U-Turn

Great (non-fiction) book I finished reading:

"U-Turn: What if you woke up one morning and realized you were living the wrong life?" by Bruce Grierson"

several items I marked for remembering, given the context of the political discord and state of the world we're in today:

p.278 " Change, in other words, is not efficiently brought about by force or even direct lobbying; its better kindled by the creation of an oppositional force around which resistance can galvanize. A band of teetotalers singing the virtures of sobriety will have less impact than a wave of dangerous reprobate drunks"... hence my recent political awakening inspired by the dangerous reprobate activities of the BushCo Administration. I think a lot of people really started go beyond just "paying attention" to the news, only with the shock of the Abu Ghraib photos.

p.203 on the contradictions of living with " authenticity" and "honesty":... " is it more honest to be faithful to your old vision of the world -of who you used to be -or to be faithful to human nature?...

"Modern life is just too full of contradictions for people to claim their behavior is always in line with their ethical aims, "says the University of Toronto cognitive scientist Keith Stanovich. We all wrestle, more or less contstantly, to reconcile the two. But-and here is the big, heartening point -we don't have to succeed in aligning them to be ethical human beings. We can live with a certain amount of hypocrisy, as long as we've thought the issue out thoroughly. ( The irony is that it's those folks who are struggling with moral questions at the highest level, constantly subjecting their thoughts to scrutiny and reevaluation, who tend to be he ones accused of hypocrisy. " Those who are frankly self-serving but consistent", Stanovich notes, "escape the charge entirely." )

I think this applies perfectly to "bitter-gate" this week and all the crap in the debate yesterday. Ugh.

p.281 "There is a familiar notion, particularly among followers of Eastern philosophies, that a collective awakening is the result of a growing number of individual awakenings. This is the proverbial "cool revolution," a proactive mass movement that kindles change subtly, gradually, and peacefully. No single charismatic leader drives the agenda. "When people have transformed their minds, they will natrually transform the society," says Robert Thurman. THe dynamic is the opposite of the lonely crowd: Think of it as the collective individual."

p.283 resonating.... " " The way to feel virtuous in America today, to feel assurance that we're 'okay', is through material wealth," Jerome Kagan told me. " The income gap leaves too many people feeling they have a damaged or compromised sense of their worth. So how do you reassure yourself that you're 'good'? By becoming religious. And it works. It works. I happen to know very well two brothers. One brother is very successful in the secular world; and the other isn't. And dit bugged that second brother. And he suddenly turned religious. It was his way of saying, you see, actually I win, because I'm more moral."

But religion isn't the only way for those left behind in the materialism game - or, more to the point for the typical U-turner, disillusioned by it --to express their "goodness". A commitment to some social-welfare issue may work just as well.

p.286 " In other words, it's not about who's involved or what the catalyst is: If the conditions are right -politically, socially, culturally -ideas that capture the moment will spread. The pressure of events cannot, beyond a certain critical point, be contained"

Lots of big ideas here to contemplate.