The Old Guitarist, from Piscasso’s Blue period collection 1903-1904

I was taught that mentally forcing myself to make more carefully calculated decisions on pressing issues as opposed to making a decision through a reaction under the influence of negative or positive momentary emotional burdens was unarguably a crucially important skill in the development of my character in this material world. I thought that not giving into the temptation of instantly reacting was a masculine virtue, instead of constantly following my gut instincts similar to that of a cro-magnon man. In situations where I deeply felt that my mind had to react, I quickly engaged an inner voice to artificially tell me to give it a day or two and “sleep on it” in order to make a fully thoughtful decision devoid of the heated emotion I was in at that specific moment. I would be orchestrating my life based on processed and verified data, using the passing of time as an undisputable ally along the way. It was made clear through the more experienced colleagues ahead of me in the game of life that this was the right mindset to adopt for a man desiring to progress. However, later, as I contemplated more and more on this mental approach, I realized that; to artificially degrade the mind into an emotionless computer like state that thinks mainly about taking the right actions, which would directly or indirectly promote self-interests was a fallacy. In a way it was like having a full grip on the puppet strings of a puppet who I was assuming was the person I was dealing with which later I realized was my authentic self, desperately pleading to reemerge. As I got older, constantly monitoring my thoughts to keep them in line with my self-interests just seemed to me as a different type of an Orwellian approach to life. This time Big Brother wasn’t a dystopian character in a fictional book in the year 1984, but It was me, being the Big brother by constantly monitoring my inner dialogue, making sure it was in line with the interests of Oceania (Self Interests of power and wealth within this made up material world).

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Compared to past generations in history, the world is experiencing an unprecedented amount of materialism. Most other virtues of life have been over shadowed by this phenomenon, which was developed by the baby boomer generation, and later picked up by the millennials. These materialist trends were accelerated via social media and the success gurus within it.
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Raul Conestro oil painting

I’m convinced that the single biggest weakness of the human animal is his “ego”.

History and our daily lives are full of examples where ego’s stood and continue to stand in the way of progress and achievement. Continue reading →

Pablo Picasso 1905, family of  Saltimbanques

I understand and fully accept the unspoken fact that everyone thinks that they are the “chosen one”. I think it is a natural and instinctual behavior to be selfish deep inside. It’s an indispensable and immutable component of our survival instincts. But this does not mean that we must constantly display it to everyone with all of its nudity. Human beings are also social animals with cultures and customs which do not appreciate fully exposed individual selfish intents. This is derived from the fact that a tribe’s survival and well being has always been more important than any individual’s self interests within that tribe. Hence we have called people who don’t understand and comply with these collective values ‘selfish’ and those who understand them ‘generous’.  Continue reading →

Zoom in Detail of an oil Painting depicting Benjamin Franklin done by Benjamin West in 1816

My Note: Benjamin Franklin, A man of accomplishment who has made many discoveries and inventions along with an astonishing political career. He achieved all of this without a formal university education, today we see an image of him on the front of a 100 dollar bill, perhaps the single biggest connotation for material success which we are reminded on a daily basis

Since I was young I always had a mindful way of living which forced me to question “why?” repeatedly on certain issues in life until i got something close to an acceptable answer in relationship with nature. I have never had doubts on the fact that human beings are related to animals. And I honestly think that we should not be ashamed of being sophisticated animals, it’s just ok. We sleep, eat, defecate and fornicate like them, so any man with reason and an above average IQ would be tempted by the idea that we must have some sort of a kinship with them. A premise, which Darwin and many other men of thought sought to scrutinize.  Continue reading →

The mind is no different than a vessel within the Bosphorus.

When we are young our minds are similar to that of a speed boat, it is agile and it easily maneuvers itself to different directions as it wishes. But as we age our frames of the world turn more into massive tankers of slow speed, which possess in it the heavy weights of experience and engraved belief systems acquired through many decades. In order to change its direction a tanker needs a long time and a good distance, which the Bosphorus does not provide due to its narrow and meandering nature.  Continue reading →