The Gravaton Blog. Your Already Moving. Where Will You Go?

Pictured above: guest blog author, Aaron Ableman

"Looking at a rose does not tell you that it is a rose; the things you notice about the rose–its color, shape, fragrance, and beauty–were all created by the looker. These things are not qualities of the thing itself, but our own knowledge about the flower projecting itself, that’s all."-Krishnamurti

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This is a “Guest Blog” and when I invite someone to be a guest blogger at The Gravaton it’s because I hold that person in esteem for selfless qualities I’ve seen them demonstrate in their dealings with others, as well as for the fact my gut tells me that the person in question is an all around “good egg” based on my own personal dealings with them.

Guest bloggers have free reign to write about whatever they wish without censor and all guest blogs are presented without endorsement or rebuke of any kind. Any input from me as editor has already been incorporated into the article with the authors consent.

Guest blogs remain the intellectual property of their authors and are presented here on a nonexclusive basis with the permission of the author.

Now, Aaron Ableman’s

A Wrong Turn to the Right Road a.k.a.

"Clean Toilet, open Spirit"

When I was 15, I first read William Blake under an oak tree… It was like visionary hip-hop on a Zen mountain top! Go figure. I was attending a rustic boarding school founded during the peak of the 1930’s depression teaching the experiential ethics of sustainable living from Thoreau to the Buddha. Situated on three thousand acres of wilderness, the philosophy deeply illumined the value of Nature in all of Her infinite relationships.

We aimed to live simply, with what we ‘needed’ and not what we ‘wanted’, a tough distinction in a world of never enough needless things. Nevertheless, the students made various attempts at understanding this inconvenient daily challenge by cleaning toilets, rewriting mathematical theorems, and ‘not’ taking too many ice-cream bars after supper. It was a community of punks and hip-hoppers, nerds and losers, sports players and wayward thespians.

But when I first picked up the aforementioned book by William Blake for some quiet reading under an ancient oak tree, something shifted in my observation of ’study’ (and more importantly, life in general). Now that’s not to say I didn’t already greatly appreciate the miracle of studying in such a unique high school environment.

Believe it or not, I actually loved writing essays depicting the impact of European disease on Native peoples in the tragic conquest of the America’s. I loved chasing girls through the wilderness after dark. I even loved chopping wood for hours in the December rain, just to make a few kids’ shower water hot.

In fact, I was one of the happier students in that strange place and…being a chameleon by nature, I’d always made my best
intents on adaptation to various climates, be they urban farms or third world war zones but…

On that one blessed day, when all my friends had left to play sports, and I labored over Blake’s proverbs, I realized that in so constantly seeking to challenge myself with external physical & academic stimuli, I had been ignoring the web of life all around and within me. I had lost my connection with nature; the nature of my mind in all of it’s awesome spirit. It was then that I turned the page to read:

"The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing that stands in the way. Some see nature all ridicule and deformity…and some scarce see nature at all. But to the eyes of the man of imagination, nature is imagination itself."

My life (before reading the words above) had been slave to the endless thoughts of the who, what, where, when and why, but never… the "Wow"! I had sacrificed the real creative learning of openness and mystery and I’d missed the clichéd "forest for the tree’s".

 

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The work of the nameless creator, makes light look like shadow until you read between the signs.

"There is a Secret One inside us; the planets in all the galaxies pass through his hands like beads. That is a string of beads one should look at with luminous eyes." -Kabir

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Until my quiet epiphany in central California, I’d not realized how my boarding school was seeking in it’s ‘wild cultivation’ of young minds” to open the world of possibility to me. Since that day however, I’ve changed my entire approach to the "learning" process.

My opinion of rocks, for example, expanded into pure awe after participating in improvisational theater exercises next to a river for 11th grade extra-credit class.

Subsequent revelations abounded in such a newly re-perceived environment of study, work, and sillyness: even compost became sacred and poetry, exploded off the page in with a force most boom boxes can’t "bump". Seems I fell into this ‘minor enlightenment’ school by accident, “a wrong turn to the right road”…

It’s with this spirit of happy coincidence and magic that I now ascribe to live with. From impromptu street performances in downtown Bombay, India to making living flower mandalas with eight year olds. The more I see life as awesome the more AWE-some it becomes. The more love for the serendipitous truth of ‘what is’, the more I feel gratitude to this unexpected path.

Without presumption or ego, I am moved by a larger spirit these days. I have somehow found my own solar system, a microcosmic artist painting the macrocosm, awakened from the sleep induced illusions of commercial culture. In this sense, I hope that all beings of the world may discover their infinite potential which sits waiting at every moment.

May we all discover the Buddha at the supermarket, the rainbow in the street side puddle, the music which can create Duke Ellington, the tree which inspires Julia Butterfly and the book which sings of divine imagination.

 

You can hear more of my music and sample my art at Ablemonk and find about my education based initiatives at
Planet Express.

Peace

Aaron Ezra Ableman

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Pictured above: guest blog author, Pedro Carvajal

“For an artist and activist like myself, the concept of how art can be used as a catalyst for activism and change, comes naturally… As part of my regular column “The Carvajal Chronicles,” the editor and I decided to begin by my writing and presenting video expose’s exploring this fascinating issue. This is just the part one of several more to come in upcoming installments”,
~Pedro

Introduction (about guest blogs)

This is a “Guest Blog” and when I invite someone to be a guest blogger at The Gravaton it’s because I hold that person in esteem for selfless qualities I’ve seen them demonstrate in their dealings with others, as well as for the fact my gut tells me that the person in question is an all around “good egg” based on my own personal dealings with them.

Guest bloggers have free reign to write about whatever they wish without censor and all guest blogs are presented without endorsement or rebuke of any kind.

Guest blogs remain the intellectual property of their authors and are presented here on a nonexclusive basis with the permission of the author.

Lets continue with award winning documentary filmmaker Pedro Carvajal’s first appearance at The Gravaton Blog.

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The Power of Billboard Banditry

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As a filmmaker, I first got involved in the art of “billboard banditry” as I was making a documentary about the now defunct art collective known as ARTFUX. I still remember with vivid clarity the first time members of ARTFUX and artist Ron English got together for the very first time in order to liberate five billboard that they created right in the heart of Manhattan. Entitled “ART PUSHES; ART PROVOKES; ARTFUX,” I produced this documentary when I was still in college. ArtFux disbanded in the mid-nineties with half becoming CICADA.

Being an outsider looking in through the lens of my camera, I could even feel the adrenaline pumping through my veins as I watched with awe members of ARTFUX and Ron English go up a seven-story building in order to culture jam a 40X60 foot billboard and replacing it with one they created with the image of a very confused UNCLE SAM and the message “CENSORSHIP IS GOOD BECAUSE ______ _______ _______! In my documentary “POPaganda: The Art & Crimes of Ron English” there is a small segment depicting that day (you can purchase the POPaganda DVD from Cinema Libre, or Netflix).

Art has always been a reflection of, and a reaction to, the times…in that, perhaps, ultimately all artists are activists, and all genuine lovers of art participants in a call for cultural transformation. In the case of Ron English and his “billboard banditry,” English hijacks corporate advertising challenging us (the audience) to change the sham of reality that advertisers have created for us and reminding us that free speech still lives. Ron English subverts traditional images and words into confrontational art meant to inspire and “activate” its viewers. He challenges the growing “culture of junk” and in his work asks us to demand integrity, truth and respect from corporations that chronically dumb us down to sell us up.

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Below, you’ll be able to view a short culled from footage shot for my film Popaganda The Art & Crimes of Ron English.

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“The Art and Subversion of Ron English”

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In upcoming weeks, at The Lohasian, where my regular column “The Carvajal Chronicles” appears, we will explore the influence that art has on society and look at other artists of today and yesteryear, who pushed the boundaries of art as a vital tool of social change.

Peace

Pedro Carvajal

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Pictured above: Guest Blog Author, Dawoud Kringle

Introduction (about guest blogs)

This is a “Guest Blog” and when I invite someone to be a guest blogger at The Gravaton it’s because I hold that person in esteem for selfless qualities I’ve seen them demonstrate in their dealings with others, as well as for the fact my gut tells me that the person in question is an all around “good egg” based on my own personal dealings with them.

Guest bloggers have free reign to write about whatever they wish without censor and all guest blogs are presented without endorsement or rebuke of any kind.

Any input from me as an editor (as italicized text in brackets) or double arrows denoting and bordering >>(edits)>> only appear if the original author has reviewed and approved said annotations.

Guest blogs remain the intellectual property of their authors and are presented here on a nonexclusive basis with the permission of the author.

And now lets loose the Renegade Sufi, Imam Dawoud Kringle upon the Gravaton Blog.

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Musical “Warriorship” for the Young Artist

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The world has changed. While (my beliefs inform me that) we stand at the beginning of a Second Golden Age of Islamic Civilization, there will be no return to the past. What is arising will be very different from what has happened in the past. Or, perhaps the Last Day is within sight. Allah is best to know.

One of the things that has crept into the consciousness of people (in the later half of the twentieth century) is the unpredicted use of sound as an art form: not in the way we normally think of as music, but pure sound.

Hip Hop DJs, Avant-guard artists, Free Jazz musicians, the electro psychic onomatopoeia of Jimi Hendrix, etc. are all sound art. I have done experiments with sound art, both electronic and acoustic, since I was in my teens. >>(Society now)>> acknowledges the potential of “sound art” as being legitimate and authentic art.

The operative word in the last sentence is “potential.”

There has been a horrifying trend in the 20th century that is known as “Art for art’s sake”.

Some half-baked dilettante makes some kind of mess (in whatever medium of expression they choose), without method (technique), knowledge, or authentic insight, that (ultimately) means and accomplishes nothing. Then… they point to it and say “This is art because I say it is art!” And of course, there will always be a group of people who will accept their nonsense because it flatters their egos to be part of some kind of quasi-elitist inner circle.

I reject >>(the aforementioned trend)>> with extreme prejudice. It is the ultimate degeneration inherent in democracy; and deliberately invites all and sundry to turn authentic art into its lowest common denominator. I see little difference between some stupid avant-guard noisemaker and Beyonce Knowles; except that the later is more easily marketed for reasons so obvious they do not bear mentioning.

Now, as I said, this doesn’t mean that sound art cannot be authentic art. Nor must it remain chained to a tradition. Indeed; it must innovate and explore uncharted ground, or it will become incestuous, stagnate, and die. But (I postulate that) it must embrace the same ontological and metaphysical qualities as all art, which deal in (and are “constrained” by) absolutes that contain infinite potential and variation…

Wwithout >> (a benchmark reference that puts the “art” in some sort of perceptual context, the absolutes needed to form the springboard that allows an artist to explore, innovate and truly create, are not there to provide the arts foundation) >>. And (this) is particularly dangerous because it all too easily permits the talentless to produce worthless facsimiles that are easily pawned off to the unaware.

Nietzsche drew a sharp distinction between the elite and the masses, especially in the realm of art. He noted that the elite will have virtuosos and nothing less, while the masses are content with charlatans.

To be sure, fortune favors the bold. Having said that, if one dares venture into any realm of artistic “expertise”, one should pay attention to what the masters said (and did) with the respect due their station, and learn the actual language and procedures of the territory before attempting to establish a presence and exercise the will to power. This, especially, when one is attempting to venture into uncharted artistic territories, and establish tomorrow’s traditions.

It will not do to present the subtle and subconscious insinuation that one is equal to the established masters with an artistic genre until and if it became an actual and provable fact (by the “established” criteria of history and tradition). If one failed to do so (”prove themselves”), one would deserve every disaster that such arrogance and ego deliberately invited.

In my youth, I became interested in poetry. When I began writing, my poetry was amateurish and sloppy. I first had to clarify who and what I was and what I wished to express. Then I had to refine my understanding of the language. Then, I had to refine the techniques of poetry and how to make it into authentic art. Only then did I dare say I am a poet and share my work in public among the merciless scrutiny of true poets and connoisseur of poetry. Same with my music.

I learned a long time ago - and the process was quite painful and crushing to my ego as I recall - that the capacity to enjoy and appreciate music does not in any way qualify me or anyone else to make music. I had to earn the right to make music.

Musicians are like martial artists in that they have a higher awareness of the self. As artists we must truly know ourselves.

Sooner or later, each musician / artist enters a crisis in the development of their artistic self. An initiatory trial by fire. We must pass through it and emerge a higher embodiment of our self - or be defeated. Some might not make it. Few have what it takes to do so. But few have the guts to take the first step on the path. If they knew what awaited them, they wouldn’t try.

Some turn back to the comfort zone whence they came, stagnate, and watch themselves become extinct and obsolete. All true artists know what I’m talking about. Enlightenment waits on the other side of fear: and nothing is more frightening than the annihilation of the illusions and vanities that seduced us.

Nothing is more painful than the acknowledgment of the Non-Self.

This is a statement of my personal experiences. I learned these lessons by having my “bread broken” and my “grapes crushed”…a shameless reference to a poem by Rumi. As you’re doubtless aware, while there are ways and ways of crushing grapes, there is no other way to make “Wine”. We crave the “Wine”, but are these crushed grapes too painful? We must endure the process; or drink tap water and be silent.

Click Here To Sample My Music

Ma’a Salaam {With peace}

Dawoud Kringle

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You’ve just read an entry in The Gravaton Blog. To read more you can always return here as well as visit The Gravaton Mini Blog which will contain different (though sometimes related) content. Go see for yourself.

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“Anybody can become angry, that is easy; but to be angry with the right person, and to the right degree, and at the right time, and for the right purpose, and in the right way, that is not within everybody’s power, that is not easy.”

Aristotle

It is considered one of the Seven Deadly Sins but before I turn the Gravaton eye towards it, a bit of Gravaton Collective business:

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There’s a new Gravaton Music Artists forum over at the Gravaton Fun Forums that’s been added in advance of the New Artists who’s work will be featured on the Gravaton Collective sites and sold through Gravaton Music as the spring and summer progresses (here in the northern hemisphere). The forums will have artist profiles, image galleries, live performance announcements and product announcements as well as serve as a place for the artists to communicate with fans and folks alike. Also keep an eye out for artists guest blogs making their appearance here at The Gravaton Blog.

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Right then, and what about that dramatic picture up there at the start of this article? We‘ll get to it, read on.

Anger (like all other emotions) is an evolved response to certain types of external and/or internal stimuli… yeah, big DUH I know. But like I said, its EVOLVED and like anything evolved… (from our opposable thumbs to the tiny hairs that can grow in often the most unwanted places on our bodies)… it represents a (once) needed evolutionary response that was developed to help us survive and progress and like all such evolved traits its either on its way in, an established part of our being or on its way out (no longer needed…now vestigial like some of those tiny hairs I mentioned earlier).

We tend to get angry when we’re hurt in some way (or we think we’re about to get hurt) The hurt could be any combination of a physical, emotional or spiritual injury or… perceived injury… or just the (often merely perceived) threat of same but… the evolved, primal animal response is always the same; anger (which can then flower into all sorts of modern day nasty things like depression, aggression and hatred).

Anger has become a real problem for us modern “civilized” folk because we don’t really need it any more. In fact the types of situations for which we evolved the anger response are now mostly, no longer with us but anger is such an overwhelming biochemical response, so deeply rooted in our primitive animal nature that when it triggers… and does the job it was designed for… it overrules all the other intellectual and spiritual intelligence that we’ve evolved since the anger response was first developed in our species.

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Now about that picture above (from the critically maligned film 10,000 B.C.). That picture is an illustration of why our primate brains evolved the anger response so lets weave a lil story around it.

“Ug” (that’s what I’ll call him) the caveman up there was on his way back home from a little hunting trip with his two buddies so he could put some food on the cave floor for Mrs. Ug and the lil Uglets. Now it so happens… that a large saber tooth had something similar in mind… and when Ug and the boys were all set to pounce on their prey, the big cat pounced on them.

Ug’s friends aren’t in the picture above because one of them is dead and the other is now running faster then any bipedal humanoid has ever run up to that point in human evolution…far far away from poor Ug and the cat up there. That leaves Ug. Now… at that point the can try slowly backing away from the beast but that doesn’t look like its going to work. Likewise… running like his nameless other friend wont work as the big cat is now firmly focused on him. Ug could also try cowering in fear… and hope the hungry cat will take pity on him but practically speaking, if Ug wants to have a chance at surviving he’s got to do just one thing, get mind clearing, fear dissolving, adrenalin pumping, aggression focusing ANGRY!… nothing else will do. In a situation like that, anger clears and sharpens the mind and body for the violent brutal task at hand.

That’s what anger was evolved for, to eliminate all distraction and prepare the body for single minded, explosive, aggressive action. Not the modern day idea of “fight or flight” where you experience the equivalent of a type of fear response nope… I’m talking… get ready to throw down cuz its on, right here and now, no retreat, no surrender and there’s only one thing on your mind and in your body, a will to overcome and annihilate that which threatens you.

Thing is… how often do you run into situations like the one above in modern society?

Problem is… That well evolved anger response still triggers in response to situations that no longer require (or permit) such a forceful response as anger was designed to enable us to enact.

“How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.”

Marcus Aurelious

Result is… we get short circuited, mind / body schisms develop, heath problems develop and our more evolved minds try to cope with the bio-chemical onslaught (that we can’t, under most circumstances give into) by developing depression, emotional paralysis, unfocused latent aggression, hatred and self destructive behavior. All the aforementioned being a further “evolved response” to not being able to intercept that now rarely necessary primal anger response before it takes us over to prepare us for something that we (most likely) are not facing when we get angry to begin with.

On the positive side our evolving natures and spirits have also given us the notion of philosophy, art, spirituality and reasoning as other “evolved” responses to the internal and external suffering caused by the now vestigial (but still powerfully present) anger response.

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“He who angers you conquers you.”

Elizabeth Kenny

Now think about this. If I were part of a group that wanted to manipulate you… a sure fire way I could remove your ability to focus on something I don’t want you to see… is by making you angry. Really consider that the next time your sucking on the glass teat (TV or Internet screen). Think about how many times information is feed to you in a manner designed ONLY to raise your ire and almost never in a manner that’s designed to promote positive change or reasoning… or… from a more personal perspective, next time someone tries to push your buttons (so to speak), consider if you really want to let them have that type of control over you.

So to quote (and expand a bit on) James Thurber:

“Let us not (react in or) look back in anger… or forward in fear, but (rather) around in (serene) awareness”.

Welcome To The Gravaton.

Peace

Ren

The Dedication: To The Renegade Sufi, The hardest rockin Sitar player I know, A man who has confronted and overcome more personal demons in his (slightly younger then mine) life then I ever want to face in my entire lifetime. A man who tolerates my irreverence about things I shouldn’t be irreverent about and a man who I’ve personally witnessed extending his time and compassionate attention to others in need… and (shameless plug)… a man who’s work will soon be available through Gravaton Music. This one was for Dawoud Kringle

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They are a grass roots level organization that (every four years since 1992) has been hosting (and funding) spiritual runs/walks designed to connect, concentrate, blend and re-scatter the cultural and spiritual energies of the indigenous peoples of the Americas all the way from

Chickaloon Alaska,
where the Athabascan people will start the Northern part of this years journey,
to South America’s southern most point at

Tierra del Fuego (land of fire)

Where, sadly most indigenous culture has been wiped out over the last 400 years.

Begining May 1, 2008, simultaneously from those two extremely distant points on the earth (close to the north and south arctic circles)… THEY, MOVE!… on foot… across the continents… with pure intent, from village to village, town to town, nation to nation, through hundreds of indigenous communities.

At the meeting points they share their respective spiritual practices, culture, ideas and ideals with each other and dialog on the issue of peace and dignity for Indigenous Peoples.

Afterwards, while some return to their communities, others (along with new “runners” from the receiving community) move forward and carry those prayers and conversations to the next communities until both the North and South hemisphere runners meet up with the Kuna people in

Panama City,

Panama, a symbolic center point joining the North and South American continents.

The Kuna then host the celebration joining the spiritual energies that came from the North and South that symbolizes ALL Indigenous Peoples joining to manifest the prophecy of the Eagle and Condor.

Each of the Peace and Dignity Journeys has had its own theme as follows:

• 1992 Dedicated to the Children
• 1996 Dedicated to the Elders
• 2000 Dedicated to the Famlies
• 2004 Dedicated to honor Women

The 2008 Journey is dedicated to honor, preserve, and protect our Sacred Sites and with that in mind, routes are being planed to intersect with as many indigenous Sacred sites as possible across the approximate 8 routes of the North American Portion of the Journey. There are two main routes (over 3,000 miles long) and six tributary routes (with the tributary routes eventually feeding into the main routes):

Main Routes

The West Coast Route will begin out of Alaska. Runners will run throughout the West Coast until reaching Panama. The Plains Route will also begin from Alaska. However, these runners will head south-east through Canada and enter the U.S. somewhere in the Plains (North Dakota or Minnesota). Then the runners will make their way to Colorado and New Mexico. The Plains Route will connect with the West Coast Route in Mexico, where they will merge and run together to Panama.

——Tributary Routes—–

New York Route—– (A new route being added this year scheduled for a June 2008 start ) This route will probably begin in northern New York State in the Oneida Nation and the runners will make their way south and or west until connecting with the Plains route in a location TBA.

The New York Crew are in the early planning and fund raising stage and… being acquainted with the run through them, I’ll do my best to pass along updated information about their progress (probably via the Spiritual And Social Activism Forum at the Gravaton Fun Forums.

The Trail of Tears Route*—–

*Marks the forced relocation of the Cherokee Nation in 1863.

Where this route will begin is still in the process of being organized. However, at this point it may begin in Tennessee and make its way to southern Illinois.

California Inland Route—–

This route will split form the West Coast Route and will head towards central California. From there it will head east into Arizona and will re-connect with the West Coast Route in Sonora, Mexico.

Tri-State Route—–

This route will also split form the West Coast Route in either Washington State or Oregon. These runners will run south east through Nevada and will run through northern Arizona and head south through eastern Arizona. This route will also re-connect with the West Coast route in Sonora, Mexico.

San Francisco Peaks Route——

There will be a group of runners that run from the San Francisco Peaks, Arizona and connect to the Tri-State Route.

There will be other tributary routes in the San Diego, California area and throughout Arizona.

All the above routes will link up and move on through Mexico and Central America towards spiritual fusion in Panama City approximately six months after the first runners started the Journey.

It should go without saying that an undertaking of this size can’t possibly come together without Money, Man/Woman power, Talent and Faith. The organization will accept any level of help offered and you can use the contact information below to find out how you can help.

Contact Information

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Peace and Dignity Journeys
c/o Tonatierra
PO Box 240009
Phoenix, AZ 85074
Tel: 602.254.5230
Fax: 602.252.6094
Emails:

info@peaceanddignityjourneys.com

lalunaxicana@yahoo.com

webmaster@peaceanddignityjourneys.com.

I feel privileged to have been told about this beautiful project and doubly privileged to have been blessed with the resources to tell you all about it. It’s tilted my awareness in a new direction and left me with a desire to be of service to other worthwhile causes. That desire will find its expression via the new Spiritual and Social Activism Forum at the Gravaton Fun Forums.

As Always,

Welcome To The Gravaton.

Peace

Ren

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Before the subject at hand, a bit of Gravaton business:

There are a new batch of Micro movie reviews (6 to be precise) at the Gravaton Fun Forums.

The Gravaton Art sites launch will be postponed until later 2008 in favor of getting the much delayed My Space page up and running. OK.. HERE WE GO

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Gays In The Military & Women In Combat (The REAL well reasoned reason why they’re a bad idea).

With a title like that let me immediately calm some ruffled feathers.

First: This article does not speak to the inherent suitability of women or homosexuals for various military roles, that is not the point and (to grossly oversimplify things) they can pull a trigger as well as anyone else.

Second: I am not a misogynist or anti equal rights in any way.

Third: I am not “homophobic”. Aside from the fact that that word actually means to be afraid of ones own sex (not to be afraid of homosexuals) , I’m not anti gay (and I realize that there are two types of gay: born gay and made gay by childhood abuse. In both cases, if the person is happy with themselves and does no harm, I have the same respect for them that I would have for any straight person who is also happy and harmless to others)

Fourth: (make no mistake) the ONLY reason Women are allowed in or near combat now and gays are remotely tolerated in the military has nothing to do with any laws or presidential orders… It has to do with a massive straight manpower shortage in an all volunteer system. Believe me, even with the present laws, if the military command structure didn’t want to tolerate either situation they have ample “extralegal” ways of assuring they wouldn’t have to.

Onward….

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The ability to reason, has long since been programmed out of the political left and right so no modern day political “leader” or military general is able to publicly address the issues at the title of this Blog.

For the right it’s now a question of Sin, Immorality and erosion of “traditional” values.

For the left it’s a question of “equal rights”, “tolerance” and discrimination.

I promise you , there has always been a sound well considered reason for experienced military leaders NOT wanting Gays in the military OR women anywhere near combat. If your either gay or a woman knowing that reason wouldn’t make it any less painful for you to be bared from combat (and thus from career advancement opportunities) or from serving (as openly gay) as the case may be but you’d be hard pressed to disagree with the real reason behind the military’s preference that you be subject to those restrictions. So… what’s the reason?

Continue Reading This Article »

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First, Gravaton Business:

Digital Life Winter Coverage is starting at the Fun Forums so go maximize your fun information intake at the Gravaton Fun Forums when your done here.

Also, Gravaton Mini Blog 16 touches on TEN TRILLION LOST DOLLARS (that’s 10,000 Billion or One Million… Million) Yikes!

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Ok, lets press forward
with a little music to set the tone

“When you come to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on.”

~Franklin D. Roosevelt

No one can truly be defined by their successes. There are two measures of a person, one being how you “succeed” in an endeavor and the other… THE MOST IMPORTANT ONE.. is how you persist in the face of what you perceive as “failure“.

If you are in active pursuit of your souls true calling, then all you need to do is keep on moving in that direction. “Success” or “failure” become unimportant (not that success isn’t desirable mind you but…). You will be happy. You will be defined and contented by your perseverance and that perseverance is the one thing that increases your chances of “success” more than any other quality you can imagine.

Paraphrasing Thomas Jefferson, Calvin Coolidge is credited with saying,

• “Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence.
• Talent will not; nothing in the world is more common than unsuccessful men with talent.
• Genius will not; unrewarded genius is a proverb.
• Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts.
• Persistence and determination (PERSEVERANCE) alone are omnipotent.”

To which I would add wealth will not, for some of the worlds wealthiest came from humble beginnings and lived to supersede powers rooted in generational (dynastic) wealth and…

Many religions deify individuals born to unremarkable circumstances millennia ago that to this day, still shake the foundations of great secular powers. Those deified individuals names are still with us today because in life, they persevered in faith with their beliefs and realized that…

The “destination” (whatever material or emotional endpoint you endeavor towards) is never the goal (that it’s sometimes mistaken as such is a cause of great suffering and confusion). The destination will ever be in the future while the goal… is ALWAYS in The Present. The “Goal”… is the UNDILUTED application of daily energy with faith, an open heart and a BALANCE of perspective that only comes when your taking care of the business at hand that should be tended to, today and there is ALWAYS something that needs doing TODAY.

Keep what you’ve read so far in mind and where others see dead ends, you’ll see opportunities to break through to new places. Where others see defeat, you’ll truly be grateful for what you learned on the latest go round (and then you‘ll go round again with new enthusiasm). Not a day will go by that you will feel dissatisfied when you understand the perspective that faithful perseverance IS your bliss, is… life’s only goal. Through it, possibilities and “discoveries” reveal themselves to us (sometimes sending us off in unimagined, even fun directions).

Sure , once in a while people get lucky or unlucky in their endeavors and the lucky ones are often over celebrated by those mass media types I often inveigh against but person for person, story for story, the foundation of any lasting “success” is the ability to quiet your Fears And Desires, focus on what you CAN do and then Stand Up and move with un-distracted purpose.

Looking good is easy when your winning. But after a fierce defeat, can you rise up and fight again? If… you can and… HOW YOU DO IT… will dictate your true worth and the universe (or your god) will apportion to you… in proportion to your sustained efforts… over time… if… your intent is true.

So I bid you, rise to your calling and advance! Never stop! Never surrender!

Welcome To The Gravaton.

Peace

Ren

You’ve just read an entry in The Gravaton Blog. To read more you can always return here as well as visit The Gravaton Mini Blog which will contain different (though sometimes related) content. Go see for yourself.

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Having just wrapped covering the Digital Life Show for the Gravaton Fun Forums and having just finished attending the AES (Audio Engineering Society) show (also covering it for the Fun Forums), I was struck by how well both events went . — Considering the scores of vendors, thousands of attendees, food services, security, electrical/audio/computer cabling, even the things you take for granted like clean floors, stocked toilets, temperature control and no doubt a few dozen other things I can’t think of right now. — All those separate groups of people, with different (sometimes even competing) goals, all coming together to accomplish tasks that would yield a set of shared benefits for all those participating (at whatever level). Those benefits often overlapped across many groups and none of the resultant benefits would have been possible if there was not an overt (or at least implicit) understanding of the shared overall goal and a common sustained effort to achieve said goal(s).

This put me to considering some of the great accomplishments my country (the USA) has achieved for itself during its short history as a civilization, none of which would have been possible without the national will and (often close) co-operation of its citizens.

Mind you some of those “accomplishments” had their dark sides, and sometimes caused some form of suffering but the same can be said for any society/civilization so to be clear, I’m not unaware of the totality of my countries negative history but that history, like any countries history, runs concurrent with it’s positive history and this Gravaton Blog needs to reference the positive side of things (why that is, will be obvious as this article unfolds).

In that “Luddite” (old school) time before people even had TVs (let alone cable and internet), if you were bored or lonely, you had to go out/reach out for some kind of group activity or meeting place and there was always (in any sized community/neighborhood) some kind of hang out place (be it a barber shop, town square, dinner, church, whatever) where people meet, talked, argued and otherwise exchanged views and in so doing built a sense of community and social consensus. Now that’s VERY IMPORTANT because that community was in a nation of other communities (and saw itself as such, right down to the people level) and… to have bonded thus with it (when you went out to engage it)… also carried the benefit of (by extension) bonding with the country at large in a way that no amount of watching CNN or playing endless hours of - insert whatever massively multilayer online game is popular at the moment - could ever accomplish.. If you live in the suburbs as you read this, its a safe bet you barely know anyone who lives more then one house away from you and chances are, you’ve never even broken bread together with the ones you do “know”. That (increasing pre-programmed social isolation) is not the way countries can sustain themselves.

Its in our basic design to commune with one another

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First: A bit of Gravaton business:

The second set of tracks is up at the Gravaton Music Site and it concludes the first release, “The Message” which can be downloaded for just $7.99. Ok shameless plug out of the way.

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Now on to that hard science
Its all well and good to espouse warm fuzzy philosophies but you’re just expected to take all that talk on Faith. Since being compassionate, is way harder then it sounds its easy to brush all the lovey dovey-isms aside (especially if your not spiritual or religious by nature). So herewith, I’ll appeal to your secular, logical side. Lets take a bit of Cosmology (the study of the cosmos) and a dab of Quantum Mechanics (which includes the study of the very very small) and see if we cant find some concrete reasons why we all might want to ( in the words of the fictional Bill and Ted) “be excellent to one another”.

The Cosmological Constants

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First, know this: All the matter and energy in our universe is finite and constant… ALL.. of the everything… that was in the post Singularity Planck unit (reeeealy tiny) size of the expanding Big Bang (many billions of years ago) is all that there is today and… all… that there ever will be.

The energy that forms, animates (and propels) the matter that is you and everything you can (and can’t) perceive, is as old as time and is still fueling the ever accelerating cosmic expansion. When your done with your share of it, long after everything that moves around you has (as far as you might perceive) stopped moving, all that energy will still be there… transformed, relocated or dormant (locked away in matter) as potential energy, but still there (as it was in the beginning ), until the end of time (which is unlikely to ever come).

We (and our present state of space time) are just the latest localized coalescing of that constantly present, undying energy (the over all concept is known as “The Conservation Of Energy”).

So in the preceding context… what are you (and all those souls around you) and why should you bother to even be nice (let alone full on compassionate)? We’ll get there, read on.

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Our common consciousness. (Religion and faith and respect)…

A dear friend of mine who’s always on the look out for alternative media documentaries and other Fringe Element type stuff, told me about a small independent documentary making the rounds on Google and Yahoo video called Zeitgeist. I confess that once I got through the needlessly long introduction (featuring negative and depressing imagery)… I was only able to sit thought half the film… I’d stopped watching, once it became apparent to me it was a (perhaps unintentional) selective re-presentation of ideas and research I’d first become aware of in the work of the scholarly, brilliant and late Joseph Campbell.

I also became somewhat offended by the films (In my opinion) thinly veiled anti Christian bias. Mr. Campbell’s work (unlike the film I took offense to) deals with the shared mythological roots contained in virtually all religions (including Judaism, Islam and Buddhism as well as Christianity and other religions and does so because it espouses the idea that we all have a shared common conscience and common consciousness and that is why we all draw from the same pool of mythological wisdom in order to teach ourselves the moral concepts we must use as the bedrock of any society.

Mind you…though raised Catholic, I’m not a practicing Christian nor am I devout believer in the mythology of my baptized faith… however… I value… the value… of FAITH and unlike Campbell’s work (which celebrates that shared pool of mythological and symbolic wisdom from which many of the worlds ancient and modern religions base their beliefs) The afforementioned “Zeitgeist” seemed to me to be more concerned with the deconstruction of Christianity for its own sake (and mind you it could have used the same research sources and found material to de-construct any of the worlds major religions). But I digress. The film did lead me to consider just how much mainstream and alternative media tries to discredit religion, people of faith and even the concept of faith in general. Which leads me to wonder….

Why do certain people (those people being the gatekeepers and purveyors of media) seem to have such an interest in downplaying, marginalizing, caricaturing, distorting and otherwise overtly and subversively trying to remove from society… a moral and ethical center? (Stress on CENTER for I’m not writing this Blog as a right wing religious zealot. If you’ve read this or the Gravaton Mini Blog at the Fun Forums you know that by now). So lets explore the question I just posed.

First, since its feared, discredited, ignored and publicly vilified in media so much, lets find some religion!

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