Convivial Me

Perpetual Optimist; Prone to bouts of Melancholy

[convivialbob]

Fear

Understand your fear. Understand that it's not fear but preparation. Your body is governed by nature, by genetically directed conditioning. The problem with you is that you have spent your whole life believing it's fear. It's not fear, its conditioning. Whatever it is you are facing, you don't need to be ready for it; it needs to be ready for You.

[sandandglass]

The United States House of Representatives Committee on Science, Space and Technology.

[convivialbob]

Yep

[convivialbob]

A man that makes me laugh, just made me smile.

[evolution-of-consciousness]

Ohm

[convivialbob]

This time last year when we sailed all the way to a dance contest... #ohhhsailor #bestival

[convivialbob]

Socially unsociable...

I am easily confused. Mostly with the constantly updated and frequently misguided political views of my social feeds. Not to mention the uneducated barrage on my ear drums by the under-informed and over opinionated bigots that I share public transport with, it’s no wonder there seems to be a constant feeling of an imminent uprising at any moment; anywhere in the World, but what’s the cause of it? What was the catalyst that started this mock awareness of our impending doom? Well…there isn’t one.

The problem has always been there. Always. It’s just that now YOU know about it.

I have heard it argued that the new millennium has brought with it a whole new kind of anger and that “Soon there will be a revolution!”. Maybe, but why now? What changed so dramatically in the the last 15 years that could warrant such a dynamic shift in public opinion and allow such a devastating public attack on our so-called ‘Global’ peace in September of only it’s 2nd year?

One word: Information.

Easily accessible, open source, un-filtered, information.

The 90’s heralded some of the worst humanitarian acts seen in the previous 4 decades. The internal bitterness of the Yugoslav Wars made the evening news but only because of the presence of troops from the UK. Rwanda’s genocide in which an unfathomable amount of Tutsi and moderate Hutu ( 500,000 – 1,000,000 during the 100-day period from April 7, 1994 to mid-July of that same year, which constituted for as much as 20% of the country’s total population. An average of 10,000 murders a day with 20,000 men, women and children being hacked to death during one period of darkness alone) barely made the side columns of the nations favourite newspaper. Somewhere sandwiched between a Page 3 girl and Eric Cantona improving his chances of joining Cobra Kai with his aerial antics away to Crystal Palace. The major difference between then and now is that we no longer have to rely on the biased producers of News at Ten or the ethical standpoint of our daily fire starter, because we can now find out a number of different points of view from a number of different sources, allowing us to formulate our own opinion…all with help of one digital Highway.

But here’s the kicker for me…

What do we choose to do with this gateway to unlimited knowledge? Nothing. We remain soaking in the stagnant waters of one sided information delivered to us by the same tired news mediums we have looked at for the last…well…god knows how long because we, by our very nature, hate change. Unless that change is the giant leap from Newspaper to App. This is not me climbing into the pulpit and preaching about why “you shouldn’t be using the internet to look at cats, ice-bucket fails or people falling on their faces” because you should!! That shit is hilarious! My point is that your same old regurgitated political opinions should be, as Tim Minchin says ‘regularly taken out onto the balcony, and hit with a cricket bat’. When you hear someone talking of the problems with immigration, the failures of the Government, and the inner turmoil faced by foreign countries; do me a favour and do a little research.

Telling me that Israel is evil for what they are doing, because you read it in The Sun (I’m not saying that what they have done isn’t evil because 100 children killed or injured during shelling in July 2014 is horrific) but Hamas’ motto is roughly translated as ‘We want death as much as Israel wants peace’…and don’t say that you support them, a Muslim Group, but in the next breath put on your Hitler Youth boots and tell me the real way the government should be handling the ISIS/IS situation. Your oxymoronic moral stance makes me dizzy.

…but I digress…

It is no coincidence that people’s swing in attitudes and awareness has changed in this new millennium, proportionally, alongside the improvements to the internet and technology as a whole. Where as before there was news at a set time on one of 4 channels (yeah I grew up with 4 channels till I was 12 and it was kind of awesome) now we have 24 hr news stations and YouTube video clips uploaded by real people with real opinions who get to places with their smartphones that Western reporters could only previously dream of. Large political movements are organised by Facebook, Twitter starts trends that brings awareness to just causes, whilst injustice is met with the instant Global attention it deserves. There is no hiding Mr US police officer that strangled an unarmed man to death. There is no covering up your relentless lubido Mr. Berlusconi. No acting away your true racial views, pretty much every member of the British National Party.

My point is this…the internet is amazing.

The internet is here for you to watch funny videos, find old friends and stalk their Facebook. The internet is there so that you can realise that somewhere in the World there are people that think the same way that you do. A place for you to converse with these people and exchange ideas, and as long as you are not encroaching on other peoples social liberties or privacy as well as respecting that wrong is still wrong even in the digital World, then why not go on a couch vacation to the other side of the Globe. So why not use your modem as a capsule of escapism that transcends the ideas of those in your immediate social circle? But allow yourself to be open to new ideas and new ways to think and look at the problems of the World.

Who knows, maybe you will find and swallow your very own Red Pill.

[digg]

Azuma Makoto sends flowers to space in his latest installation piece, Exobiotanica.

[convivialbob]

Our revels now are ended. These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits, and Are melted into air, into thin air: And like the baseless fabric of this vision, The cloud-capp'd tow'rs, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff As dreams are made on; and our little life Is rounded with a sleep.

Prospero. The Tempest Act 4, scene 1, 148–158

[convivialbob]

livelearnevolve’s photo on Instagram instagram.com

Doctor Martin

[staceythinx]

Illuminated nights captured by Roberto Bertero

[convivialbob]

Summer is my favourite part of the year, no question

[upworthy]

The Simple Truth Of John Lennon’s Classic ‘Imagine,’ Illustrated And In Color

[convivialbob]

People being Awesome People

[convivialbob]

Don’t aim at success—the more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one’s dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself. Happiness must happen, and the same holds for success: you have to let it happen by not caring about it. I want you to listen to what your conscience commands you to do and go on to carry it out to the best of your knowledge. Then you will live to see that in the long run...success will follow you precisely because you had forgotten to think of it.

Viktor Frankl

[convivialbob]

Those who were seen dancing were called insane by those who could not hear the music

Friedrich Nietzsche

[convivialbob]

Life should be lived to the point of tears

Albert Camus

[convivialbob]