The World of the Coffee Breaks and Books

AMERICA'S STATUE OF LIBERTY IN NYC

The most wonderful thing about America, for me, at least, is the association of coffee with relaxing, reading books, and of absorbing books with learning. When I first lived in Washington, DC, it took me a while to get over the culture shock of the American way of packaging and presenting food.

Take a Coffee Break in a Book Store

Its important to take regular coffee or tea breaks, walk around, do some stretches, relax and get rid of tensions, chat with some people, laugh and smile, daydream. The coffee that you drink can give gives you stimuli that you need to work smoothly and alertly. My favourite times are the memorable coffee breaks that I have had with family, friends, colleagues at work, strangers around the world, people at conferences, and people in book stores. The best thing for the book store has been its association with coffee and with relaxation. A book store without a coffee shop are no longer attractive.

Food Differences

As a Brit, I felt that American food looked rather soggy. I know this seems strange, and I know Jay Leno's recent comments on late night TV about British food are something similar. His attitude is that British food was pasty, not very appetizing. Boy, have things changed! Now, I think British food is right up there with the best of the best, especially the pub food. Americans have wonderful chains of grocery stores that sell healthy foods. The chefs have changed almost everything for the better, or so I would like to think. Even school food is getting better! I am told. Food generally now seems to being prepared in more appetizing ways, but there is lots to do.

My experience has been that shopping for better quality food, especially coffees for your coffee breaks brings enormous personal benefits. I have moved off sugar and sweeteners in my coffee by eating something sweet alongside my coffee. That something is a something that I would have eaten anyway, such as a zone bar, or blueberry oat bar. I try stay away from anything that contains wheat flour, eggs, fructose, and milk.

Ever heard the expression that it is the white things that are bad for your health. It seems true in my case: white sugar, white sweetener, salt, white bread, white flour, white milk, and the white of an egg.

Places of Meditation

I have a places of meditation and they are not far from books and coffee. Avoid people and places that do not offer you peace and quiet. Develop an inner peace that comes from learning and from being at ease with yourself and your world. Begin quietly in a coffee shop alone with your thoughts. Then, gradually free your mind from your thoughts and just allow yourself to drift into a state of relaxation and meditation. Awaken after twenty minutes and join in the 'fun.'

Life Consequences of Misunderstood or Only Partially Understood Laws

NYC SKYLINE WAS CHANGED BY EVENTS

We might ask who was ultimately responsible for the events of 911 in New York, and if we do we are presenting the question from the space-time world of classical physics. The tendency is to think that something was done to America, rather than to think that America attracted a negative force. The events of 911 were America's wake up call. There are those that see such damning events as arising through what is referred to as the secret. This approach suggests that American's attracted their own karma or destructive force. In a way this is true, but we do not ultimately know whether the force operated from with America or came from outside. There are some who write very interesting material on their own personal experience with the secret, the laws of attraction. In contrast, I, then proposed my ideas of 'the laws of association,' which fall within a cause-effect dynamic rather than an acausal 'quantum' or 'semi-mythological' dynamic. This was my response to the notion that your mind has to be tuned into the positive vibrations of the universe, which I think is correct. The problem still remains that the distribution of benefits is hierarchical, very uneven, because the skills of the the tuning instruments in our respective brains is distributed unevenly! In other words, even if the 'mythological' laws of attraction do work, some people are better at initiating them than others because they have brains that are more easily tuned to the positive vibrations.

The laws of attraction assume that events happen because of something that you do to attract them. The laws of association assume that events happen because of something that you do to associate yourself with the sources of events. In many ways, the laws of attraction and the laws of association are very similar, but there are subtle differences. The laws of association are closer to laws that you can research and can verify by means of the scientific method. You need science. The laws of attraction are not yet laws that you can verify by the scientific method. You need faith. The laws of attraction are not verifiable because they are based on a wonderful mythology of waves with agents at the source of the waves who are actually working with or on you for whatever reason, but mythology, nevertheless, has its value.

As an aside, when I write my blogs, I am trying to lead the reader down a pathway, a dynamic of thought, that the reader might not otherwise follow. Initially, the reader may or may not be attracted to the title of my blog page. By associating with the page, the reader will learn how to think and this will be an importance step towards independence and freer movement of thought and living. My ideas will attempt to point in directions that will give greater freedom in terms of moving towards a longer length of life. This approach emphasizes the economics of the life cycle that are often forgotten. If you extend your life by living longer, then you do the impossible. What you do not want to do is attract death by associating with those things that increase your probability of dying. If you engage in risky behaviour of any sort, you may attract forces of association, as well, as attraction. Now that's a thought, so be careful.

We forget economics at our peril for it is the economic laws that really govern our universe and not the physical laws. The beauty of the economic laws is that they include us and our dynamic in ways that we would not expect. The laws of economics are all powerful as the Fed is just now realizing as it tries to bring America back from the brink of disaster. What Americans do not realize is that terrorism has as its most effective weapons, the seeds of destruction with the agent of destruction arising from within the victim's own tendencies of excess and addiction. If America is addicted to war then planting the seeds of war will ultimately lead to its destruction. Yes, the seeds of war have been planted, but they are to be understood as coming from within the weaknesses of the US economy and its inherent social instability. Watch the series OZ about the Ozwald maximum security prison to see what I mean.

The seeds of war that are planted by terrorists aim a redirecting destructive tendency of Americans towards addictive processes that can be easily manipulated and lead to unpredictable social consequences. Inflation, debt, doubts about commercial trust, monopolization of resources, excessive ownership, excessive consumption, wasting of energy and fragile resources such as wild animals, dominance of the military sector of the economy, inward migration beyond absorptive capacity, mismanaged or misguided fiscal policy, excessive dependency on imports, and so on. Remember that how we treat our animals is a reflection of our nature. We do best to move away from a violent nature and treat our animals with the love and respect they can thrive on.

The Processes and Regions of Discovery - 2. The Group

THE MANOR HOUSE

Groups, like people, engage in processes of self discovery. One of the less attractive aspects to this is that groups can be leaderless. When an individual is leaderless, we say the individual is insane. When a group is leaderless, we need to say that the group is also insane. Insanity occrus when the individual or the group despite self awareness has no leadership to limit behaviour. It is like a ship on a vast sea without a captain. The ship may or may not try to find shore. Those on the ship squabble interminably about what direction the ship should take or what allegiance it should have to what nation or people.

At birth, human beings are normally fortunate enough to have automatic systems in place that predispose new borns to survival within groups. A baby will cry for food, will gurgle to indicate satisfaction, will stare to show awareness and acknowledgement of others present. Groups are something else! Groups emerge from other groups as a recognition of a difference. The members of a new group form a group because they observe a difference even if this is only a difference in direction.

A new group forms as one individual heads away from the rest even if only in thought. Others may or may not follow. When an individual strikes out in a new direction, there is generally the thought by that individual that there is something, or someone, or some group, over the horizon perhaps that meets certain specific needs more closely. Groups, once formed, or individuals departing from a group may try to get others to join. The group recognizes that an environment may require a group of a sufficient size for it to survive. What we see in modern society is the gradual breakdown of the authority of larger groups as individuals recognize that they survive in smaller and smaller groups.

What defines this process is the force that enables the survival of the independent group. Remove that survival mechanism and you force small groups to retreat into large groups and the process of group formation rather than group disintegration ensues. Ever wonder why civilizations rise and fall. It may be that the dynamics of the forces that hold a group together change and the large group can no longer survive and becomes increasingly fragmented. This dynamic occurs within groups, so there are subgroups within groups and subgroups form and move. All this is because of the processes of group discovery and group awareness. What leaders do is enable the group to discover aspects about itself that distinguish it from other groups in meaningful ways.

Technology is a very important force in the creation and destruction of groups. We have seen how the birth pill has affected the family group. We will see how the test tube baby will affect the pairing of individuals of the same or different sexes into groups.

Why it is important to make mistakes and get lost

THE SOMERSET MIST

I often get lost wandering through the many hedged lanes of Devon and Somerset. These tiny lanes are only wide enough for a small car to travel one way. The walking is not easy because the lanes go up and down hills, often very steep hills, and you can find yourself huffing and puffing. My longest walks occur when I get thoroughly lost. The sign posting is not very helpful sometimes because it directs you around in circles until you finally realize your destination is somewhere in the middle of a circle. By that time you are so tuckered out that you collapse by the side of the lane, put your feet up and fall asleep. Then, you dream while you listen to nature humming around you.

A crow caws away in the distance. She has seen you and her challenge is to watch you while you are in her area. If you were to get up and walk one direction she would caw one sound, but if you went the other she would caw another sound. She knows how to tell everyone that matters to her, who you are and where you are going. There are eyes watching you that you could never imagine. Unseen eyes monitor you from many places. And, so it is with the world. You may think that you are alone, but you are never alone. There is always someone or something following you and watching you.

If you have been watching the ABC TV series Lost, you will appreciate part of what I mean.

There are many ways to be lost. One of the aspects about being lost, however, is that you have an opportunity of self discovery. At some point, usually from fear, your senses are heightened and you have to think if you are to find out where you are. Generally, you have enough where-with-all to discover how to find your self. You look for the smallest of clues to determine a direction from which you have travelled. If all else fails, you retreat as far back along the route that you think you have made and try to guess which turnings you took.

Another way you can get lost is when you have prepared something, as on the computer, and the electricity goes out suddenly. Everything that you have been working on is lost. You may have spent hours on the work that you were doing. The great thing about having been lost, and we all lose ourselves at some time, is that having has the pain of being lost we learn to avoid being lost the next time. Or, at least, we learn to avoid the worst consequences of being lost. It is important to ask for directions if you are lost. It is important to set marks on your route if you are travelling in unfamiliar territory. Even mental marks helps as in remembering yourself for a half second and recording your surroundings and yourself within those surroundings.

Economists Search For Equilibrium

BICKLEIGH CASTLE

A constant theme in economic thought has been that of equilibrium. But, the search for equilibrium was always elusive. Even Karl Marx in his Das Kapital was under the illusion that an economic system would at some time reach an equilibrium. Others knew better, and it was Joseph Schumpeter, a Harvard professor and economic historian, who was studying business cycles, concluded that the capitalist economic system, and for that matter any economic system did not linger in an equilibrium. He even felt that there was no dynamic equilibrium, and pointed to new commodities as the reason. Economies are constantly subject to innovation he wrote.

The most famous macro economist of all time John Maynard Keynes also concluded that economies rarely reached an equilibrium. This did not stop classical and neoclassical economists from assuming equilibrium in their models. What resulted was the great schism between those that assumed economies would attain equilibrium and those who in face of severe criticism maintained that economics were constantly adjusting and generally were to be found in a state of moving disequilibrium, albeit dynamic.

What amazes one after reading all this history of thought is that the economists who proposed equilibrium did not seem very sophisticated at political science, and after all the field had been named political economy. The reason is obvious. For if you shared one view of politics and wanted to maintain the status quo, whether you were communist, liberal, or conservative, you would want to view the economic world as being in equilibrium.

That you were totally wrong did not matter. You wished to believe in the myth of economic equilibrium. So entrenched were the ideas of the equilibrium people that they would stop students from getting post graduate degrees if they viewed the economic world as in disequilibrium. The left wingers and the right wingers would select leaders and they would agree amongst themselves to maintain an equilibrium of graduates who exposed there respective views of the economy and indirectly political philosophy.

Thus in return for two PhD graduates of equilibrium there would be in return two PhD graduates of disequilibrium. So the result was a state of equilibrium, you might think. But no! The problem was that no matter how much you avoided reality by allowing only mathematical models of equilibrium to pass a PhD, you would end up in disequilibrium because more students wanted to show that economies were in disequilibrium. So to solve the problem, PhD graduates proposing dissertations that exceeded the number of those producing theses of equilibrium were stopped from getting PhDs by being failed, or discouraged, or told to do more work so that they waited five years or more in a queue before attaining their PhDs. Such was the state of disequilibrium at the best British universities in the world when I was a post graduate student.

What is it like now?

Think Positively in All That you Do - A Gitomer World

DID YOU EAT MY MOTHER ?

One of the most positive individuals to hit the book stands in recent years, deposing Norman Vincent Peale, is an author going by the name of Jeffery Gitomer. What makes Gitomer so absolutely appealing is that he thinks that one should work and that working hard is good for you. It may even help you create a positive attitude in all that you do. Gitomer says that watching the news is not a great way to develop a positive attitude. Turn the TV off and study how you can really help other people.

A Review of Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

If you are a stock market investor, this is the book you should be reading if you have not done so already. It would have been easier for you had you absorbed what Taleb has to say many years ago, but now you have had a taste of the negative, you can turn your efforts into the positive. I remember attending the lectures of John Kenneth Galbraith who spoke often of stock market crashes. His ideas were based on a thorough reading and analysis of the 1929 crash. Investing in the stock market is gambling, but it may be the only way that the 'small' investor has to get a portion of the capitalist economic pie. The rewards of investing in stocks and shares can be considerable, but the small investor has always to be aware of the sharks and black holes.

What Taleb does very well is show how self deception can dominate stock market and for that matter credit market advice giving to the point where it absorbs most of the capital of investors who lose almost everything. I might add, in one foul swoop. That's the danger, the risk, the eventual out turn from speculation that is completely outside one's control. We see the Donald Trumps of this world and expect that he has some secrets that he can share. The only problem is that a host of Trump wannabees have lost heavily in the property market. What's Trump's secret you wonder?

Well, you need to read Taleb's book and you will begin to understand how those investing also hedge. Hedging is when you take the risk out of investing realizing that you are not an expert investor or adviser, but part of a largely random process that can be terribly destructive of valuation of capital and almost everything else.

In the UK, the individual in the civil service who mailed a package containing a disk with people's private information thought that he knew the mail system, that it was secure. The upshot was that the individual took a risk and almost everyone in the country, almost 25 million people, lost big time. It would have been better for the government to install a fail safe system of auditing so as not to risk people's private information. This is what hedging is all about. Its about making sure that you are not exposed to risk. You carry on your business. You make money. But, you do not take unnecessary risk.

In foreign exchange operations, CLS Bank, does this very task of eliminating certain kinds of risk. FX dealers hedge their currency positions all the time so that their banks are not exposed to unnecessary risk. When I worked in Barclays Bank we were put on courses that showed us how to build a currency book and maturity ladder that got you where you wanted to be, largely without risk taking. That's the way money remains with you.

This is what the IMF SDR valuation is all about. Smart countries follow the SDR valuations of their currencies so as to avoid risk, avoid Asian financial implosion! What do you think China is doing? If it followed the advice of the US authorities it might be taking unnecessary risk so it has to monitor the value of its currency against all the major currencies. This way it avoids the rsik of an implosion and disasterous surprise and gradually moves in the direction it needs to move. Look at the Chinese exchange rate. Is is moving in the right direction? This is a question that you need to ask in a period of wild speculation in oil as a commodity.

The Canadian Identity - Does One Exist?

Au Canada, l'idéal est que des personnes soient capables de parler les deux langues couramment. Je suis coupable de pouvoir parler couramment une seule langue (anglais), et les autres langues moins couramment (français). Ce n'est pas parce que je n'ai pas essayé de parler français. J'ai vécu au Québec pendant une bonne partie de ma vie, et pendant que j'étais là, je parle français la plupart du temps. C'est avec regret que j'ai quitté le Québec après avoir obtenu son diplôme de l'Université McGill, mais l'impact du Québec sur ma façon de penser est incomparable, même aujourd'hui.

Canada, et le Québec en particulier, m'a appris à penser d'une façon très particulière, combinant la science et la philosophie. Elle a peut-être été les hivers froids quand on a beaucoup de temps pour être seul et réfléchir, mais je ne le pense pas. Je me souviens de mes amis à Longueuil au club de tennis qui ont toléré mon pauvre français. Je me souviens de Jean Beliveux, le joueur de hockey Canadien, qui était un merveilleux voisin. Il a signé une pétition pour l'accès au centre commercial, qui a sauvé de nombreuses minutes nous arriver à des commerces. Je me souviens de mon patron à Westons Boulangerie, qui m'a appris comment utiliser un chiffon brun et bleu, ce qui m'a valu mes frais de scolarité à McGill.

Je me souviens de mes collègues de travail, les francophones eux qui m'ont appris leur philosophie de la tolérance et l'acceptation, ainsi que de la bonne humeur. Je me souviens de la désastreuse St-Jean-Baptiste qui a été celectration struct par un orage féroce et de nombreuses autres ont été blessées. Pour être honnête, j'adore le Québec et son peuple. C'est en partie ce que signifie être Canadien. C'est un pays d'une immense tolérance. Je pense que les Canadiens français tolérer beaucoup de Canadiens anglais, probablement plus que les Anglais réalisent. Il est important pour les Québécois parlent anglais et français. Pourquoi? Parce que, en parlant les deux langues, elles peuvent montrer à tous ce que les bonnes gens qu'ils sont vraiment.

L'identité canadienne - t-on exister?

Les Canadiens posent souvent la question de savoir si ou non une identité canadienne existe. Ayant vécu à Québec pendant près d'une décennie, comme j'étais jeune. Ayant vécu aussi en Ontario pendant de nombreuses années. Ayant vécu au Royaume-Uni depuis de nombreuses années. Et, ayant vécu aux États-Unis depuis de nombreuses années, je crois que je suis assez qualifié pour répondre à cette question en l'envisageant sous plusieurs points de vue.

Mon intérêt est dans les livres qui racontent une bonne histoire et de développer notre philosophie, et c'est pourquoi j'ai fondé Togwells Publishing.

Togwells

Un judicieux endroit pour en apprendre davantage sur quelques-uns des meilleurs livres à lire sur science, la philosophie, la religion, la connaissance, la mythologie et de l'apprentissage
Un site inspiré par la visite d'éthéré et de présences et de fantômes de l'Ordre de la Lumière.

Bienvenue aux amateurs de livres!

Togwells favorise livres éducatifs et inspirants films qui engagent le lecteur à une réflexion indépendante sur les nombreuses variations et orientations de la science et de la religion. C'est à travers la lecture de livres et visionner des films que l'on peut acquérir des connaissances dans la multitude des voies supérieures à un mode de vie positif qui, autrement, Être manquée.

Togwells fournit des passerelles supérieur à la pensée, de détection et de raisonnement.

Pennydrop se réfère à une tradition d'ouverture et de processus dans lequel le novice acquiert à ethereal idées notions clés de la vie d'extension et de transformation. Pennies que La chute du Wu vous donner un aperçu de la mystères de votre être. AW Lac vous accueille pour étudier avec lui Le monde de l'inconnaissable Wu magicien de la danse et de la pensée taoïste unreacheable royaume de Wu-wu, l'état de néant.

Togwells Publishing a sa propre série de livres et de films complémentaires à l'élaboration de populaire web blog écrit par AW Lake, l'auteur de la Wuh Lax série de livres et productrice de la série de Lax Wuh Films.

Wooh ou Wu est une très vieille mythologie associée en partie, avec le taoïsme, mais également utiles pour ceux qui s'intéressent à la physique et à danser avec Dieu notre créateur. Unreacheable Elle représente une force qui transends notre être. On peut seulement deviner l'intervention de Wu dans Notre existence mondaine. Wooh vient du monde embrassant tous de la lumière et des ténèbres cherche à bannir de notre pensée.

Wuh Lax et les personnages de la série Lax WUH de livres sont copyright (c) 2007 by AW Lake, Tous droits réservés.

Wooh embrasse enseignements de nombreuses philosophies taoïsme, le bouddhisme, le christianisme, l'islam, l'hindouisme, le yoga, le confucianisme, le judaïsme, le soufisme, la Quatrième Voie, le stoïcisme, Druidism et une longue liste d'autres. Out of an unknowable singularity is our sentient world created over and over again again. Sur une singularité est inconnaissable doués de notre monde créé, encore et encore.

English

Canadians often ask the question whether or not a Canadian identity exists. Having lived in Quebec for almost a decade as I was growing up. Having lived also in Ontario for many years. Having lived in the UK for many years. And, having lived in United States for many years, I think that I am fairly qualified to answer this question looking at it from many points of view.

In Canada, the ideal is for people to be able to speak two languages fluently. I am guilty of being able to speak only one language fluently (English), and the other language less fluently (French). This is not because I have not tried to speak French. I lived in Quebec for much of my life and while I was there I spoke French much of the time. It was with regret that I left Quebec upon graduation from McGill, but the impact of Quebec on my way of thinking is unmistakable, even today.

Canada, and Quebec in particular, taught me how to think in a very particular way combining science and philosophy. It may have been the cold winters when one had lots of time to be alone and ponder, but I don't think so. I remember my friends in Longueuil at the tennis club who tolerated my poor french. I remember Jean Beliveux, the Canadien hockey player, who was a wonderful neighbour. He signed a petition for access to the local mall, which saved us many minutes getting to the shops. I remember my boss at Westons Bakery, who taught me how to use a brown and blue rag, which earned me my tuition at McGill. I remember my work colleagues, the French speaking ones who taught me their philosophy of tolerance and acceptance, as well as of good humour. I remember the disasterous St. Jean Baptiste celectration that was struct by a ferocious electrical storm and many were injured. To be honest, I love Quebec and its people. That is partly what being Canadian means. It is a country of enormous tolerance. I think the French Canadians tolerate a lot from English Canadians, probably more than the English realize. It is importance the Quebecers to speak both English and French. Why? Because by speaking both languages, they can show everyone what good people they really are.

My interest is in books that tell a good story and develop our philosophy, and that is why I founded Togwells Publishing.

Togwells

A sensible place to learn more about some of the best books to read on science, philosophy, religion, knowledge, mythology and learning.

A site inspired by and visited by ethereal presences and by ghosts of the College of Light.

Welcome book lovers!

Togwells promotes educational books and inspiring films that engage the reader to think independently about the many variations and directions of science and religion. It is through reading books and viewing films that one can acquire insights into the multitude of superior pathways to positive living that would otherwise be missed.

Togwells provides gateways to higher thinking, sensing and reasoning.

Pennydrop refers to a tradition and process of initiation in which the novice to ethereal ideas acquires key notions for life extension and transformation. The pennies that drop from the Wu give you insight into the mysteries of your being. AW Lake welcomes you to explore with him the world of the unknowable Wu dancing wizard of taoist thought and the unreacheable realm of Wu-wu, the state of nothingness.

Wuh Lax and the characters of the WUH Lax series of books are copyright (c) 2007 by AW Lake, All Rights Reserved.

Togwells Publishing has its own series of books and films complementary to the development of a popular web blog written by AW Lake, the author of the Wuh Lax series of books and producer of the Wuh Lax series of films.

Wooh or Wu is a very ancient mythology associated in part with Taoism, but also relevant to those interested in physics and in dancing with God our creator. It represents an unreacheable force that transends our being. We can only guess at the intervention of Wu into our worldly existence. Wooh comes from the all embracing world of light and seeks to banish darkness from our thought.

Wooh embraces teachings of many philosophies Taoism, Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Yoga, Confucianism, Judaism, Sufism, the Fourth Way, Stoicism, Druidism and a long list of others.

The Now as a Work Concept

World famous guru speaks and writes about being in 'the now'. Philosopher listens intently being an expert in 'the now'. Guru says that people need to disassociate themselves from matters that coddle ego and distance them from being in 'the now'. Philosopher ponders idea of 'the now'. In 'the now', what is, is.

The problem with you, philosopher or scientist, is that you are not in 'the now'.

People who are not in 'the now' cause the wars and problems that the world has seen throughout its history. Guru claims that in the new world when people are all in 'the now' a wondrous new age begins. Is this Zen and has America moved towards 'the Now'?

I am reminded how similar the now is to remembering oneself. There is an art to the enlightened master of meditations. It is helpful to realize that the journey of meditation occurs over several of one's lives.

As you mature and have a partner, use the methods that have been successful in love and intimate relationships.