Several British news media have reported that a 22 year old was awarded £10,000 for helping to convict a rapist, and then donated this amount to the victim. Lloyd Gardner saw a Crime Watch programme on TV and recognised two women he knew and this led police to the rapist, Polish national Jakub Tomczak. Mr Gardner felt he didn’t deserve the reward and that he wanted the money to help the woman rebuild her life.
Turn on the television news and there is an almost overwhelming focus on financial mess, social problems or crime. So what actually is the meaning of life? When I look around me I can’t help longing for a better kind of world. Sometimes I feel we are so used to the unsatisfactory state of things that we have given up hoping for something better.
Is idealism completely out of fashion? Have we become too cynical to have a vision of utopia? Or are we too scared of being tarnished with the same brush as the fanatical extremists who have not been slow in broadcasting their own hate filled criticism of modern life. Perhaps I’m being hopelessly idealistic but surely society could be better. How can I find my perfect society? What follows are the prejudices of an idealist.
Spiritual healing can be needed for guilty feelings. Not all that is going on in our mind is the working of a true conscience. Some of us find ourselves at times on a guilt trip. Even if we have a sound mind, we may sometimes feel guilty over the smallest thing – without rhyme or reason painstakingly worried about something we have done that really is unimportant.
One example is children who, having been trained by their parents to follow certain rules, like never putting one’s elbows on the table at meal times – feel guilty when they have grown into adulthood feeling guilty if they ever break this rule. Other examples of illogical guilt are saying `sorry’ a lot of the time and unfairly criticising ourselves. Trying too hard to get friends to like us, feeling easily embarrassed when asking for favours or doing anything that might displease them.
Many hopelessly sick people feel constantly guilty. This may result from the suspicion that their sickness and fate are self-inflicted and their own fault. Alternatively, they may assume, more or less, the role of the utterly dependent child. Some consciously apologize for the trouble and fuss they are causing. (Our Western culture fosters a sense of guilt in most of us when illness places us in the dependent role). If we are dying, we may even feel as if we are forcing the living to face the necessity of their own deaths for which we suppose they will not be thankful.
You are on a train and 30 drunken football fans are hurling abuse at you. What do you do? WalesOnline reported that Lisa Robinson found herself in exactly this situation. After she had stepped in to try to prevent another passenger from being insulted, she said she became the target of hatred for the hooligans. When the … Continue reading Standing up to yobs
Lecture on the Cerebellum and Procedural Control
by David Lister
Date: Sat, 29/01/2011 – 4:00pm
Venue: Swedenborg Hall, The Swedenborg Society, 20 Bloomsbury Way, London WC1A 2TH
David Lister will explore the modern knowledge we have about the evolution of the brain, with particular reference to the cerebellum and is functions as described by Swedenborg.
Madeleine Waller, Artist in Residence: Shortlisted for the Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2010 The Swedenborg Society are very proud to have the photographer Madeleine Waller as their current Artist in Residence. Madeleine was very recently shortlisted for the Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2010; her work Wet and Dry, Laura is one of 60 portraits chosen … Continue reading Madeleine Waller
PoW Heinrich Steinmeyer (now aged 84) was captured after D Day and imprisoned near Comrie, a Perthshire village. Locals were so kind to him that he stayed there for seven years after the War and still keeps in touch with several families. Such friendliness was a surprise to him for he was a Nazi member … Continue reading Good begat good
by Stanislav Grof, Suny Series in Transpersonal and Humanistic Psychology, State University of New York Press. 2000. ISBN 0 7914 4622
This book is about modern consciousness research. It is written by one of the founders of transpersonal psychology and covers his ideas regarding non-ordinary states of consciousness. His term for these is ‘holotropic’ experience which signifies ‘moving towards wholeness.’ His discussion draws on for example such fascinating human states of consciousness as past-life experiences, peak experiences, communication with spirit guides and channelling, near-death experiences, crises of shamans like witch-doctors, states of possession, and awakening of Kundalini. He also reports findings from his original research into ‘psychedelic therapy’ and ‘holotropic breathwork’.
One critic has commented ‘If more psychiatrists could be persuaded that human consciousness transcends the limitations of the physical brain and instead is but an aspect of what may best be described as ‘cosmic consciousness,’ we could not only expect treatment modalities to change, but we could also anticipate the possibility of culture-wide rethinking … about the nature of personhood.’
Imagine you were phoned up out of the blue by a researcher from Harvard University and asked what you were doing, how were you feeling and what you were thinking? Research reported in the journal Science found that’s what happened to 2,250 people around the world who were contacted at random. All the responses pointed … Continue reading What makes us happy?
Ever looked at Google Street view on the internet and seen yourself on the screen? That’s what happened to Bob Mewse, aged 56, although he didn’t recognise the morbidly obese man, with a shirt hanging over his huge stomach as himself – at least not until he made a closer inspection. He weighed 21 stone … Continue reading Shocking view