the matter, of simply what is happening -- and not just the propaganda of what they think they are doing.  Those are the few that break through in any field of activity -- to attain the truth beyond, and that is what is important, and serves them well all their lives -- regardless of the field of their specialization.  That is the universal truth recognized in all.  That is what rings true.

Otherwise, one thinks there is a different truth for every different occasion, even if it seems totally at variance with every other truth one has learned in life -- and so only the different experts in such fields, can know that.  But the truth is not like that.  It is recognizable to those who haven't been indoctrinated in all that propaganda to accept it wholly.  It can be recognized in any part of it -- because the truth is always in the whole, and never in the half-.

But many say, "I'm not ready for the whole truth, tell me just the half-."  And so what they know, is a collection of half-truths, not adding up to any whole -- and so nothing makes sense, or is expected to.  They simply repeat what they have always done before.

And thus they age -- badly. 

Inflation and Deflation

Deflation is good for people on limited fixed incomes -- like those on Social Security, etc. They should welcome the news that the cost-of-living adjustment is "only" 1.5% -- rather than trying to hype it higher. The bottom line is what you can get for the money -- and not simply getting more money to buy one increasingly less -- as the union and media shills would have us demand for them.

The chained (lower) CPI is correct in reflecting the reality that people have to adjust their choices -- rather than continue to buy the same things despite their escalation in price. Even the poorest persons can get $200 worth of food stamps, housing subsidies, medicaid, etc. -- that already puts them above the median income -- so that they aren't living at the poverty level.

But $200 a month of food will make one obese -- and then requiring the Medicaid from all those complications -- including that one is sitting around all day chain-smoking and pursuing their favorite addictions to while their idle time. The smarter choice would be to grow as much of their own food as possible -- ensuring a more healthful diet, which is what a chained CPI would expect one to do -- make better choices, including downsizing one's lifestyle -- instead of lamenting that they have less money for travel and gifts to the grandkids.

The downsizing of lifestyles means more used good are available at yard sales and thrift stores -- and so wealth is redistributed in that way, rather than people hoarding everything they have in the hopes that inflation will make whatever they have more valuable, which results in a more inefficient society.

So most people still "earning" money, are vested in higher inflation rates, while those on fixed incomes should be vested on lower inflation -- instead of being manipulated as dupes against their own self-interest, to fuel the greed and ambitions of the unions and media people who want to be at the top -- and in control.

The Value of Life and Death

This is an important issue for the future.

When people have a pet that is suffering -- and that life is no longer viable, it is the humane choice to put that animal to sleep -- rather than keep it alive in pain and suffering for as long as humanly possible, and at whatever cost.

That same consideration and compassion should be given to human life as well -- rather than the insistence that people who want to end their lives, have to do it themselves in a horrible way.  We have the technology to prolong life long past any consciousness and enjoyment of it -- but we also have the understanding to end it as painlessly, and humanely as possible -- when their very living is a constant torment.

Otherwise, people have to commit suicide by cops -- after taking many other innocent lives; they should be allowed to just make that decision for their own -- sparing the countless others from that pain and suffering -- just by being at the wrong place at the wrong time.  So if we really are sincere at reducing the pain and suffering in the world, that would be the intelligent choice -- that people are increasingly allowed to choose for themselves.

The whole lesson of Christianity and other religions -- is to become at peace with one's own dying, and at peace with everyone else.  That also is the object of life, and living.

A Future Worth Living

 What's missing in the "health care discussion," is that HEALTH is one's best health care insurance -- and not making THAT one's priority and leading investment, makes all the other discussions moot.

No amount of insurance is an adequate substitute for being in good health -- and dedicating all one's time, energy and resources to that attainment first -- rather than paying huge sums (one's entire life savings/resources) to those who make a handsome profit on one's poor health and condition.  That's where this country made an immensely wrong turn -- investing in the poor health of its individuals and institutionalizing sickness as the norm -- rather than ultimate health and its fullest actualization -- that solves all the problems.

Fortunately, this is the turning point towards the new way of being -- and not simply deteriorating because one can, and every bit of one's resources will be directed towards those ends.  That is a totally meaningless existence -- and the promise of retirement, and seniority, is defining and reaching a higher standard of life than ever thought possible -- because one has all the time, energy and resources to dedicate to that.

That is a future worth living -- and not just being fodder for all the vultures of the world -- infinitely.

"Somewhere"

That 1.5% Social Security cost-of-living increase is ten times the interest rate they're paying out at the bank -- which is a godsend for savers.

What this country needs is an Office of Relocation so that people with low incomes, can be relocated to communities where the cost of living is very low -- rather than being trapped in the high cost, high crime ghettos of the high-cost-of-living cities -- especially since they are retired and are trapped and victims of those environments. They would doubly benefit from a fresh start in life from the overcrowded cities -- and finally get a chance at the dream of American pastoral (low-density) life.

They don't need to be there and would be far better off almost anywhere else -- if there was some agency that would expedite those moves. I know many think people should die in the homes they've always lived in, but for many low income and even moderate income people, obviously a life anywhere else would be better -- especially with such disparities that exist in the world. There could even be an international branch of relocation so that people who want to move anywhere else in the world on their Social Security, can choose to do so expeditiously -- where they can live like kings and queens, rather than be homeless in New York City, San Francisco or Honolulu.

Other countries might welcome these newcomers -- as valued citizens with high fixed American incomes. There's probably a Walmart, McDonald's, or Starbucks to make them feel right at home.