The American Dream

 

What is The American Dream? Where can it be found? Is it in the Porno-Pop Culture of  Fame? Does it reside in the Shimmering-Limelight-Illusions of Hollywood? Or is it entrenched in East Coast Wealth passed down from Generation to Generation? Is it in the Get-Rich-Quick California kinda dreamin' ? From all the land grabbin' to The Gold Rush to Silicon Valley? Is The American Dream captive of all those bouncing balls in the Powerball Lottery machine? Is it in our hopes for the Next Generation of Americans? Funny that American Dreaming seems always to be on the surface, but the thing about it that isn't so funny is The Native Americans had a dream too, and we extinguished that one. Replacing living, as one with Mother Nature, with some kind of Sadomasochistic Rape & Bondage Theme, a movable feast of fetishes, power, and greed. A dream turned into a nightmare, for these days we have begun to realize we gotta start dreamin' like the dream we extinguished, or the livability of Mother Earth is doomed, and we, along with it. Funny? Not so funny? What they call Global Warming has made even The Hippies of The '60s seem on the right track. The American Dream has to turn from the exterior world of things, which we have surely abused, into the interior world of values, which we have sorely neglected.

 

Now the deal is dreaming is an interior kinda thing and sets up how we relate to reality. Our dreams make sense of the way we live and tell us about the world we live in. Dreams tell us who we are. MLK saw that The American Dream in this kinda way, and his was a dream of interior values. The American Dream of acceptance and equality.

 

The American Empire is crumbling 'like matchsticks into one another' to quote Dylan, who as the Poet Laureate of The '60s was not kind to The American Dream. He got inside her and tap danced around, as Dylan always said, he was just a song and dance man. The only revolution is a Revolution of Consciousness and The Psychedelic '60s pointed to the fact that everything is alive, connected, whole, and sacred. Living is being. The moment timeless. Such dreaming can take us ever deeper into The River of Life. 

 

So are we as Americans going to continue to let The Dogs of Capitalism, psychopathic international corporations, define The American Dream for us? Dumb us down and market her as a shallow whore of consumption ? Will we continue to let the religious dogmas that gave birth to Manifest Destiny, and dominion over all, continue to blind us to the fact that everything is alive and deserves it's place under the sun? Will we forever dream so shallowly? Fitfully? Tossing to and fro? Well? The Smart Boys in Las Vegas always put their money on The Capitalists when they place their bets. The Hippie Way is such a long shot you can always get good odds on that one. Me? I think The American Empire is gonna fall because we were dreaming the wrong dream. We did have a chance in The '60s to start dreaming a different dream, a dream of interior realities, but the intrinsic value of what the young were saying to their elders in those days was ignored, and only met with control, disdain. Thought always trumps love in this World of Illusions, a realm where Maya readily grows and flourishes. It's like this world is supposed to be fucked up. What can go wrong will go wrong. Murphy's Law.

 

So what do you want from this life? What's going to fulfill you? How do you see The American Dream? How do you see things? What do you dream of? It's all about the individual you know. Societies are only as strong as the character of their citizens.

 

There are two links posted below, one is a Wikipedia link to The American Dream, the other a talk given by Krishnamurti. Are we gonna end up like Willy Lohman saying: "I realized what a ridiculous lie my whole life has been."? Are we gonna jump in The Red Shark with our lawyer and head to Vegas from The Polo Lounge, ignoring all the bats along the way, searching for The American Dream? Are we gonna be as accepting as Huckleberry Finn? As loving as MLK? What's it gonna be?

 

 I believe that Americans these days see The American Dream as an interior kinda thing, spiritual values over materialistic accumulation, so to speak, but you rarely get that from the media. Like old Norman Rockwell up there painting his portrait it's a question of how we see things? How do we see ourselves? America needs to take a good look in that mirror. We need to see ourselves as we actually are, because The American Dream may be dead and buried upon the grounds of Robert E Lee's old home, resting by The Potomac River. Arlington National Cemetery. We have to dig her up and breathe new life into her.

 

We need a new American Mythology. One that's alive in the moment. Not the one entombed in the plastic of Disneyland. 

 

 

 

Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me,

I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to.

Hey! Mr. Tambourine man, play a song for me,

in the jingle jangle morning I'll come following you.

 

Then take me disappearin' though the smoke rings of my mind,

Down the foggy ruins of time, far past the frozen leaves,

The haunted frightened trees, out to the windy beach,

Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow,

Yes to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free,

Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands,

With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves,

Let me forget about today until tomorrow. 

 

Bob Dylan

 

 

 

 How can we dream

 The American Dream

 unless

 American Mythology

 wakes up?

 

 

 

Mother Earth

has set

the clock

ticking.

 

 

 

 

The Great American Spiritual Desert 

 

         "Las Vegas is the savage heart of The American Dream." Dr Hunter S Thompson

            http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Dream#History

From February 6th through the 9th 2013 on Kinfonet....The Krishnamurti Quote of The Day.....gives account of the 5th Public Talk given in Ommen, Holland on the 12th of August, 1938. Just hit.....'next quote'.....and over 4 days you get the entire talk. 

    http://www.kinfonet.org/krishnamurti/quotes/desire-cannot-exist-by-itself-it-must-always-be-in
 

~~~A House Divided Against Itself Cannot Stand~~~

"House Divided" Speech by Abraham Lincoln


   Does today's Class War compare to The Civil War? Will there ever rise such a man as this to appeal to~~~The Better Angels of Our Nature~~~or will politicians forever more be bought and sold by the powers that be? How does the denial of personal freedom compare to the social denegration that springs from~~~economic and environmental destruction? Who can live peaceably together with slaveholders~~~or~~~corporate entities that have no social responsibilities? Is democracy for All The People~~~or~~~is it a Tattered Quilt of states rights? Was it really~~~North vs South? Is it really~~~Democratic America vs Corporate America? Blue vs Grey~~~or~~~Red vs Blue? Today there are Two Americas~~~the haves~~~and the have nots~~~and i don't believe we'll ever be blessed with a man such as this~~~to unite our house divided.

it's hard~~~To Be A Cartoon Character and Make A Living~~~at the same time

Only the great political minds are capable of such a daunting task.

~~~The Medium Is The Message~~~

   Cave Walls and Pigments~~~Pictures and Pushpins~~~Smart Phones and Websites~~~technology has developed more and more sophisticated ways for us to gather the constellation of images~~~that captivate us~~~that define us~~~and show all with the eyes to see where the boundaries of our lives are~~~and so we have~~~drawn~~~attached~~~and these days~~~downloaded~~~them into the space that surrounds us~~~as we live our daily lives~~~we seek their security and comfort~~~while upon the impermanent face of this planet. Our desires and our mysteries~~~our fears and our allegiances~~~it is within these forces~~~of thought it's self~~~that propel us to gather fresh imagery each and every day ~~~and these~~~Our Own Cherished Personal Collages~~~Refreshed and Renewed~~~ascribe some sort of meaning and supposed individually~~~security and comfort~~~into this life of ours~~~but our horizons seem to go no further than the confines of thought~~~which are our own personal~~~Walls of Plato's Cave. We all wear the same polo shirt. We all choose between the music available. We all drink from the same cup when it comes to imagery~~~it's just thought~~~and if you don't know it by now~~~All Thought is Limited~~~and the word is never the thing~~~the description is never what it describes~~~for images and thought are only abstractions of that which is.   

   So you might as well pull your pants down when you show another your Collage of Imagery~~~and come to think of it~~~that's pretty much where it all ended up~~~just a bunch of desperate scribbling upon The Global Village's Common Bathroom Wall~~~and that would be The Invention of Little Zucky~~~his spitting image cast in logos up above~~~Facebook. Well? You seem to be able to~~~get lucky or start a revolution~~~on this new electronic bathroom wall of ours~~~and for sure we all cash in our 15 Minutes of Fame while we post in there~~~because it's a flat hierarchical structure and power can't control it's communicative abilities. Our Brave New World inhabited by all of the corporate bastions of authority~~~church, state, nation, and all the myriad mix of psychopathic corporations~~~has to be worried that we all are using the same bathroom now~~~because what comes from the bottom up is always more authentic and real than what comes from the top down~~~and what's trending electronically even beats the pollesters to the punch. So don't you know~~~Big Brother~~~is in here too trying to spin things the corporate way~~~looking to reign all this messiness in.

   Facebook is~~~THE MOTHER OF ALL BATHROOM WALLS~~~but it cares not for blood nor skin in it's imagery~~~and this is it's thin veneer of morality. So if I  were to meet this~~~Pompous Zuckerboy~~~I imagine that he would have the same reaction to me as Marshall McLuhan had~~~to that guy talking about him while standing in line for a movie~~~as this was the script of McLuhan's cameo appearance in Woody Allen's movie Annie Hall~~~and so this guy is talking while standing in line for a movie and it's like he's an expert on everything about McLuhan~~~and McLuhan himself appears~~~out of nowhere~~~and comes up to him and says: "You know nothing of my work."~~~but I do know that the Digital Revolution has changed what we pay attention to and the way we live our lives~~~not it's content~~~and that's the change that I've always been looking for.