The Adventures of LitBoy: Bill Brent's Blog

kick-a** blog recommendation

Greetings, friends and browsers of this blog --

This young man comes up with more good content than most ten bloggers combined. This excellent meditation on PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT is, IMHO, one of his best to date.

-- Despite public appearance, I am a very private person, and so I'm only going to say this once: IT WORKED FOR ME. I stumbled upon the basic principle Glen describes in this post by myself, by mistake, and through a great deal of trial and error. If you are one of the attentive few who truly knew me when I was 19, then 29, then 39, you know that I am not making this up.

-- I also believe that some of us genuinely evolve throughout our lives, whereas most of us merely achieve some fairly superficial levels of change, and never really experience what I would call a deep, integrated growth process.

To put it more bluntly, talk about personal transformation is cheap.

And very lucrative.

-- You may not agree with me on this point, and I will concede: IMPRINTING can happen at any point throughout our lives. While it is never too late, the earlier you start, the better your odds of lasting progress ... toward becoming the person you want to be, rather than the one you are told you should be. Growth and integration oriented change do NOT happen by remaining steadfastly in our comfort zones, however charming and appealing they may be.

That's all I'm sayin'.

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2009.04.23, 3:05 p.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is the brainchild of writer Bill Brent. If you enjoy this blog, please consider a donation in support of my work. You can either (1) send money via PayPal to info [!at] litboy [!dot] com, or better still, (2) use Revolution Money Exchange. Unlike PayPal, RME pays 100% of your donation. It's quick and easy!


Here's the button for that:

mele kalikimaka

Aloha!

Drenching, sheeting downpours today. Sun peeking out in between 'em. Bromeliads breed mosquitos like nobody's bizness. I nearly became mosco lunch while snapping these. Still, preferable to being buried under 2 ft. of snow today, like some poor folks.

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2008.12.25, 11:20 a.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is the brainchild of writer Bill Brent. If you enjoy this blog, please consider a donation in support of my work. You can either (1) send money via PayPal to info [!at] litboy [!dot] com, or better still, (2) use Revolution Money Exchange. Unlike PayPal, RME pays 100% of your donation. It's quick and easy!


Here's the button for that:

Unless otherwise indicated, all original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, Please Ask Me First. Higher resolution images are available, and sometimes additional unposted photos!

On mass delusion, part 2

HERE IS A FOLLOW-UP to LAST WEEK'S POST regarding the notion of IDEOLOGIES AS A CONTAGIOUS MENTAL DISEASE.

I have some thoughts I'd like to share on this topic, but I'm letting them form a bit further before I compose an essay, or simply list my thoughts in a more ordered fashion than below.

Central to this constellation of ideas, though, is my realization that if we can construe society as an addict, then we can also construe society itself as the drug. Social approval, for instance, and in particular: the need to at least appear to SOCIALLY CONFORM (use the drug) in order to be compensated (for example, get the funds that enable us to keep using the drug). In other words, late-stage capitalism is akin to late-stage drug use.

So what's the solution? Well, for starters, I've noticed more of my friends have been bartering lately for goods and services. (Here in Hawaii, it's fairly easy, since many folks can grow or raise food on the land they inhabit.)

We all drop in and drop out of the mass culture in various ways at various times. Heck, sometimes you have to OPT OUT, just to avoid the mass marketers. But there are other ways than simply removing yourself from lists. For instance, forming unpredictable, one-time tribes, such as GUERRILLA QUEER BAR in San Francisco circa Y2K, keeps the landscape freer, more spontaneous, and less of a target. As you can see by clicking on the link, Guerrilla Queer Bar is a great example of a meme that has spread, virus-like, to many other cities.

Any other ideas? Feel free to chime in.

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2008.09.09, 10:30 p.m. Hawaii time]

keywords: Society is an addict. Society is a drug. Conditional tribe, tribalism, pack behavior, spontaneous swarm.

LitBoy.com is a culture-oriented site, focusing mainly on literary art and current events. If you enjoy this blog, and you wish to support its continued existence, just hit the "Post A Comment" button at the end of any post. In your comment, indicate your desired contribution amount. The moderator will then reply with an invoice you can use to contribute via PayPal. Your name and contribution amount are confidential and NOT posted to the blog. Your three-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

20.00 / $200.00 (10.0%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars and the annual goal of $200. Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually LitBoy posts your contribution on the very next blog post.

Unless otherwise indicated, all original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.

On mass delusion

WOWSERS.

[backup link HERE]

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2008.09.03, 9:40 a.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is a culture-oriented site, focusing mainly on literary art and current events. If you enjoy this blog, and you wish to support its continued existence, just hit the "Post A Comment" button at the end of any post. In your comment, indicate your desired contribution amount. The moderator will then reply with an invoice you can use to contribute via PayPal. Your name and contribution amount are confidential and NOT posted to the blog. Your three-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

20.00 / $200.00 (10.0%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars and the annual goal of $200. Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually LitBoy posts your contribution on the very next blog post.

Unless otherwise indicated, all original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.

Why the Shaka is Better than the Wave

...'cuz when you're walking in Hawaii with a freshly gathered piece of fruit in your hand, it's a lot easier to acknowledge someone with a SHAKA than with a wave.

That happens a lot here.

In fact, it happened to me on my walk today.

An avocado and guava, in case you're curious about today's finds. No camera right now to show you the evidence, but trust me, they're choice.

[NOTE: Today's bit of artwork illustrating the "shaka," roughly the Hawaiian version of the hand wave, was kyped from another blog. (I was going to give an artist with a lovely image posted on the Web some free publicity and possibly some sales, but I would have needed her written permission to repost her image, and neither you nor I, gentle reader, have time for that.) So there's a dandy explanation of the shaka HERE. Whether the story is apocryphal or indeed true as claimed, I like the logic of my version anyhow.]

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2008.08.19, 8:35 p.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is a culture-oriented site, focusing mainly on literary art and current events. If you enjoy this blog, and you wish to support its continued existence, please email a reply to this post. Indicate your desired contribution amount. The moderator will then reply with an invoice you can use to contribute via PayPal. Your name and contribution amount are confidential and NOT posted to the blog. Your three-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

20.00 / $200.00 (10.0%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars and the annual goal of $200. Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually LitBoy posts your contribution on the very next blog post.

Unless otherwise indicated, all original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.