Some housekeeping, clarity searching, brain dribble, transparency, promotion and a call for information!
This article serves multiple functions; clarifying my own thoughts surrounding donations derived from a recent experience with a promotion, attempting to be completely transparent with my audience about my intentions, further promotion of a good cause and a call out for information! I know many of you will be happy to hear this is under half the length of my last two pieces and with a slightly different flavour, as I explore my own predispositions amongst other things.
Is talking publicly about donations taboo? Now maybe I’m totally off the ball here and I hope that this isn’t me playing some weird mental game with myself as a technique to justify my own actions, however, having recently made a significant investment to a project I wanted to both support and capitalise on as an advertising tool I have been very two sided about whether I believe this is morally right, wrong or a total non-issue. Therefore, I wanted to honestly spell out my thoughts and intentions on the issue. Should I think I feel guilty about publicising this donation because it looks like I’m doing so to further my own ego and I quite possibly could be; however, this could be a case of completely over-thinking and there’s nothing wrong with it at all.
What I actually did was invest some money buying some t-shirts for a project called plogolution. They are doing amazing work, setting up meetings around the UK (primarily London) and going into schools – in attempt to get both children and adults to go out and collect rubbish in their local area (and there doing quite a successful job of it!). I chose them because their cause is pure, true, has amazing benefits to the environment and brings the community together, I love it. However, I can also see how brilliant it is and I expect them to become very popular and therefore by buying them t-shirts with their logo accompanied by website links to my projects as well – it would hopefully gain some traffic towards the websites and social media accounts I have directed them to. There is a positive effect on both parties and I’m doing nothing wrong by drawing further attention to this by showing it on social media.
I want to be honest to myself and the public to the fact that I am not just skipping around giving money to charity causes, there was multiple incentives, one of which being It was done with the intention to benefit me as well. I already feel a lot better by airing this thought and would be extremely interested to hear others opinion on it! From there I can then take further action if necessary. I’m squirting these thoughts straight out onto the page and will likely upload them this way but am interested to see what others think? Am I right in feeling guilty about this, or is that ridiculous, or in fact is there some deeper dogma around talking about donations in which I should pursue and investigate – if you deem it interesting enough!
Side note time…I have often thought that if we choose to distribute our disposable income towards more positive projects in our communities and across the globe oppose to excess cloths, newer cars and other materialist items it would shift the way the world views production. The great capitalistic machine that runs our society would find its attention surely shifting towards companies who are doing great things as that is where people are putting their money! We could direct the paths that old and new companies take but to do so the vast majority would have to be willing to put their money in the right place, something people may be reluctant to do, may not have the privilege to do and something that may not be so easy to identify! I do think there is a shift towards this type of economy already and I think the answer to a lot of global environmental problems may lie within it! I shall explore the idea of targeting our purchasing power and ideas such as gift economies in another article!
If anyone has any links to content regarding anything mentioned above – I would be grateful for it being sent my way. Thanks.
Advertising logo for the other project in question.
You only have one life and it’s one continuous moment, one continuous feeling, one continuous presence in which every human being, animal, plant, and atom experiences simultaneously, until it stops. At what point each of those experiences stop in terms of consciousness is yet to be discovered by science, religion or conspiracy and is overlooked daily by the vast majority. I believe that having a good understanding of each of these possibilities is a good basis as to become a grounded human being. Being able to understand other people’s beliefs and perspectives and how they were formed allows you to act non-judgmentally knowing that there isn’t an answer to many of the great questions of life. This can then by-pass conflict and allow constructive conversations to take place regarding the issues at hand.
The fact we don’t know should scare and excite you. Every second of your existence be it as a single mind or a great collective consciousness passes just as the next one arises. It is this belief that fuels me to embrace every second, finding the silver lining in the worst moments and maximising the potential of the so called “dull” moments. Being present is the only way to truly do this and this idea has been supported by many of the key figures and ideologies which I have begun to study. To see the life in the faces of individuals and to feel every sensation that our body experiences. I’m pretty shite at doing this and can only maintain this level of presence for a few precious seconds at a time before my mind begins to flood with crazy ego driven desires and projections of negative situations. It’s this incessant brain waffle which screws us as humans; our values and our mental well-being. We either want something more or become unhappy with the way things are, we produce positive scenarios in our heads that can never be achieved or we create terrifying outcomes that hold us back, basically we become unhappy as we try to control that, that cannot be controlled. The rate and potency at which the realisation that we are not as aware as we believe we are differs between individuals. Going completely unnoticed for some masked by the flood of distractions provided for us by the modern world.
A little hard hitting I know but I hope introducing these ideas slowly will stop them becoming overwhelming and instead allow for a fresh outlook to form. For many this is old news but you are not the voice in your head! I will explore that concept in more detail at a later date but for now I don’t want to scare friends off with the so called “hippie bullshit” just yet.
I will explore that concept in more detail at a later date but for now I don’t want to scare friends off with the so called “hippie bullshit” just yet.
A recent series of drug induced psychotic episodes combined with the deflating realisation that making money and achieving ego fuelled goals doesn’t make you happy and, in my experience, never truly will as we attempted to tick off a box on our never-ending shopping lists. This began a progressive change in my outlook and combining this with my previously misguided lust for life has helped me to generate this new-found love for knowledge. As a 20-year-old male from Kent I have been surrounded by materialism, individualism and egoic ideals my whole life, and although I still believe materialism, individualism and the ego do have a place in society, I don’t believe it should be the main focus for mankind and as these concepts grow, they have devastating repercussions to individuals, the earth and all that inhabits it. When material possessions take priority over basic human concepts such as love it becomes clear there is an underlying problem. I have been lucky enough to be raised in healthy living conditions and environments, having received the perfect mix of the two combined with the scenarios I have been through and the choices I have made have eventually led me to grow and have allowed me to see through the fog I was previously living in, setting me off on a new path to make better choices. I have personally experienced the differences in lifestyles and I cannot see why anyone would healthily choose to go back after making this conversion. Family, friends and strangers have commented on this and although my choices have improved and my outlook streamlined, many of my actions are still dreadfully incorrect and will require far greater levels of scrutiny. The fact I am beginning to understand this and am becoming aware of my own faults is the most important first step for me. This idea has been relayed heavily by many key philosophers and religious figures across the globe and throughout history.
The population of aware intelligent human beings or at least that I have personally encountered is very small. We are very fucking stupid; the vast majority of human beings continuing to blindly follow the patterns laid out for them by the previous generation of people who didn’t understand how to live a truly meaningful life – the evidence of which surrounds us. I am certainly no way near living such a life myself but laughably four books down and over 50 hours in podcast later I’m feeling a lot better about what is really important. So, in attempt to motivate myself to think, read and write, I shall begin using a blog to write articles and to attempt to share the most important sections of what I’m choosing to study. I want to begin relaying information from books & podcasts, key characters & statistics, ideologies, religions and politics publicly, with an open honest mind as truthfully as I can. This should motivate me to write and help to clarify my own ideas whilst simultaneously opening them up to criticism and allowing further discussion to take place. This is the path that I believe the rest of my blog will follow, hopefully being directional, semi-entertaining and informative as it unfolds. If I can inspire a few individuals to follow this path or begin upon their own journey of discovery then that’s a bonus. It is my current belief that it is only through the honest interactions of individuals and the successful communication of ideas between them that positive change can happen in this world. This belief has been derived from many of the significant figures who’s works and reputations, past and present speaks for themselves.
There’s no doubt that the frequency of interesting thought-provoking conversations being had between young people is increasing, from my own experience I’m finding the nature of many of my discussions be it at work, travelling or outside a pub at 4am turning into questions of politics, spirit and the future and I’m not always the advocate of these kinds of topics. There’s an unavoidable depth in the youth of today, most likely down to the crazy political landscape we live in; with the environment being an example of an unignorable topic moving to the forefront of discussion.
My sister (aged 15) recently said to me that “all adults
seem unhappy, everyone seems unhappy but you’re like the happiest adult I know
and I feel like I have a good chance at being happy as an adult because you’re
my brother”, now I didn’t just wham that in there to make me look good, well
that wasn’t my main intention. The fact is I’m not even as happy as I could be,
I’m aware of that, in fact I’m a miserable fuck most of the time, so how
fucking sad are we all? Whether my so-called happiness is due to my own youth
having not yet faced the tests of time, I don’t know but I truly think that as
we evaluate our own behaviours and increase our understanding of the world in
the right way, we can learn to live happily amongst one and other; humbled and
exhilarated by the great expanse of the unknown.
To make all my true motivations clear I will be fighting
myself with all my might to not make money and personal gain the primary focus
of my writing although making an extra penny would of course be a new-found
dream come true! Sharing my opinion publicly on the facts and theories of all
the great minds and texts that continue to expand my consciousness both thrills
and terrifies me but I cannot help but think about it and therefore I’m going
to run with it for a while. I am no newbie when it comes to trial and error and
having attempted different business ideas and so-called social media quests
which have succeeded, failed and dwindled out. I’m giving this a shot but with
learning at the heart of this endeavour it seems it cannot fail to be at the
least personally beneficial. Welcome to my learning blog.
Second from the right, my scruffy little face, hopefully creating a sense of the person of whom this is coming from :), not the guy who’s been invited to try clay pigeon shooting; in case that was to becomes an issue for someone – but the human.
Side note… Although I’m not hiding my identity, I’m using the name alias “enable new minds” to allow me to use different social media platforms whilst maintaining separation between my writing and my personal life. It’s quite a cool name which kind of concludes the aims of my own personal education although it does act as if I’m already some kind of important writing body or organisation of which I am not.
In attempt to gain headway with my writing I’ll be shamelessly promoting this across social media and I hope that anyone who at the least has found this vaguely interesting could do the same and show their support. I consider this compulsory of my close friends and family and I welcome constructive feedback from anyone be it through private messaging or below if I can generate a comments section. Any support and/or insight would really mean a lot, helping me to develop further and gauge how this has been received. Much love.
Enable New Minds 