This Sunday, we inquired into slavery and Freedom. We distinguished emancipation from the possibility of Freedom, in the extraordinary sense. We find that there are aspects of slavery and Freedom hitherto neglected, or so it seems.

The question to consider this week is, “What enslaves me now?” Other ways of phrasing the question may be “In what ways am I not Free to Be?” or “What is impeding my Freedom?”

We spoke of a section of US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s State of the Union Address, delivered January 11, 1944. This is often simply called “The Second Bill of Rights,” and once constituted the Progressive Agenda in America. Here is that section:

It is our duty now to begin to lay the plans and determine the strategy for the winning of a lasting peace and the establishment of an American standard of living higher than ever before known. We cannot be content, no matter how high that general standard of living may be, if some fraction of our people—whether it be one-third or one-fifth or one-tenth- is ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill housed, and insecure.

This Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the protection of certain inalienable political rights—among them the right of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. They were our rights to life and liberty.

As our Nation has grown in size and stature, however—as our industrial economy expanded—these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.

We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. “Necessitous men are not free men.[1]” People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.

In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all regardless of station, race, or creed.

Among these are:

The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the Nation;

The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;

The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;

The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;

The right of every family to a decent home;

The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;

The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;

The right to a good education.

All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.

America’s own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for our citizens. For unless there is security here at home there cannot be lasting peace in the world.

One of the great American industrialists of our day—a man who has rendered yeoman service to his country in this crisis-recently emphasized the grave dangers of “rightist reaction” in this Nation. All clear-thinking businessmen share his concern. Indeed, if such reaction should develop—if history were to repeat itself and we were to return to the so-called “normalcy” of the 1920′s—then it is certain that even though we shall have conquered our enemies on the battlefields abroad, we shall have yielded to the spirit of Fascism here at home.[3]

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[1] In the English Property Law case, captioned Vernon v Bethell (1762) 28 ER 838, it was affirmed that there could be no restriction on the equity of redemption. In justifying this rule, Lord Henley LC made the famous observation that, “necessitous[2]” men are not, truly speaking, free men, but, to answer a present exigency, will submit to any terms that the crafty may impose upon them.”

[2] necessitous |nəˈsesitəs| adjective
(of a person) lacking the necessities of life; needy.
ORIGIN early 17th cent.: from French nécessiteux, or from necessity + ous.

[3] http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/archives/address_text.html

PHISBE is an acronym for Pictures of How It Should BE. These pictures are painted mostly in broad strokes, although certain areas are rendered in exceedingly fine detail. The medium is language, and the model is one’s preferences, expectations, values, ideals, and strongly held opinions.

PHISBE are persistent elements of one’s personality or identity, providing a self-styled means by which we are able to identify ourselves to ourselves and to differentiate ourselves from others. These PHISBE clutter the space in which we exist, leaving no room for possibilities or the creation of anything. Each of us has developed a huge portfolio of ideas and images of how things should look. These pictures seem to be such an inherent part of who we are that we assume that they are reasonable — and that any reasonable person would agree. We think that it is commonly understood that something should go a certain way or look a certain way, so we leave these preferences largely uncommunicated. It never occurs to us that we would need to talk about them. We put together these PHISBE from bits of the past: scraps of memories and decisions that are unique to each of us. We started making these pictures when we were very, very young, and we have been refining them ever since. Most of us have had these pictures and ideas for so long that we pretend they are eternal Truths, when we have simply forgotten that we made them all up.

Often in ‘significant’ relationships, which people consider ‘serious,’ we are willing to punish the ones we love, or even scuttle the relationship, when our perceptions do not match our PHISBE. It is useful to note that our perceptions of what is happening are distinct from what is happening, as our perceptions are filtered through our sensory structures, interpretive structures and memory structures. It is also constructive to consider that our PHISBE are unique to each of us, and we have not communicated (or communicated fully) what we are expecting life to look like. When life does not match our expectations, we tend to believe something is wrong and we resist it. We often place responsibility for discrepancies between our perceptions and our PHISBE on people, institutions or entities that are external to ourselves.

Both one’s perceptions and one’s PHISBE are products of internal processes. No one external to yourself can ever be held responsible for your internal processes. No one has ever ‘made you angry’ or upset you, no matter how much you may want it to be otherwise. They did whatever they did, and then you processed it through your PHISBE (it only takes a second) and produced an upset or a reaction of anger. Whenever you begin to think that something should be some other way than the way it is, consider that you made that up. Of course, it should not be any other way than the way it is. If it should be some other way, it would be that way, but it is not that way. It is this way, which is always, already the way it should be. It is perfect.

Many people, upon reading this, may complain, “Oh, that is so fatalistic. We should always try to make things better. Some things should be changed: poverty, war, exploitation, oppression, abuse, disease” — the list could go on. This sort of complaint is ordinary, deeply mired in PHISBE, and has never in the history of humanity made a difference. In the present moment, everything is perfect — whole, complete, not lacking any essential part. It is useful to notice that being perfect is distinct from desirable, flawless or idyllic, and is independent of one’s values and opinions. Life does not have to be fun or entertaining to be perfect. All is perfect in this present moment, whether you like it or not. No one can change the present moment. It is too late; this is how things turned out. One cannot change what is, no matter what we believe or pretend. Still, one can, here and now, create what currently is not and commit to having it be what is. In other words, at any time, one may create the future. In the moment of creation, the future transforms into an inspiring new context in which to hold the content of this present moment.

Mostly, people are not creating futures, instead choosing (accidentally) to suffer about apparently present moments that fail to correspond, in every detail, to some PHISBE from the past. In the encumbered presence of PHISBE, the capacity to create — as well as any possibility for a future — is concealed from us. Desires and demands make dramatic appearances, masquerading as possibilities, and getting in the way. Creating the future can only be accomplished in open space, devoid of PHISBE, where possibilities may be authentically deconcealed.

When you are willing to give up your PHISBE, in favor of experiencing the perfection of everything exactly the way it is, and creating inspiring possibilities and futures, you can communicate authentically with the people with whom you are related, and in so doing, you can be someone who makes a difference in the World. You would be fully alive, here and now, which is the only place and time available to us for living.

by Samantha (futuredirected)

Now for the enquête du jour…
“If an individual doesn’t think something is perfect, do they have their expectations too high?” The short response is that perfection is not a function of expectations.

As I wrote in the “Beginnings” article, the mastery of anything begins with telling the small-t truth about it: giving up the little lies and motivational self-talk that support our beliefs, opinions and romantic notions. When measured against our self-invented ratios, things show up in everyday life that fall short of our expectations. They might be tragic, terrible, awful, bad, poor, fair, marginally acceptable, good (not good enough to be good, but pretty good), and so on. That’s the ratio. Each of us has a ratio, developed over time through a process of ratiocination. Each of us has a different ratio, as each of us has had a different set of experiences and made different decisions about them. Clearly, one’s ratio is entirely from the past.

When one declares that something is “not perfect,” it is en expression of a feeling that it should be some other way. Another way of expressing this feeling might be, “I have measured this against my personal ratio of preferences and expectations, and I don’t like it, I wish it were otherwise, and I want it the way I want it,not the way it is.” This would be, at least, honest. Most people don’t want to be responsible for their preferences, they don’t want to appear to be whiny and spoiled, so they distance themselves from their declaration, and put the responsibility on something external to themselves. “IT isn’t perfect. My ratio is reasonable, and it really doesn’t have anything to do with me anyway. The imperfection is over there, with that (situation, object, person, condition, etc.).”

If there were a Gospel According to Samantha, and it had a chapter 2, it would be: “If it were supposed to be some other way, it would be that way, and it is not that way. It is this way — exactly this way — and it is perfect. What is, is and what is not, is not.” Right here and right now (and as I’ve mentioned before, this is the only place and time that one can be alive) everything is the way it is. You and me and everyone and everything are exactly the way you and me and everyone and everything are. If we are exactly as we are supposed to be, right here and right now, are we not perfect?

Here is the etymology of perfect (adj.):
c.1225 (implied in perfectiun), from O.Fr. parfit (11th Century), from L. perfectus “completed,” pp. of perficere “accomplish, finish, complete,” from per- “completely” + facere “to perform.” The verb meaning “to bring to full development” is recorded from 1398.

When something is perfect, it is complete, whole and not lacking any necessary quality or characteristic. Everything is the way it is. This is how it turned out, so far. You can create a possible future that is some other way, and constitute yourself as the possibility you create. Living into a future of your own creation is powerful, although it doesn’t mean that the present should be some other way than it is. High expectations will not change the way it is. Lowering your expectations (if such a thing is really possible) doesn’t change the way it is either. “It’s dark in here.” There is the amount of light there is, which is perfect, and there are the perfect number of lamps available. Turn one on. It’s not about your preferences or expectations. Preferences, expectations, desires and opinions can only get in the way of of happiness. They never produce happiness.  Even if your expectations are met — or exceeded — the expectations  added no value.

Some of us have difficulty recognizing ourselves and others as perfect. We are not lumps of dough in the process of becoming bread, with most of us half-baked. We are human beings, and this is our current state of completion. We arrive at this moment complete to this point. The notion that a human being could be “not perfect” crept into Western thought through medieval Christian theology, and the ridiculous notion of “original sin.” The concept of original sin is that human beings are born incomplete, lacking perfection, due to the sin of our distant ancestors, Adam and Eve. It is then up to their god, to bring them to perfection, through discipline, education, prayer and cultic practices, and so on. Original sin is not a concept presented in the Bible. It is the invention of the Medieval Scholastics, particularly the so-called saint Thomas Aquinas. It is an absurd and detrimental concept, although if you have a church and you want to make a lot of money, original sin is good for business. Hmmm. Maybe I should rethink this. No! It’s absurd!