Love2live2learn

Love2Live2Learn, Learn2Love2Live Together

The Human Experience   The Great Experiment

Commentary:  By Darric May

A challenge to the individual readers and the world at large.  The Challenge is in understanding the current times that we are in.  This will require knowledge and understanding of our past so that we may direct our future.  Let us come to a full understanding of the fullness of our current condition so that we may embrace the Human experience in its wholeness.  The hope is that we realize that man is ready to move forward out of his cocoon and transform into a new creation.  But the new creation requires new thoughts, mental expansion beyond the known familiar territory into the unknown out of your comfort zone.  New ways of being and doing.  The old ways must be shed for they are no longer beneficial, In fact they act as restrictive boundaries cutting off the creative flow of source.

Convergence

Love2Live2Learn, Learn2Love2Live Together

The Human Experience The Great Experiment

 

Our current condition in the world we are witness to wars, famines, Global warming, genocides, these are viewed as birthing pains of the new creation. The ways of old replaced with the ways of new.  Walk with me as we share ideas and thoughts  on how we can actively come together as a people.  We invite you to take part in the first interactive novel.

Learn to love to live together the first interactive novel invites you to engage, to interact by sharing your views in what  you envision a utopian society looks like.  What are the obstacles in place that stop us from coming together.  Join me in the Global think tank  where we can capture and formulate what the people visualize the perfect world would look like.  We then share amongst each other and work cooperatively to bring it about.

https://learn2love2live.com/global-think-tank/

Book update

Love2Live2Learn, Learn2Love2Live Together

The Human Experience The Great Experiment

 

So I have struggled to stay on track, coming to a  realization how broad a topic this subject covers. To be quite honest it has at times presented itself as an obstacle causing some delay.  Although I have had plenty of time and opportunity to write the topic is vast and complex requiring study and research.  But atlas I am back on track and pushing through with discipline and perseverance.

A lot of followers have been asking when will the book be completed, are you still working on it, rest assured you will find that I am and will be sharing some of the material within the blog post, I would urge you to take part and share your ideas on the topic within the Global think tank

 

 

learn2love2live0_cover

 

Global Think Tank

WEDNESDAYS IN MISSISSIPPI:

WEDNESDAYS IN MISSISSIPPI: The real housewives of Jackson Mississippi

This Op-ed was written by Marlene McCurtis & Cathee Weiss, producers of the Wednesdays In Mississippi Documentarty Film.

There been a lot of buzz recently about (the book and movie) The Help – Is it “true”? Who is represented fairly? What’s good and is not so good. Many question the actual merits of movie’s “feel good” approach to race relations. As filmmakers this controversy has confirmed our belief that we need more books, more films, and most importantly more talk about what really happened in Mississippi during this time of enormous change.
Set in the middle of the civil rights era in Mississippi, The Help depicts the relationship between two groups of women– middle class white southern women and their black maids. At the end of the day, it is a piece of fiction, one writer’s interpretation of the complexity of racial relationships in the south. Yet, during this same time period there were real-life black and white women in Mississippi quietly, and some times not so quietly, working hard to dismantle the dehumanizing Jim Crow system. These women were obsessed, not about their toilets or polished silver, but rather about the abject terror incited by such racist stalwarts as the White Citizens Council and the Ku Klux Klan. They were determined to do what they could to help create a more just society for themselves and their children. A few years ago we discovered a story about a few of these very real and committed Mississippi women. As documentary filmmakers, we felt compelled to add their story to our shared history. It is the story of an amazing, yet little known organization called Wednesdays in Mississippi.

 

During the summer of 1964 under the banner of Wednesdays in Mississippi, over 400 women, both black and white met behind tightly drawn curtains to discuss how they could support the civil rights movement. These were middle class women—white women who did have ‘help’, yet could clearly see the cruelty and the untenable nature of the segregated system. They were also black women who were not maids, but who were business owners, schoolteachers, nurses and librarians. They all were women with power and the will to invoke change.

 

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Hope justice resolve
Dorothy Irene Height and Polly Cowan, co-founders of WIMS. From the WIMS website

These revolutionary meetings were organized by Dorothy Height, the head of the National Council of Negro Women and her close friend and colleague, Jewish political activist, Polly Cowan. Dorothy and Polly were northern, yet they knew women all over Mississippi were working to support civil rights.

 

The summer of 1964 was Freedom Summer. Thousands of Northern college kids came into Mississippi to set up Freedom Schools and register people to vote. That same summer Wednesdays in Mississippi brought black and white women from the north into Jackson to meet with their southern counterparts. Here’s how it worked: every week a team of women from a different northern city flew into Jackson. They came in undercover, as respectable ladies- wearing white gloves and pearls. They went into the heat and terror of Jackson, often against the wishes of their families, sometimes with great risk to their personal safety. Their goal was to listen to and support the women of Mississippi who sought peaceful and lasting change.

dorothy height, polly cowan, fanny lou hamerFannie Lou Hamer, Dorothy Height and Polly Cowan

 

While in Mississippi these northern women met with women like Elaine Crystal, a Jewish woman who decided, “to stop playing bridge and be a part of some thing that made a difference.” Elaine helped form Mississippians For Public Education and fought to keep the public schools opened. And women like Jane Schutt, who was an active member of the integrated organization Church Women United and served as the chair of the Mississippi Advisory Committee to the US Commission on Civil Rights. When in December of 1963, the Klan burned a cross on Jane’s yard, she decorated it with Christmas lights and kept right on working for racial equality.

 

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In the black community they found women like Clarie Collins Harvey. A prominent businesswoman, Clarie had the economic freedom to boldly stand up to racist policies. She started WomenPower Unlimited, a grassroots organization to support young civil rights workers in the state and to register black voters. Clarie also developed the Chain of Friendship, an informal network of white women outside of Mississippi who supported the efforts of women fighting for integration inside the state. Jessie Mosley was another mover and shaker in the black community. A professor’s wife, she started the first chapter of the National Council of Negro Women in Mississippi in the 1950s. While her husband’s courses at the Jackson State University “were often observed by members of the Klan or White Citizen’s Council”, this didn’t deter Jessie. She was a huge supporter of Wednesdays in Mississippi and worked closely with Fannie Lou Hamer and other women activists to develop Head Start programs.

 

Throughout the 1960’s Dorothy Height and Polly Cowan continued to work through Wednesdays in Mississippi (which later became Workshops in Mississippi) to join black and white women together. They spread throughout the state helping women work together to develop everything from home ownership projects for low-income families to community-based farm co-ops.

 

In the end, it doesn’t seem fair to place the burden of truth on just one story, like The Help. Wednesdays in Mississippi offers another perspective on this “truth”. As those who were involved in this project are now reaching their 70s, 80s, and 90s, it is crucial that their story like so many others from that time be documented before they’re gone. The truth will be found when the stories of those on the front line and in the living rooms, those who were the backbone of the movement are told. Wednesdays in Mississippi is just one of those many stories.

 

 

To find about more about Wednesdays In Mississippi and other women in the movement, please check out the following links:

wimsfilmproject.com

http://www.history.uh.edu/cph/WIMS/

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Wednesdays-in-Mississippi-Film-Project/266953138296

http://jwa.org/teach/livingthelegacy

http://www.sites.si.edu/exhibitions/exhibits/freedoms_sisters/main.htm

http://www.nps.gov/mamc/index.htm

http://seesaw.typepad.com/blog/2010/04/wednesdays-in-mississippi.html

 

 

 

Wisdom from Early Japan on Learning / Join me as we explore the Japanese Culture of the Samurai!

Learning

We learn about the sayings and deeds of the men of old in order to entrust ourselves to entrust ourselves to their wisdom and prevent selfishness. When we throw off our own bias, follow the sayings of the ancients, and confer with other people, matters should go well and without mishap. Lord [Nabeshima] Katsushige borrowed from the wisdom of Lord Naoshige. This is mentioned in the Ohanashikikigaki. We should be grateful for his concern.
Moreover, there was a certain man who engaged a number of his younger brothers as retainers, and whenever he visited Edo or the Kamigata area, he would have them accompany him. As he consulted with them everyday on both private and public matters, it is said that he was without mishap.

Yamamoto Tsunetomo7

…all samurai ought certainly apply themselves to [the study of military science]. But a bad use can be made of this study to puff oneself up and disparage one’s colleagues by a lot of high-flown but incorrect arguments that only mislead the young and spoil their spirit. For this kind gives forth a wordy discourse that may appear to be correct and proper enough, but actually he is striving for effect and thinking only of his own advantage, so the result is the deterioration of his character and the loss of the real samurai spirit. This is a fault arising from a superficial study of the subject, so those who begin it should never be satisfied to go only halfway but persevere until they understand all the secrets and only then return to their former simplicity and live a quiet life.
There is an old saying that bean sauce that smells of bean sauce is no good and so it is with the military pedants.

Daidoji Yuzan8

Learning is to a man as the leaves and branches are to a tree, and it can be said that he should not be without it. Learning is not only reading books, however, but is rather something that we study to integrate with our own way of life.
One who is born into the house of a warrior, regardless of his rank or class, first aquaints himself with a man of military feats and achievements in loyalty, and, in listening to just one of his dictums each day, will in a month know 30 precepts. Needless to say, if in a year he learns 300 precepts, at the end of that time he will be much the better.
Thus, a man can divide his mind into three parts: he should throw out those thoughts that are evil, take up those ideas that are good, and become intimate with his own wisdom… I would honor and call wise the man who penetrates this principle, though he lacks the knowledge of a single Chinese character. As for those who are learned in other matters, I would avoid them regardless of how deep their knowledge might be. That is how shallow and untalented this monk is.

Takeda Shingen (1521-1573)9

When a man in the beginning of his life is ignorant of everything, he has no scruples, finds no obstacles, no inhibitions. But after a while he starts to learn, and becomes timid, cautious, and begins to feel something choking in his mind, which prevents him from going ahead as he used to before he had any learning. Learning is needed, but the point is not to become its slave. You must be its master, so that you can use it when you want it.

Yagyu Munemori (1571-1646) (as interpreted by D. T. Suzuki)10excerpt Learning taken from: http://www.samurai-archives.com/cultcat.htmlImagepicture by Tung Luong