Dan Pallotta

Saturday, December 13, 2003

Sunday, December 14, 2003

Three ad campaigns that I noticed today. Audi - "Never Follow." Cadillac - "Break Through." Robinsons-May - "Give the Greatest Gifts." There are no superlatives left for God. They have all been taken by the car companies and the soda companies. And the messages set you up to feel like a loser if you're taken off guard. "Never follow." Never? Even if I don't know where I'm going and someone else, or something else does? In other words, "always have the answer." Always? Even when I don't ? "Break Through." In a Cadillac? What kind of a break through am I supposed to have just because I'm in a Cadillac? And how does Cadillac know that I should be breaking through? What if I'm supposed to be sitting still? "Give the Greatest Gifts." Isn't love the greatest gift? What does Robinsons-May have that's better than that? Something, apparently, because they have the greatest gifts.

Just a friendly reminder on this Sunday that if you find yourself feeling that you're never enough it could very well be because that's how our society is trying to make you feel.

Add Comment Read Comments (0 comments)

Saturday, December 13, 2003

I saw a photo on CNN this morning of a long winding line of people waiting to get flu shots. I have never seen a photo of a long winding line of people waiting to help little children in Africa get malaria shots or diphtheria shots or chicken pox shots. People will line up for anything when their own interest is at stake - certainly when their own well-being or survival is at stake.

We need to create a world where people will line up when the well-being of others is at stake - a world where that is every bit as important - without qualification - as one's own well-being. It seems to me that this is what is meant by love your neighbors as yourself.

This does not have to be a difficult thing. Somehow we need to show people that we would all be much happier in such a world than we are in this one, where a few privileged people will get flu shots to keep them from getting a stuffed up head, while the great mass of others are denied a diphtheria shot that will keep them from getting a death sentence.

This world is possible. Those of us who did the AIDSRides and the 3-Days saw - many, many times, over and over again - what extraordinary things people will do in the interest of others when they are simply reminded that it works better - and we saw the happiness that came of it. It didn't take years of moral indoctrination. It just took common sense.

The logic of the world we could be living in - the happiness of it - simply does not occur to people. I am convinced that this is the entire problem.

Add Comment Read Comments (0 comments)

Thursday, December 11, 2003

Friday, December 12, 2003

When I was 15 years old, my parents took us to Disneyland as part of a two-week trip out west. This was pretty unheard of - California just wasn't someplace a working-class family from Boston went in the '70s. New Hampshire and Maine were the horizon, because that was all people could afford. But my parents saved up for this trip for us on a construction worker's salary. This was their dream - to show their children places they'd never gotten a chance to see themselves when they were kids. Big places. Big things. My mom and dad had dreamed of taking us to Disneyland for years, but never really believed they would actually get us there. We were all in Disneyland on the 4th of July in 1976.

I'll never forget the magic of that night. There were the thousands of people gathered there that night. Perfect strangers in tears with one another, singing "God Bless America" - singing for the love of their country, and feeling undeniably connected to each other. For the first time, I had the feeling that this is the way the world ought to be - people should be singing with each other instead of fighting with one another. It's not enough to just not fight. We should be singing with one another. Impossible, right? But there it was, happening for everyone to see and it wasn't lost on me. I etched that image in my mind. It was a formative experience.

But I remember leaving Disneyland - walking under those arches we had entered into three days earlier, with the monorail buzzing over our heads - and I never felt so sad in all my life. I didn't know if I'd ever be back in that magical, wonderful, utterly impossible place. My soul was sad, because for three days, it had returned home. "Home" was a place where dreams come true, where nothing is impossible, anything can happen, and there are no limits to how wild, fun, beautiful, and incredible life can get. You know, as adults - not human beings, but adults - we place limits on how beautiful things can be. On this deep blue marble with swirly white cotton clouds over green oases, with waterfalls and mountains twirling and hurdling at 15,000 miles an hour through the twinkly stars in the blackness of space - on this magical stage, we place limits on the potential of beauty.

There is a quote that I love that says, "I have always envisioned a God that dances." When I first heard that, I said to myself, "Of course God would dance. After all, God is the source of all beauty and joy - the source of rainbows, the toucan, the Alps, the tulip. Of course God would dance."

So, I was sad to leave Disneyland. Because Disneyland said that God dances, and that you can wish upon a star and your dream will come true - this resonated with me to my very essence and I was leaving that place for the sorry, weary alternative that adults had created outside of its gates.

I have returned to Disneyland many, many times since that day. But after a while, it lost its splendor. You can't keep returning to someone else's dream and expect it to replace the feeling of fulfilling your own.

On the AIDSRides and the 3-Days I saw people singing together again. Laughing, crying, and singing. And it was even more fulfilling than the experience of Disneyland, because they were laughing and crying and singing in the name of something larger than themselves. From time to time I go back to my memories of those events. But after a while, they lose their splendor. You can't keep returning to your old dreams and expect them to replace the feeling of fulfilling your dreams still to come.

Add Comment Read Comments (0 comments)

Thursday, December 11, 2003, Second Post

Just got this from a friend who saw it on a Salvation Army holiday sign:

"While you're trying to figure out what to get the man who has everything, don't forget about the man who has nothing."

Add Comment Read Comments (0 comments)

Wednesday, December 10, 2003

Thursday, December 11, 2003

This was sent to me today by a friend. It is a paragraph of haunting power.

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising them the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over a loss of fiscal responsibility, always followed by a dictatorship. The average of the world's great civilizations before they decline has been 200 years. These nations have progressed in this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance; from abundance to selfishness; from selfishness to complacency; from complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependency; from dependency back again to bondage."

Written by Alexander Fraser Tytler in "The Decline and Fall of the Athenian Republic" 1776. (I have not verified the quotation in the book itself, but some internet investigation gives me confidence that it is authentic.)

Add Comment Read Comments (0 comments)

Wednesday, December 10, 2003

I look at advertising from a different context than I used to. I used to look at the fonts and the aesthetics in terms of what they said about the product. I used to look at the headlines and the slogans in terms of what they said about the product as well. Now I look at it all in terms of what it says about the world, and the statements are startling. We all generally acknowledge that we live in a materialistic society. But we don't really acknowledge the significance of the materialism. We generally know that we are prone to measure ourselves in terms of our financial worth, but we brush that off as only marginally important. We don't acknowledge, as individuals or as a society, that the entire source of our unhappiness could be the materialism and the financial measurement of the self that pervades society. We tend to blame our inner selves more for our malaise than we do anything outside ourselves. Granted, we have to nurture our own inside. There are a few masters who have lived on the planet who knew how to do that, regardless of exterior circumstance - Jesus, Buddha - maybe a few others. But the rest of us are a lot more vulnerable to outside influence than they were. To put a human being inside today's culture of materialism and ask him or her to be happy and joyous is like asking an alcoholic to take up permanent residence in a bar and maintain his sobriety.

We blame our personal selves too much for our unhappiness without examining the world we are asked to (and agree to) live in. If we could recognize that we have put ourselves in a wildly unhealthy environment perhaps we could more accurately address the problem.

This is where advertising comes in. If you will look at advertising from a different perspective you will gain a lot of insight into the human condition of this age.

First, look at the prevalence of it. It is everywhere. We are inundated with audio and visual messages incessantly from the moment we wake up until the moment we go to sleep. Our homes are no refuge, because we are inundated with the messages there too. I don't know much about brainwashing or indoctrination, but it would seem to me that if you wanted to get someone to believe something, you would keep pummeling them with a consistent message until their thinking was re-programmed and all their priorities were reorganized toward the thing you most want them to believe.

Second, look at the messages. You can make a meditation out of it. The Army tells you to "Be all that you can be, in the Army." So the Army has replaced God. In a spiritual culture, God is what makes you all that you can be. IN a materialistic culture, the militia that protects all your material things is the thing that can make you all that you can be.

Yesterday I saw an ad for Rolex. It said, "Seduces Your Soul." So Rolex has replaced God. In a spiritual culture, your soul desires joy in peace and communion with God. In a materialistic culture, your watch is the limit of your soul's desire. That is all it takes to seduce your soul. A new Rolex.

The new ad campaign for Pepsi is simply, "Real." In a spiritual culture, humility makes you real. In a materialistic culture, the kind of cola you drink makes you real. It makes you cool. And in a materialistic culture, to be cool is to be real.

The new ad campaign for the Acura TL says, "A higher form of performance." The Acura replaces God. In a spiritual culture, higher performance comes from a higher power and generally means a higher form of humility - a slowing down to the speed of life. In a materialistic culture higher performance comes from the human mind of science, and it is all about going faster, so you can use your new Acura to get to your Rolex which will be protected by your Army.

Is it any wonder that we are unhappy?

All day long we are inundated, from every conceivable angle, at every level, and with every possible device and method to view consumer products as divine. If I were going to brainwash a culture - if I were going to try and change a culture's thoughts about what is God, this is probably how I would do it.

I have found great peace in this consciousness. It helps me to realize that I am not crazy. It helps me to see that the culture I live in is crazy. And it helps me to begin to catalogue and observe how that is so. This is an act of self-love. We can use the advertising that is designed to brainwash us to expand our consciousness. We can allow it to use us, or we can begin to use it. We can use it to elevate our sense of self and understanding about the world, just as an alcoholic, slowly but surely, begins to realize that the bar is an unhealthy place for him to test his sobriety. We can let it manipulate ourselves into self-punishment ( "I'm a loser because I don't have enough money to buy that") or we can use it to ask, "what does that message prioritize?" "What does that message tell me is important in life?" "Do I believe it?" "What is that message asking me to idolize?" "Do I want to idolize that?"

ultimately, we can use every advertisement in the world as an opportunity to ask ourselves, "Is that message healthy for me?"

In this way, advertising can actually begin to instruct us along the spiritual path, and what was meant to take us off the path can actually set us more firmly on it. It can help us strengthen the idea that the world is crazy, not the self. This is the opposite of what the world teaches us. The culture is designed to make us think that our desire for serenity, for peace, for love, and for God, is crazy, and that the desire for Nintendo, for new cars, and for new watches is really the healthy thing. This is how the culture sells more Nintendo, more cars, and more watches.

But this is the opposite of the truth.

We need to begin to inundate ourselves with that message.

Add Comment Read Comments (0 comments)

Monday, December 08, 2003

Tuesday, December 9, 2003

Ozzy Osbourne had an accident on an all-terrain vehicle. A U.S. Congressman was convicted of second-degree manslaughter in a drunk driving accident. President Bush signed a new Medicare bill that some people think will destroy Medicare. Arnold Schwarzenegger is being sued for defamation by a woman who claims he sexually harassed her during the filing of one of his movies. Rosa Parks is suing OutKast for trademark infringement. This is what's new in our world. This is what's news.

God help us find a higher purpose. We are mired in minutiae. Our newspapers are filled with things that don't matter. Because we cannot stand the thought of that, we give these soap operas meaning that they don't deserve. We act as if Ozzie Osbourne's condition is important. We act as if it is important whether or not Michael Jackson is convicted. We act as if it is important whether the Congressman goes to jail or not. We act as if it is important whether or not the Medicare bill passes. Our sense of what has meaning and what does not is completely distorted.

The millions and millions of AIDS orphans do not give a damn what happens to Michael Jackson. The millions and millions of people who are dying of AIDS this year, with no medicine and no medical care do not care whether the Medicare bill passes with prescription drug coverage. The great masses of the poor, working for pennies an hour in the developing countries of the globe do not care whether the Congressman goes to jail. And the millions of children dying of hunger and hunger-related disease do not care about Ozzie Osbourne's condition.

There are no great conversations occurring in the world. It is not for lack of topics. We have the opportunity for greatness. The problems that confront humanity, by their very nature, call humanity to greatness. They call humanity to test itself. They call humanity to measure the best in itself. They call humanity to take its part in history. WE could be he generation that ends hunger on the planet. We could be the generation that stops the global AIDS epidemic in its tracks. We could be the generation that brings a livable wage to all of the world's poor.

But that is not where we are headed. We are headed in the direction of a generation that will be utterly forgotten for lack of any resolve or commitment in the face of the issues of our time.

What is it that we seek in casting our eyes away from the poor and the suffering? An isolated sense of personal pleasure apart from their pain? Can we not see the short-sightedness of a segregated happiness that specifically excludes them? In fact, that is dependent on their exclusion? In a world where happiness depends on the accumulation of material things and where there are not enough material things to go around, my happiness is inherently dependent on their unhappiness.

Can we not see that there is no joy in our limited idea of happiness? Can we not see the joy that would erupt around the globe and around our own hearts if we took on the task of ending the AIDS epidemic in five years and we achieved it? Can we not hear the church bells ringing around the globe on the day that we end hunger for every man woman and child on the face of the earth? Can we not see that the joy that would follow from such a collective accomplishment? Can we not see the sorry substitute for joy that is our selfish focus on our own accumulation of material things? Can we not see the pathetic nature of what passes for news in a world where we could be discussing greatness?

Why do we settle for this half existence? This half death that we call life? This world where there are no real dreams? This stagnation? Why are we so beaten? Why are we so dull? So lifeless? So willing to settle for no progress in the face of such great opportunity for compassion, for love, and for the real progress of all humankind?

We listen too much to the cynics who tell us we must be practical. We listen too much to the learned experts who tell us it will take millennia to end hunger. We listen to much to the scholarly pragmatists who tell us it will take fifty years to end the AIDS epidemic. We listen too much to the people who tell us it will take twenty years to get to the moon, when we have already watched ourselves do it in seven!

We are too busy calling ourselves a can-do nation and not busy enough showing the world what we can do. Look into the eyes of the poor, America. Look into the eyes of the AIDS orphans. Look into the eyes of the suffering masses around the world. There lies your destiny. There lies your greatness. Turn away from the soap operas and the tabloids and face up to your calling. Rise up. Raise up your eyes to a new world. Speak a language of meaning. Construct a great conversation. Construct a new age.

We can chose to be great. We can have the faith to know that God will help us if we dare to set our sight on an impossible horizon. We can live with the hope that miracles will happen. How much happier we would be in that world than in this sewer of cynicism, limitation, and pseudo news. We can say that world is not possible. We can sound the trumpet of defeat before the battle has even been engaged. Or we can stand up and fight. And then, even if we be defeated, we will at least be able to say that we have known what it was to live.

Add Comment Read Comments (0 comments)

Monday, December 8, 2003

Having no original thoughts today (although that hasn't stopped me in the past) I'd like to give you a passage from Emerson's Essay, "Man the Reformer." I love Emerson. He was a voice of spiritual insight and bravery far ahead of his time. America has no time for him now. He did not speak in sound bites, so the average person has no patience for his wisdom. But his wisdom is immense.

"The Americans have many virtues, but they have not Faith and Hope. I know no two words whose meaning is more lost sight of. We use these words as if they were as obsolete as Selah and Amen. And yet they have the broadest meaning and the most cogent application to Boston in 1841. The Americans have no faith. They rely on the power of a dollar; they are deaf to sentiment. They think you may talk the north wind down as easily as raise a society; and no class more faithless than the scholars or intellectual men. Now if I talk with a sincere wise man, and my friend, with a poet, with a conscientious youth who is still under the dominion of his own wild thoughts, and not yet harnessed in the team of society to drag with us all in the ruts of custom, I see a once how paltry is all this generation of unbelievers, and what a house of cards their institutions are, and I see what one brave person, what one great thought executed might effect."

Add Comment Read Comments (0 comments)