Can you guess where this one comes from?

Eric Fromm, the famous humanistic psychoanalysis rocked the world in the 1970s when he wrote The Art of Loving. It was part of a series of books that shed light on basic human foundations, love, well-being, etc. He also wrote To Have Or To Be? and later The Art of Being, both of which I haven't read yet. Both seems like the perfect read while in this COVID-19 forced rest.

BrainPicking writes on the topic of all humans want to live but don't necessarily think about how:

"That we want to live, that we like to live, are facts that require no explanation. But if we ask how we want to live — what we seek from life, what makes life meaningful for us — then indeed we deal with questions (and they are more or less identical) to which people will give many different answers. Some will say they want love, others will choose power, others security, others sensuous pleasure and comfort, others fame; but most would probably agree in the statement that what they want is happiness. This is also what most philosophers and theologians have declared to be the aim of human striving. However, if happiness covers such different, and mostly mutually exclusive, contents as the ones just mentioned, it becomes an abstraction and thus rather useless. What matters is to examine what the term “happiness” means…"

But from having our needs met and our wishes fulfilled leads to the question of what do we actually want?

Fromm goes on to say:

As someone geared towards communicating, I tend to see the world as an embracing Universe interested in sharing and exchanging ideas. I often miss the eventual miscommunication periods of life. They come unsuspecting and they always take me by surprise.

Sometimes I wonder if I can't see the signs clearly on the road of life. Sometimes? Most of the time! I swear I will curtail my strange Facebook curiosity by going less but I'm intrigued. What else are people say8ng? Nothing much more but burn the witches and offer no solutions in general. I'm often on LinkedIn where the conversations are more often of better quality. But even there, a few folks love to argue and read between the lines what they want to see.

Overall, Covid-19 has had a positive effect on people around me. I live in Southern California and "social distancing" is respected. The term is awful and predicts an ugly manipulative agenda. We'll deal with it at some point. People engage more. People want to feel more connected. Despite the Facebook rants and panic bot messages, what I see, hear, and experience here is vastly more positive than negative.

Sometimes miscommunication happens and it's not always the fault of the original communicator. Sure, things can be better explained, but that's part of the back and forth. After the second round of answers, we get the idea and gracefully move on to the next step. But sometimes you got those folks who don't sign their names nor show their face taking personal shots at you. Trolls are an odd manifestation of our society. Unhappy with your life? Take it out on someone in almost complete anonymity.

OK, what's the silver thread here? Oh yes. Confucious says things happen. The rest, we can only take in stride, center back, don't take it personally, and send loving thoughts and vibes to those in need. Simple, no?

For all the cheers and pleas to go back to work, getting back to normal was never that normal. It bears the question. Has the 100th monkey stepped into the equation or to put it in another way, have enough people tasted the sweetness of life to say back to work, OK, but not back to normal?

I have to admit to a sick fascination. I go to Facebook once a day. Yup, I know. I'm not proud of it. It's negative for the most part. It's unruly. Heck, it's like life but even worse, twisted and manipulated.

In my adult role on this planet, I'm part of the specialized news media. I dig into my topics which I know very well. I shriek in horror when I sit with mainstream news journalists. They ask the strangest question betraying they know nothing of the topic. I shake my head thinking they reach millions and get paid easily five to 10 times more than my fighting wages. It gets even more frightening when we realize most people go to social media sites to get the news... the same sites that are overrun with bots, manipulative algorithms, and trolls.

I go to Facebook to see what the world is like outside. Since I can't go out as much and my social interactions are compartmentalized to other people who walk their dogs, I have a distorted view of the world. Dog owners are happy people for the most part. You will find those who lean to the left and those to right talk to those like me who are so independent an independent party would make me run the opposite direction.

Still, going on Facebook -- and yes, I know there are good groups there -- is an exercise in applying an ancient hermetic concept of getting to the fulcrum to avoid the pendulum swing while being aware of it.

Can you guess what the next topic is? One of my favorite, The Kybalion!

I hear this story a long time ago but don't know where it came from. I thought it was perfect for our COVID-19 forced introspection.

The Source of All Things, or God as many call it gathered three of the biggest Earth gods, namely the god of the sea, air, and Earth. The Source of All Things wasn't happy with humans. They were not using their divinity well and were abusing it. You see, back then mankind could fly, warp space without ill-effects, and manifest anything. But it was resisting using divinity for its own betterment. The Source of All Things decided to hide it from humans so that they would develop a finer appreciation of this divine gift.

The Source of All Things asked the god of the seas where he thought humanity's divinity should be hidden. The god of the seas said that it would be best to hide it in the deepest depths of the oceans where mankind couldn't reach it.

After a brief moment, The Source of All Things said that one day mankind would learn to build sea vessels and explore every inch of the seafloor.

So then the god of the Earth said that it could be hidden in the deepest caves of the planet. But again, the Source of All Things said that one day too, mankind would learn to build vehicles and explore every inch of the Earth.

Finally, the god of the air shyly said they could hide it in the highest stratospheres... but again, the Source of All Things said that one day humankind would learn to build aircraft and fly to the highest reaches of the air.

Failing to see that the Source of All Things was also testing the gods of Earth, sea, and air, it paused and said: "Ah hah. Here's where it can be hidden. In a placed it will never think to look for. Right there, in the deepest depth of their hearts where silence rules supreme!"