Love Doesn't Wait for Agreement

       Love has a mystical, transforming power. It takes the sting out of Life. While we are 'waiting for the other shoe to drop' love can come along and remind us that it doesn't have to be that way, if we are open to that possibility. Are we? Doesn't optimism open doors, while pessimism is afraid for what may be there if we do?
       It is such an easy thing to become so invested in the business of self protection and preservation that we become callous to the soft, subtle alchemical energy. In order for it to flow it has to be allowed to do so. It will not force it's way in. It is against it's nature.
       In human relationships we don't get that far without this quality of energy. When there is a problem we would be hard pressed to prove that it doesn't have to do with this issue in one or another of it's facets. Love necessitates a healthy respect for others (which means ourselves also) as well as the practice of self questioning and inquiry. I think that love engenders our own ability to question ourselves and thus to get a little closer to being able to slip our foot into the other person's slipper for just a bit. This is just long enough to make all the difference between an outcome of peace or one of continuing conflict. It's not about agreement , but rather respecting different perspectives.
       Love is not about agreement, but respect, flexibility, and compassion for the many views that make up our combined experience. Waiting for agreement or understanding on the part of others to reach a certain pitch is just playing the waiting game.

Age comes naturally. You have to work for Wisdom.

Heart Communication Between Relations: A Golden Highway

Sometimes the spirit in which we give something is not the spirit in which it is percieved or recieved. This can complicate matters when there is no real dialogue. Time and time again matters of human nature seem to come back to one basic human to human action that either happens or doesn't---actual communication--communion.
     When enacted with love and respect this simple activity can work Miracles on events and relationships. It is not always easy, as the 'real deal' requires respect, love, equality, care, and the dropping of the fascade that we so often wear out of self preservation. It can be difficult to do this without the ego tagging along. If the ego succeeds in being present in one of it's many chameleonized forms then our success may only be skin deep and short lived.
     Real communication starts in the Heart and works outward. It can be hard to get there, but Miracles can occur when we do.

 Age comes naturally. You have to work for Wisdom.

Little Ones in Big Peoples' Clothes

The needs that the Little Ones have are the Needs that We All Have. They have not been overlayed by conditioning to supress their expressions of need. They Teach a lot about the Nature of Human Beingness. These are things that we, as 'adults' have long since forgotten in order to survive in an 'adult world'. Their basic needs are sparkling on their surface. Ours are still there, however we are forced to use a more subtle strategy in fulfilling them---subtle, under current manipulations of the social strata. There is really no other way, it seems, as it would be too shocking and seemingly overt to put all this on the surface. We must have a working fascade of some kind just to get along from day to day.
    To love each other as tender hearted children seems to be a very good way to be if we can keep the truth in focus despite the illusion of appearances. The truth is still there lying beneath it all regardless of what we may say publicly. Everybody wants to be loved and accepted, nurtured and cared for, included and needed. The Golden Rule is Still Golden and Untarnished after all these years. The words of the apostle still ring True, "....Faith, Hope, and Love, but the Greatest of these is Love."
    We are all little grandchildren in the Eyes of the Great Spirit no matter how 'old' we consider ourselves. Do we have the Courage to Be as Ungarded, Open and Vulnerable as the Little Teachers running around at our feet Shining this Truth to us?

 Age comes naturally. You have to work for Wisdom.

My Course in Insanity

I used to think that I was a normal, relatively sane adult male. That's insane. The fact that I thought that I had figured out much in the way of life's workings was a terribly biased view of life.
  Nothing is ever the same once you have a child, for this rose colored film of naivete is wiped away with the grace of a high speed windshield wiper blade. It was once there, but is no longer and you cannot account for where it went. It's like waking up from a free falling dream by violently jolting yourself awake upon your bed. One minute you're in dremland, the next you're not.
   The development of patience, although always considered a virtue, is now a survival tool without which I would willingly go sign in at MHMR. Yeah, so I've had a real personal incentive plan going for the proactive development of patience. Not that that's Always enough, but it helps.
   I had always thought that I had somehow avoided the 'crazy' gene that seems to get passed out now and again in that long line at the genetic checkout counter, but I'm certainly not taking that for granted anymore. Laugh if you must, I would be if I were you.
   Ahhh....Hhhmm. The School of Parental Hard Knocks. Maybe I could develop a program. Yeah, well once I graduate I mean. Haha.

  

 Age comes naturally. You have to work for Wisdom.

Very Funny Take on Palm Pre Advertizing

Via: The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs

   Funny. Enjoy....


And another thing about Palm running ads about us

Listen up, Palm marketing people. If you've just launched your big breakthrough product, and the only way you can explain that product to people is to run ads comparing it to another product -- well, you've pretty much already lost, haven't you?

I mean it's marketing 101. Do you remember what the ads for the original iPhone looked like? You remember seeing anything in those ads about the BlackBerry or the Treo? No. It was a whole new thing -- 
sui generis
, as the French say. It had to be. If all we could do was to make a slightly less shitty BlackBerry, and offer it for a few bucks less than what RIM was charging, we would not have bothered to make the product. Honest.

I'll let you in on a little secret about Palm's real weakness. Palm got a lot of credit for hiring Ruby and other Apple people, like it was some big coup to steal them away. But the truth is this was the worst thing they could do. You know why? Because they're Apple people. They can only think like Apple people. Which means they're going to make Apple products -- or actually Apple clones. And yeah, maybe in some small ways their products will have an edge. Maybe for some brief period of time they'll have some feature that we don't have. But they're clones. The proof of that is right there in their own ads -- the ads that are all about us, and which only help boost our business.

Because the fact is, nobody wants a wannabe Apple. Or a clone Apple. They want a real Apple. Duh, Palm. Duh. But thanks for the free advertising.

Posted by Steve 

at 11:27 AM View CommentsLinks to this post 

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There will be blood


Well the good folks at Palm have decided it wasn't enough to steal our ideas -- now they want to steal our customers too. Which is funny, because for the past two years they've been going around saying that they weren't trying to compete with Apple. Nope, not all. Nothing to do with Apple. Why, their target audience was completely different. Palm wasn't going after iPhone users, they were going after all those people who are using feature phones and haven't yet migrated to the broad, sunlit uplands of the smartphone. Hacks would try to cast this as a "Palm v. Apple" showdown, and the Palm folks would chide them and say they really didn't want to talk about Apple, and they really wished people would stop viewing it that way. Remember all that happy horseshit from Ruby and McNamee? And now, gosh and golly, they're running ads telling early iPhone adopters that they should switch when their two-year contracts run out. Well at least they're now telling the truth. 

A few thoughts on this.

1. If this really is your business plan -- if you figure you can build a company by winning over some tiny percentage of iPhone users who are unhappy enough to switch -- well, I pray for your souls. 

2. Your big point of differentiation is price. You're claiming to be $50 per month cheaper. That's an exaggeration, but let's assume for the sake of argument it's true. Let's think about this. You're trying to lure away Apple users by offering them lower prices. But as you must know, since so many of you used to work at Apple, our users aren't attracted by low prices. In fact, they're put off by them. They don't want cheap. They want premium. They want to pay more than everyone else. It makes them feel special. To put this another way: They don't care if the 2010 Camaro SS can outrun a Mercedes SL550 and costs $30,000 instead of $100,000. They want the Merc. Did you frigtards not learn anything during your time working for me?

3. You're running ads about feeds and speeds (better browser, true multitasking) but the market has moved past that, and the key thing now comes down to "developers, developers, developers," as my good friend Steve Ballmer once said. The iPhone is our castle, but the App Store is our moat. You've got -- what? Thirty apps? Fifty? We add more than that every hour.

But hey. Maybe you'll lure away some of our developers. Maybe you'll lure away some customers too. So this is your business plan: You're going to set up a Camaro car lot across the street from the Mercedes dealer, and put up some bright balloons and streamers and maybe some huge signs about how your cuh-raaaazy prices can't be beat! Oh, and maybe some kind of big inflatable dog or something. And a bouncy castle for the kids! Free hot dogs! Girls with big hair, wearing shiny shorts and tiny T-shirts! A year's worth of free gas!

Sent from my iPhone