The Yin and Yang of Things
I Saw the Witch Doctor, She Told Me What to Do
Most of you are too young to remember this fifties song.
Peace.
I got a comment today from an old friend, Lexa Roséan, a Wiccan from the great site The Witch Doctor is In. She was upset on seeing the dialogue taking place about Kwanzaa in the last two posts, Boxing and Kwanzaa, and Festivus for the Rest of Us, The Kwanzaafication Factor, and where I addressed the arguments of the magnificent paz y amour, from the wonderful blog the path. I understand your concern, Lexa, but as I said in my response to your comment, don't worry—there's love in that dialogue, not anger and not strife.
(Go to Archives2 for recent posts and comments)
Honesty is Such a Lonely Word
One of the problems I have seen in America in our recent history is our unwillingness to be honest with each other. This is the whole purpose of this blog. I want to be forthcoming with my readers and I want them to be truthful with me. This means saying exactly how we feel and see things, while at the same time being respectful and doing it with love. We need this. Treating minorities like children, which is the Democratic way of doing things, is the tool of demagogues, and is insulting and exploitive. Being too polite and too politically correct leads to the perpetuation of outright lies, and keeps us from addressing real problems.
The great shibboleth of multiculturalism, the totem of the left, has led to all of us being separate, and not even that equal. Honest dialogue is part of the solution. By honest dialogue, I don't mean cruelty. I don't mean Uncle Joe telling Aunt Bertha how fat she looks lately. But I do mean Uncle Joe telling Aunt Bertha that he knows a great gym that just opened and would she like to go with him to check it out?
New Age Conservative
I am a New-Ager. I've said this before. I grew up Catholic, and still believe in and love the religion, although I am not a church-going practitioner now. Maybe I should be. God knows, I need Him at this time in my life. I expanded my religious horizon by converting to Judaism in order to get married to an Israeli, some many years ago now. Then, after cultural differences would not let us remain married, we became lifelong friends. I continued my religious seeking with New Age stuff.
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The only religion I don't like at this time in my life is Islam. Prove me wrong, my Muslim friends. My gripe with Islam is that they need to stand up, en masse, as Tarek does in his blog rambling and blathering, and denounce hatred, put a Fatwa against bloodshed, and wage Jihad on terrorism.
Getting back to New Age, I took the Course in Miracles and did Rebirthing and all that. I read Wayne Dyer and Deepak Chopra. I love all this stuff, as it is full of love, peace, hope, and beauty. It preaches accepting and cherishing everyone. So, with regard to religion, at this point in my life, I am trying to listen to God. I learn about Him from my Catholic roots, from my training in Judaism, from my exploration of New-Age, and from His "talking" to all of us through our fellow human beings. I think He communicates with me through this blog, with the people who read and comment here.
What's the Problem with Wayne Dyer?
Yet, with all this, I came one day to see the limits of New Age too. I expressed some of these views in several posts (Pacifism Kills; To God, Aetheists, Wiccans and My Muslim Friends; and The Problem with Wayne Dyer) and I'd like to revisit my view on Yin and Yang today.
Get Your Yin Yang Straight
One of the problems with New Agers, and with liberals, the left, and Democrats, is that they have a serious imbalance between Yin and Yang.
Yin (Chinese: 陰/阴; pinyin: yīn; literally "shady place, north slope (hill), south bank (river); cloudy, overcast") is the darker element; it is sad, passive, dark, feminine, downward-seeking, and corresponds to the night.
Yin (receptive, feminine, dark, passive force) and Yang (creative, masculine, bright, active force) are descriptions of complementary opposites rather than absolutes.
Any Yin/Yang dichotomy can be seen as its opposite when viewed from another perspective. The categorization is seen as one of convenience. Most forces in nature can be seen as having Yin and Yang states, and the two are usually in movement rather than held in absolute stasis.
The left embrace only the Yin. They and their constituents, including Feminists, promote the feminization of society, foreign policy, race relations, and everyday life. Their slogans are always things like "Make love, not war," "No war for oil," "War is Evil," "The Death Penalty is Inhuman," "Free Tookie," "Guns kill," and so on. They deny and obliterate the necessary balancing Yang, which should include things like just wars, preventative wars, a strong defense, punishment, retribution, and even revenge.
They attack everything "masculine." Boys are not allowed to be boys, and are made to feel guilty for following their nature. Schools are taught mostly by women, who admonish boys that negotiation is the be-all and end-all for every problem. This imbalance continues into adulthood in our society when Democrats want to negotiate with Hitler, Stalin, Saddam Hussein, and terrorists. Neville Chamberlain had a serious imbalance of Yin and Yang. Israelis should just be nice to those nasty Palestinians and there would be world peace. All war is bad. And the worst war is the "hideous" pre-emptive war.
Balance Flowers with Bullets
Peace, Love, and Strength
The New Agers, and Feminists, liberals and Democrats, are wrong with this philosophy. Survival demands a balance of Yin and Yang. Life is not all peace and love and joy and flowers. It includes dirt and feces and blood and tears. God, the God of all of us, or gods, or Nature, or the Universe, demands that we be strong. This means we need to be kind, but we also need to be firm, decisive, and swift in our justice and defense.I advise New Agers, including myself as one of them, not to put flowers in the barrels of soldiers' guns, as we did in the Vietnam era; instead, we should give batches and batches of flowers to soldiers—for keeping us alive, safe, and secure.
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I notice in talking with our present-day soldiers and vets, like Sarge Charlie (and check out the award-winning blog of his wife Empress Bee (of the High Sea), at Muffin53) in Florida, a Vietnam vet; and SgtDub (great polar bear shot today! Polar bears in the Middle East? Check it out!), currently serving in Afghanistan, that they do have an obvious balance of Yin and Yang. These are kind men, generous of spirit. Yet, they are willing to kill the bad guys, if necessary. This is the ideal man or woman. Yin and Yang together.
Both are vital for survival, and for the evolution of a better society. I continue to love New Agers, like Lexa Roséan—but I hope that New Agers will study their roots and allow Yang back into the picture. Then, nobody will get upset over a vigorous argument on race. People will understand why we need a strong military. That masculinity is not a dirty word; that we need both the feminine and the masculine, the light and the dark. Then, we'll make a dent in racism, and promote peace, and love.
God bless.
Rock
(*Wikipedia is always my source unless indicated.)
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Rock, first, thank you for the kind words. second, you fixed it, the site is working great again for me.
ReplyDeleteThird, Amen. As I'm writing this comment, I'm listening to Big and Rich singing We're coming to your City, putting a bang in your yin/yang. Anyway, I could go into the same comments you and I have said several times over the last few months, truth, honesty, treating each person as an individual, not part of something else. This is what we need, as a Nation, as a World. You can disagree with someone and not condem them at the same time. America is called a melting pot, not a divider tray. Accept those who share the same values, our forefathers got it right for us, we are the ones screwing it up now. I am one of the most non-confrontational people you will ever meet, it's hard to get me riled, but if you do, you bear the brunt. My demeaner and my occupation as a police officer and as a soldier don't seem to fit by the standards set up by society, but I believe it's what makes me better.
Hello Mr Rock, I read Sgt Dub's remarks and wonder what John Kerry thinks of a soldier like him....
ReplyDeleteI also hope Mr Paz saw my remarks, I did not know he was Mr Anonymous and did not say he called me a Cracker, that was my word and I conceded that my early teachings made me a "Cracker" but time has shown me that my early experience was wrong and I have grown from that. My hope for the Holiday Season is that Mr. Paz can let some of that anger go, an find a way to forgive me for what my ancestor did.
The old sarge
I resubmit the following in hopes that Mr Paz will see it.
It is possible that I owe you and Mr Paz an apology. Miss Bee told me today that the incident we discussed was during Spring Break in the mid 1990's. While most students go to the beach, Black College students go to Atlanta and party. I am not sure this is still the custom.
If I did indeed misstate the facts on your site I humbly apologize and I also offer a sincere apology to Mr. Paz, I also offer him a hand of friendship.
1. December 27, 2006 6:36 PM
well y'all are way too deep for me today, my head is twirling around trying to grasp all this, but i would say two things.
ReplyDelete1. the site is perfect now, thank you very much.
2. you hit the nail on the head rock. about the ying/yang of the soldier. he can help a small child and shoot an enemy in the next breath. but one thing i have noticed is that after the fact, when they come home, some of them are never "right" again. look under the overpasses on the highways, in the va hospitals, the soup kitchens. you'll see them. they may look like bums but some of them were the very soldiers we speak about. they could have disability income, or social security disability income, or retirement income, but they have no addresses. sarge and no. 1 son and i spend many hours in aa/na rooms, they are in there too. their stories are heartbreakers.
3. i would add a third one now, sorry for being long winded. sarge is a public speaker in aa. don't know if you knew this. he is very motivational. also, he does not mind if i break his anonymity just so you know..... smile
bee
Well Mr Rock, I made my last comment based on your previous post and had not read the Yin and Yang. I thank you for your most gracious comment about Miss Bee and me. In reading your comments I learn that you and I are closer than I thought.
ReplyDeleteI think I am a spiritual person but organized religion went by the wayside long ago. I am not sure what pushed me away from my Southern Baptist roots but I think it was the TV preachers, taking money from old folks like my mother who could not afford what she sent to them. My charity today goes to soldiers, their families, recovering drug addicts and people who need a hand up, not a hand out.
Yes I do have the willingness to kill the bad guy to protect what is sacred to me. I have been thinking about a post that reflects my opinion on Jeb Bush and his suspension of the death penalty in Florida because it took 30 minutes for a killer to die when a technician put the needle through the vain instead of in the vain.
Miss Bee and I are in agreement about this stuff, maybe we do have a good balance of Yin and Yang.
General Jay put up a new post, check it out.
ReplyDeletecharlie
Hi Rock
ReplyDeletethanks for mentioning me in your post. Just a correction, I don't consider myself "New Agey". I always fancied myself more of a Stone Ager, in the sense of wanting to get back to the spiritual roots of the world before all those religions came in and covered them up by distorting them.
I agree with you about the ying and yang. Of course we need the balance between the male and female but we also need to reallign and balance both sides as each in its own way is COMPLETELY OUT OF WHACK.
Here's hoping the New Year can shed more peace, light, and understanding into the dark nights of our collective souls.
Lexa, good to hear from you. Stone Ager? I never heard of that one, but it sounds cool.
ReplyDeleteYou make an interesting point about both our male and female being out of whack. That puts a new perspective on things.
Rock
as ever rock, I enjoy reading your intelligent and truthful posts.
ReplyDeletehappy new year
Lex