Conference Call
17 hours ago
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Saturday, June 12, 2010
A 26-foot-tall Anubis Statue Installed at Denver International Airport
A 26-foot-tall Anubis Statue Installed at Denver International Airport
Anubis, Opener of the Ways, is getting around. I think it's odd that the jackal-headed Egyptian diety is being used as a marketing tool. He certainly is an attention-grabber, but the irony of installing Anubis, whom the Egyptians believed assisted the dead on their journey through the Underworld, at an airport is a little too much for me. Aren't we scared enough to fly these days?
Anubis, Opener of the Ways, is getting around. I think it's odd that the jackal-headed Egyptian diety is being used as a marketing tool. He certainly is an attention-grabber, but the irony of installing Anubis, whom the Egyptians believed assisted the dead on their journey through the Underworld, at an airport is a little too much for me. Aren't we scared enough to fly these days?
Friday, June 11, 2010
Cynical Cynical moi
Read on Twitter this week that those emissaries of light, the folks at The Secret, are about to release a new book - the Spiritual Lessons of the Avatar.
It's as though, like our friends with Chicken Soup for the Americal Idol Soul, they have sat in a brainstorming meeting asking 'what's the most popular thing in pop culture at the moment, and how can we make a buck from it by tying it into The Secret?'
Well, I await the book with baited breath.
Kerchingg.
It's as though, like our friends with Chicken Soup for the Americal Idol Soul, they have sat in a brainstorming meeting asking 'what's the most popular thing in pop culture at the moment, and how can we make a buck from it by tying it into The Secret?'
Well, I await the book with baited breath.
Kerchingg.
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Saturday, March 6, 2010
Guru Soup 1: The Secret by Rhonda Byrne
Pardon me for asking, but...
If The Secret by Rhonda Byrne has sold so many millions of copies worldwide, why do people keep buying the book? I mean, wouldn't the Secret be out by now?
Apart from the proliferation of Vision Boards (in which Oprah Winfrey seems particularly over-represented), people are slightly shame-faced when asked what, if anything, they learned from this book. Not one reader I've asked can articulate in a sentence or two just what the Big Secret was. Of course, we all know it's about creating your own reality. The Law of Attraction is hardly a secret. The concept of Karma has been on the Indian soup menu for millenia and in the average western consciousness at least since the Beatles smoked pot with the Maharishi and Mia Farrow. Positive thoughts, positive actions, positive results. And of course vice versa.
For the average self-service self-helper living in the 2000's, dharma might be a bit too responsible though. And maybe our goals don't really relate to peace, love and mung beans any more. Today, we'd like to be thin, drive a Ferrari, have a big fat bank balance, a happy marriage to some hottie and something to do with Oprah Winfrey, though I'm not sure what. Being clear and unabashed about what you want, gluing it onto a Vision Board to bring it forth into the material world and acting as though it's already in your life will, according to the Secret mindset, magically transform any desire into reality. Or at least give you a bit of a push towards manifesting the life you want.
There's no harm in promoting positive thinking and being clear about what is important to you. The ideas in The Secret are by no means new, and certainly not mysteries to anyone that has more than two self-help tomes on their reading menu.
The concept that the standard of living we have is 100% a result of the thoughts we think, the goals we set and the Vision Boards we glue is ok for well-fed aspirational new-agers, but I can't help thinking the way this book presents the karmic lesson is essentially a spiritual cop-out for the dedicated materialist.
Tell it to the Afghanis, the people of New Orleans, the three-year-old kids scraping through garbage in the favelas and dodging the hit brigades in Brazil. It just sticks in my craw that millions of people want someone to tell them it's ok to pursue Chanel as a spiritual path, under the circumstances.
The Secret soup is a big steaming bowl of materialism disguised as spirituality with some juicy, golden marketing wontons floating on the surface. Looks very pretty, promises a seat at the 'good table', but just don't look too closely at what's in it. There could be an unflattering mirror at the bottom of the bowl, if you get my drift.
GS
If The Secret by Rhonda Byrne has sold so many millions of copies worldwide, why do people keep buying the book? I mean, wouldn't the Secret be out by now?
Apart from the proliferation of Vision Boards (in which Oprah Winfrey seems particularly over-represented), people are slightly shame-faced when asked what, if anything, they learned from this book. Not one reader I've asked can articulate in a sentence or two just what the Big Secret was. Of course, we all know it's about creating your own reality. The Law of Attraction is hardly a secret. The concept of Karma has been on the Indian soup menu for millenia and in the average western consciousness at least since the Beatles smoked pot with the Maharishi and Mia Farrow. Positive thoughts, positive actions, positive results. And of course vice versa.
For the average self-service self-helper living in the 2000's, dharma might be a bit too responsible though. And maybe our goals don't really relate to peace, love and mung beans any more. Today, we'd like to be thin, drive a Ferrari, have a big fat bank balance, a happy marriage to some hottie and something to do with Oprah Winfrey, though I'm not sure what. Being clear and unabashed about what you want, gluing it onto a Vision Board to bring it forth into the material world and acting as though it's already in your life will, according to the Secret mindset, magically transform any desire into reality. Or at least give you a bit of a push towards manifesting the life you want.
There's no harm in promoting positive thinking and being clear about what is important to you. The ideas in The Secret are by no means new, and certainly not mysteries to anyone that has more than two self-help tomes on their reading menu.
The concept that the standard of living we have is 100% a result of the thoughts we think, the goals we set and the Vision Boards we glue is ok for well-fed aspirational new-agers, but I can't help thinking the way this book presents the karmic lesson is essentially a spiritual cop-out for the dedicated materialist.
Tell it to the Afghanis, the people of New Orleans, the three-year-old kids scraping through garbage in the favelas and dodging the hit brigades in Brazil. It just sticks in my craw that millions of people want someone to tell them it's ok to pursue Chanel as a spiritual path, under the circumstances.
The Secret soup is a big steaming bowl of materialism disguised as spirituality with some juicy, golden marketing wontons floating on the surface. Looks very pretty, promises a seat at the 'good table', but just don't look too closely at what's in it. There could be an unflattering mirror at the bottom of the bowl, if you get my drift.
GS
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