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a history of western esoteric thought

This is the type of book I wish I had stumbled across many years ago. A guidebook to the history of the ideas of spirituality. As a student of esoteric thought and spiritual development, I’m interested in the members of our species that have achieved a particular state of enlightened knowledge, a direct contact with wisdom. [...]

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but I thought I was an exception…

When Dr. Laurence Peter was born in Vancouver, Canada during the year of 1919, the world was not prepared for his revolutionary doctrine. Today we suffer the consequences because few have heeded his warning, we all think we are the exception to his principle. I’m not talking about a prophet or spiritualist, I’m talking about [...]

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hope for the future of the emotional psyche

Recently I am challenged to distill the most important aspects of my mind and persona, to detail what my assets are as a human being. At this turning point in my life and career I must ask what I can give to the world, for on this I can base a long successful career not [...]

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the most important philosopher you’ve never read

Perhaps I was simply messed up as an early adolescent. While others around me sought speaker system upgrades for their cars or moments of numb bliss through substances, I was slowly building a small library of P.D. Ouspensky, G.I. Gurdjieff and  Jiddu Krishnamurti. The rationale escapes me for why I decided to pull the trigger [...]

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hope for the future of the emotional psyche

Recently I am challenged to distill the most important aspects of my mind and persona, to detail what my assets are as a human being. At this turning point in my life and career I must ask what I can give to the world, for on this I can base a long successful career not [...]

planning the roadtrip to Vancity

Updated 6/23/2009 Starting at University of British Columbia the first week of September means that it is appropriate for me to begin planning my move out to Western Canada. Jane is on board and will be bringing her car out to the Vancouver area. I will be abandoning my 2000 Saturn SL1, most likely at my [...]

an easy transition to a producer economy?

Recently I’ve been struggling with the idea of the steps required for peaceful transition into what I would like to refer to as “producerism”. Producerism meaning the the new aspect of society that sees us making more of the things we use in our daily lives. We’ve been promised independence through prosperity, through economic growth, [...]

Asides

• from a recent email about Graduate Student Orientation, As a sustainable campus, we encourage you to bike, walk, bus or carpool to orientation activities. #
• An interesting paper from and  NBER Conference back in 2005, Might the dollar eventually follow the precedent of the pound and cede its status as leading international reserve currency? Unlike the last time this question was prominently discussed, ten years ago, there now exists a credible competitor: the euro. This paper econometrically estimates determinants of the shares of major currencies in the reserve holdings of the world’s central banks. Significant factors include: size of the home country, inflation rate (or lagged depreciation trend), exchange rate variability, and size of the relevant home financial center (as measured by the turnover in its foreign exchange market). (more...) #
• This is a picture of a generator stator that's was delivered to a coal power plant in the North Carolina/South Carolina region. It took 20 days for the stator to travel from the port in Charleston to its destination. Two trucks moved it form the port to its future home. The trucks, end to end, combined to total 304 feet. Realizing that this portion of the generator is 304 feet, you get an idea of the overall generator's size. Huge! And this is just for one unit. Most coal power plants have two, three or four units. Something to consider when you flip that light switch. (more...) #
• This video describes the hard core nature of suburban life in Arlington, VA. Yes, in my home town of Charlotte I think no other video captures the way of the SouthPark area better, (more...) #
• I'm thinking my wedding invitation should look something like this... I'll see if Jane agrees, If this dosen't pan out we can always do it Twitter style: @jritch @jmw213 invite you to our wedding, 6.9.10, Highland Inn, please RT (more...) #
• I've recently become enamored with sardines. Anyone who knows my eating habits can attest to the fact that I'm going through Trader Joe's sardines soaked in olive oil at a rapid pace. Oddly enough, I enjoy them for breakfast. They are delicious little fish that also have great implications for nature. The Washington Post has even tackled what apparently is a new sardine movement, (more...) #
• From my old Student Body President blog at UNC Charlotte, I received this crazy comment via email a few days ago... I am a former ScO, the Space Shuttle Fleet, Kennedy Space Center, Florida, 1958 to 1992. I participated in or observed so far, 657 missions and am still counting. I have an event that I observed within an STS mission that will have you wondering IF a TALL ET can exist in space. Another friend had a similar event, but, in another STS mission. BOTH, TALL ETs. We are both Aerospace engineers. Did TWO such engineers with many, many years experience both see an illusion? Of course not. (more...) #
• Dear Friends and Colleagues, I've had the deepest pleasure working with all of you during my time as a student at UNC Charlotte, as an officer in the Student Government Association, at the Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute, as the 2007-2008 Charlotte 49er Student Body President and as an engaged citizen in Charlotte. On July 17th of this year (more...) #
• The typical college student focuses on one of many set career paths instead of understanding that our human existence is a beautiful gift we can give to the world. As we've become disconnected from this understanding, university graduates have focused ever more on exterior metrics of success. Removing the internal motivation that results in byproducts like happiness, integrity, satisfaction and joy. Grades and "projected average salaries" drive people into fields removed from their humanity and in line with emotional ambiguity. (more...) #
• Having become more and more connected with University of British Columbia (because I'm starting school there in the fall in Materials Engineering) I've fallen in love with the International Journalism program at the school. I love what I'm doing but if I wasn't interested in the materials sciences, I would definitely enroll in a class to travel around the world producing a great story. Here is one amazing example, (more...) #