Join me on Tuesday, 3pm PDT when I’ll be speaking with Jane Johnson on this: http://bit.ly/sVvCD

Sacramento announced that it is closing 80% of California’s State Parks by Labor Day to save the 1/10th of 1% of state General Fund money the parks, already cut back to the bone, are allotted yearly.

Factor in the estimated 230% of both lost revenue as well as the millions of dollars that would be needed to rehab the parks when (if) they do re-open, the devastating consequences to public mental and physical health that park closure would mean, and this maneuver is simply sheer idiocy.

Rather than belabor the point, I’m simply pasting below the letter I sent my state representatives. All the facts are in it, as well as the link to the State Park campaign online where you can send your own letters. It’s crazy, it’s insane, and it makes no sense. I offer a more wideranging view of what’s going on, plus one workable solution below:

Take Action Here: http://www.calparks.org/takeaction/

Join the Facebook Campaign: http://www.facebook.com/pages/California-State-Parks-Foundation/51483280208

Here’s my letter, please feel free to use it in its entirety if you like, to send to your California State Representatives:

Dear …,

As a strong supporter of our state park system, I am writing to express outrage to the Governor’s proposal to eliminate core funding for our state park system that will close virtually all parks.

I am a psychologist and have made a lifetime study of the behavior of people when removed from the resources of nature. The results of those deprived of greenspace is devastating, not only on personal mental health but on societal behavior patterns.

Persons deprived of their connection with nature withdraw, become less concerned about their fellow human beings, more callous in their behaviors and more predisposed towards violence. It is no coincidence that some of the worst riots and gang violence occur in paved cities with little access to green space. If parks are closed, a mental health disaster would result, to say nothing of the financial disaster this “cost saving” move would engender.

Additionally, the following facts need to be taken into consideration:

(Source: http://www.calparks.org. Observations & additional facts, mine)

1. The General Fund budget that state parks receive account for less than 1/10 of one percent of the entire state budget.

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OBSERVATION & SOLUTION: Stripping the state parks will not solve the budget problem, nor be in any way a significant contributor to defraying state costs. Indeed, it will end up costing us far, far more.

The citizens were never asked if they would consider raising park fees. I for one, would be happy to pay higher fees to be allowed to access my state’s park system. Raise the rate four to six times current rates. Such a move would more than make the park system pay for itself. It might prevent some from attending, but still beats the cost of a traditional family vacation for cash-strapped Californians.
————–

2. Last year alone, there were over 80 million visitors to state parks – and all indications are that this year was going to be even higher.

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IMPORTANT OBSERVATION: California is KNOWN for our state park system. Thousands of out of state vacationers come to California specifically to visit our park systems. Count on a drastic reduction in tourism revenue with our state parks closed.
—————

3. For every dollar that funds the parks, $2.35 is returned to the state’s General Fund through economic activities in the communities surrounding the parks.

That means eliminating all funding for state parks could actually result in the state losing over $350 million dollars in revenue.

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VERY IMPORTANT CONSIDERATIONS: Sacramento needs to take into account the funds needed to put parks on standby maintenance mode, as well as the millions of dollars that will be needed for cleanup and restoration when parks are reopened. In absence of adequate park staff, our now pristine parks will turn into homeless camps and rubbish drops. Parks will also be subject to multiple forms of abuse, such as illegal drug manufacture and all-terrain vehicle traffic, by those for whom a locked gate - and care for the environment - is no barrier.

In addition, locked bathrooms will force such persons to use the local environs for toileting purposes, thus creating a potentially devastating sanitation nightmare. Epidemics start when human waste comes into contact with running water and ground water. Factor in the nightmare this public health issue will create and for the sake of public safety, keep our parks open.
————–

Our state parks exist to provide educational and recreational opportunities, preserve important cultural and historic resources, and aid the state in protecting key natural resources.  They also serve a critical function in providing respite for the state’s residents in times like these - when economic circumstances keep Californians closer to home, looking for low-cost ways to vacation and spend time with family.

As I have said, the need of human beings to interact with the natural world is paramount in preservation of the public’s mental health. If our children grow up without access to nature, what kind of human beings will they turn out to be? Will they even care about preserving the environment for the future as their parents have? What one is not exposed to, one cares little for. Such persons lack the finer feelings that can only be evoked in nature. And in truth, we are lesser beings for such disconnection. That is why this potential closure of California parks is so deeply frightening.

This is exactly the wrong time to be proposing to eliminate the state’s core commitment to this world-class resource.  Not only would removing the state’s General Fund support for state parks likely close the park system, it would cause an additional economic ripple effect to the state’s budget and to local economies.  The state would lose the ability to generate revenue from popular parks, which drives local economies.  As you learned during last year’s proposal to close state parks, every $1 that funds the state park system returns $2.35 to the state’s General Fund, largely through economic activities in communities surrounding state parks.

I urge you in the STRONGEST POSSIBLE TERMS to seek creative solutions that provide adequate revenue to keep our state parks open and accessible to all Californians.

Sincerely,
Your Name
Your street address

Being a wizardly sort, Jan lives in Berkeley. If you’re a magically gifted world-changer in the San Francisco Bay area, and need help changing yourself, he’s definitely your man. I give him my highest recommendation and you a referral to his website here for more information.

A Little Night Music…

Henrietta Lacks, mother of the immortal HeLa cells

This particular evening, Jan was speaking of immortality and mentioned the cancer cells of Henrietta Lacks, branded “HeLa” cells by scientists. I’d never heard of Henrietta nor her world famous cell cultures and finding out about them makes me want to spread the word rather like HeLa cells have spread…worldwide.

Henrietta Lacks was a homemaker living in Baltimore in 1951 when she was diagnosed with, and died of, virulent cervical cancer. During diagnosis, cells were taken from her tumor without her knowledge or consent and grown in some of medical science’s first cancer cell research.

Researchers found that HeLa cells had extraordinary properties. Unlike cells from other donors, they grew on everything. They grew out of control. They consumed the growth medium in their test tubes and Petri dishes and grew outside of them to infect lab equipment, entire labs and finally, the world. HeLa cells can survive freezing, dehydration, starvation, radiation and deep space. They are known to be virtually indestructible.

(There could quite literally be some of Henrietta Lacks in that glass you’re drinking from, right now. Mind that small speck
on the rim there. Yes…that one.)

Because these were the first cells to be cultured for study, labs across the world wanted samples, which were grown and shipped to Russia, Paris, Chile, Amsterdam, London, Reykjavik and many other labs. And from there due to their extraordinary growth properties, they spread outward like a virus, worldwide.

HeLa cells were used to first culture then find the cure for polio and other diseases. They have learned to masquerade as cells from different parts of the body, and even as different diseases. In one notable incident, documented by author Harold Schmeck, American medical researchers had the unenviable task of notifying

“…Soviet scientists that the cells in which their viruses were growing were not even derived from Russian cancer patients. The cells actually originated from Henrietta Lacks…”

This interesting yet devastating property of HeLa meant that worldwide, contamination needed to be assumed, studies needed to be trashed, intense cleanroom protocols needed to be established and millions of dollars of research had to be done all over again. A commission was formed to contain the spread of HeLa, and today, genetic sequencing ensures the purity of research from HeLa contamination.

Now that you know some of the background, we’ll be picking up this thread in later posts. As Jan and I debated, immortality is in the eye of the beholder - be it the individual or the collective. But for now…

Enter the Goddess…

Crazy? No. While this may all sound like science fiction, it is most assuredly science fact. Though the woman herself perished, her cells have achieved true immortality. HeLa just can’t be stopped, so in a way, Henrietta Lacks has become the first known modern Immortal.

And in an interesting twist which brings in threads of my history in Northern European shamanism, Hela is also the name of the Nordic goddess of the Dead. She is many things but poignantly, presides over the realm of those who died disenfranchised, of disease or old age - not honorably as the ancients would have had it, in battle.

The Norse feared a death at Hela’s hands. In Odin’s realm of Valholl (Valhalla), a warrior would fight the good fight all day, eat, drink and carouse with comrades all night. What more could one want in the afterlife? Helheim was comparatively boring, and decrepitude was a dishonorable estate for one who previously went a-viking. The famous poet-warrior and Paget’s disease sufferer, Egill Skallagrimsson wrote bitterly in his old age, of relegation to shivering by the hearth, subject to the whims of mere women (in this case, his cook):

‘Old haltered horse I waver,
Bald-head I weakly fall:
Hollow my failing leg-bones,
The fount of hearing dry.
Blind near the blaze I wander,
Beg of the fire-maid pardon,
Crave for a seat. Such sorrow
From sightless eyes I bear…’

Though he feared Hela and what he would have seen as death without honor, Egill welcomed her embrace when family and peers began to die. In Sona Torrek, after the death and interment at Digra-ness (the Skallagrim burial mound) of his son Bodvar, Egill writes:

‘Hard am I beset;
Whom Hela, the sister
Of Odin’s fell captive,
On Digra-ness waits.
Yet shall I gladly
With right good welcome
Dauntless in bearing
Her death-blow bide.’

(citation: W. C. Green, 1893, Kings College, Cambridge)

Hela is typically depicted, as in this image by the artist Thorskegga Thorn, as half white, living, and half black, dead. Nordic shamans befriend Hela and go through the death experience yet live to gain great knowledge for the Well of Wyrd (meaning Fate, and All-That-Is) lies in her underground realm. The parallels to the contemporary HeLa phenomenon are uncanny, and perhaps no coincidence.

Goddess, thy name is Henrietta Lacks.

Which brings me to the main theme of this afternoon’s symposium:

In what ways will you achieve True Immortality?

I’m not talking cellular immortality (which includes having children) but other ways. What will you leave behind you that will go on after your macrobody ceases to exist?

• As the great philosophers, what immortal thoughts, questions and other cognitions will you leave behind?
• As the developers of cures, what patterns or processes that help others will you bequeath the world?
• What other things will survive you - perhaps forever?

Here is a place to let the world know, and get the word out about the value you will leave beyond your physical death. You can do that in the comment form below and we can continue this most interesting and provocative discussion…

I’m quasi-back from my six week hiatus from email though not back in the office. What I deduced is that I need far more time offline, off email and incubating the juicy things bubbling on the back and middle burners in my life. On the front burner? Family, friends, real experiences (ie; offline, in the real world, like sand squishing between my toes and taking a whole hour to follow the flightpath of just one gull at the beach) and very long bouts of meditation. Lots more swimming. Softness of mittie ears rubbing affectionately against my ankles in the bower. Sunshine and moonlight. Yes.

Others are experiencing this need to unplug, in increasing amounts. The more I enjoyed my own vacation from electronical the more people began to gripe about it. Two items on the news the day I came back to watching a little limited tv - one on having teens unplug their cells and computers for 10 days (the teens actually recommended it to their peers) and another on “Staycation my ass, I’m saving up to go to freakin’ HAWAII. I DESERVE IT.” by an employee (one of many) on the edge. Scary, kids, but not all that unusual. We’re fed up, had it and not about to take anymore.

Here’s some help. Alex Fayle is guest writing on Men With Pens. He’s doing good work teaching soloprenurs to unplug and take real vacations. Read his sage words, they make sense. Then drop down and see what Byron Kati has to say below this:

First Alex’s blog post: http://bit.ly/17WE3W

And another, from which I quote: “frickin’ learn to delegate!” http://bit.ly/2Y0vvu

Then proceed on to a fix Alex offers in the form of inspiring emails designed to get you relaxing and recreating no matter where you are: http://bit.ly/8va00

“But Maryam, I *can’t* just uproot my life and go, what would people think??!”

I’m now getting this on a regular basis from coaching clients who just can’t see their way clear to making time for themselves. “What are you, meshugginah? Crazy? I got stuff to do and people to see. It would hurt my business if they thought I was being a slacker or a flake by taking time off for myself. That’s nuts!”  Sometimes it takes a doctor telling them to chill out or face a double bypass.

Or we could all just truly listen to our bodies.

Are you listening to your body? To your heart? Are heart and head in congruence?

Byron Katie has some interesting words that parallel my experience on this. She says that another person’s opinion of you is never personal, because it’s not really about you, it’s totally about them.

What YOU think and feel about things is about you and is my business. And what someone else thinks and feels is THEIR business. If I get upset about how you feel about me, I’m minding your business. And if I’m minding in your business, how can I be conscious, alive and present to my own life and business? The answer is that I can’t.

So ask yourself again, can you let go of others opinions of you? And if so, when?

Can you listen to the subtle voices of your body, and heart before they become the scream of the ambulance siren? When?

And anything that wouldn’t allow that to happen, you can uncreate, dissolve and release. Pulse your three cues:

yes-yes-yes-yes-yes-yes-yes…seeing the rose opening its petals to all possibility…feeling the delicious deep relaxation sweeping over you and clearing the way to manifesting magic in your life.

What other wild, wonderful, wacky and delicious things are possible?

Remember, there are no limits…

Ted:
“This article is utter bull shit. Every one of those jobs is full of stress. They are either very stressful, too low paying to create financial stress (Maryam note: I think he means “too low paying SO they create financial stress”), or both. Try being an accountant. Every calculation you make must be accurate! And tax season is the worst.

Even being a masseuse causes your own muscles to tighten up. Who massages you? And a teacher? Try making ends meet on a teachers salary when you’ve baby sat a bunch of adolescents all day. You do no one any favors by propogating this drivel. It’s obviously written by someone who’s sitting at home, drinking tea and out of touch with the real world. Why? Because she’s figured out a way to make a stress free living by working 3 hours a day by writing useless garbage. I’d bet she’s living on a farm raising toddlers and chickens.”

(~*~*~*~*~ pause for interlude music ~*~*~*~*~ )

Hi Ted,
Can I recommend you take a chill pill? The vitriol here only indicates that YOU are stressed.  Your outlook effects your experience of life a great deal. My accountant is happy as a lark right now. It’s his outlook. He enjoys tax season and revels in the work it brings. If you’re an accountant and you don’t enjoy it, then you’re in the wrong job. Change your job to reduce  stress. It’s entirely doable, no matter how closed all avenues might seem. (see the end of this article)

You’re also making a lot of judgements that may or many not have any basis in reality. And your experience may be atypical. So…why “propagate such drivel” yourself?

To answer a few of your rants: who massages you? Your buddies - as a massage therapist, you develop cooperative relationships with other massage therapists. Been there, done that.  Teacher? Been there too - high school English. Most teachers who are in it as a career are doing it for love of the job..and don’t view it as “baby sitting”  - you demean teachers by this suggestion. The fact that you can read and write you owe to a teacher. Don’t disrespect them by suggesting their jobs amount to babysitting.

But before you jump on your keys to write a retort, I must correct the worst misperceptions you list: the job of “mom to toddlers” and also that of raising farm animals are two of the most time-consuming and stressful on the planet. Both require early hours until way late at night and in the middle of the night when a child or animal is ill or a large animal is giving birth. (woman and farmer? Resources here) There’s no calling in a workmate to handle your load when you “don’t feel like” going in to work or are sick yourself.

Moms and stock farmers work through it all - no exceptions.  Respect.

The next time you eat a steak, chop or chicken breast think about that. The next time you take a breath or do anything with your mind or body, you can thank your mother for that. Like her or not, you wouldn’t be here without her and whomever raised you to adulthood. If you were as angry then as you exhibit here…it probably wasn’t a 100% pleasant job.

Finally, the article didn’t say zero stress, just less stress. Perhaps I should adjust the title (already done)…but really, is all the venom-spouting necessary? If destressing is important to you then I recommend:

http://maryamwebster.com/stressrelief

or your favorite aerobic exercise.

Also, know that you can step away from this and into your own Unlimited Self, where the problems, stress and upset don’t exist.  You started out in life Unlimited, able to make your life anything you choose. You still have that power and that choice, no matter what your station in life or how crappy your job or living situation. Ask yourself  - “Would an Unlimited being choose to remain this angry, upset and stressed-out?” More here:

http://ethosmethod.ning.com

Have a good one Ted - Be Good to You!

.

http://selfcaremastery.com/maryam

and a radio interview I’m doing for Connecting Women, I will be completely offline AND off email - our offices, help desk and all connection outlets will be closed.

I’d like to share a lesson from this that I have learned as it will be beneficial for anyone to think about. That is, we have many yardsticks in our lives - many ways of measuring the shoulds and musts. And though we may have come to the point of removing the words “should” and “must” from our vocabulary, those very ideas exist in our molecular structure as strong encodings.

In my case, the coding was around “I *should* be able to rest from a week of work in the two days of the weekend and be okay” and “I *should* be able to  work during the day from 9-5 as others do”.

But my system is not set up that way - it never has  been. I’m an owl, not a lark. A small percentage of the extremely creative (some call them “renaissance people”) have biorhythms that predispose them to work at their best, and to high proficiency on a variety of topics, later in the day. Voltaire, DaVinci, Michelangelo, Tesla and Bill Clinton are among those whose bodies also favored a night-owl lifestyle. I work best in the late afternoon and evening, sleep around 6 - 7 hours at most (7 is almost too much and 8 is definitely oversleeping) and usually work on several projects at once by preference. And I need more than two days to be “off” on the weekend.

My long-suffering workhorse parents despaired of me ever being respectable in the sleep department. I happily created in the wee hours, even as a child. Well-meaning though it was, they used every moral imperative to suggest that I was not a righteous person for being a night-owl and if I kept up “these shenanigans” I would not mature into a good upstanding citizen. Mother consulted Reverend Pegues when I was seven over this perceived fault, with the result that I was awakened every morning at 6am without fail to pray and read the Bible before school in the hopes of rehabilitating my wayward biorhythms.

It didn’t work. I slept through third period in school, refusing to be rousted, and stayed up at night until my body told me it was time to sleep. It exasperated Mother no end, but she finally gave up and when she saw that I was doing cool things - nature photography and essays in philosophy at that point.  She even briefly catered to my 10pm dinner habit  and harbored hopes that I might turn into Imogen Cunningham. No such luck though.

In the intervening years, I’ve found it’s always best to do what my body tells me it needs. When I do that, I am never sick or tired, and am always at my best and sharpest.

Late last year however,  though it was a relatively minor thing, I fell prey again to the moralizing of others around my natural biorhythms and tried to be early-to-bed-early-to-rise to join with a group of yoga friends who were all early risers and determined to make me one as well. And I mean, sunrise type early, greeting the day with Surya Namaskar as the sun crested the local Diablo hills.

The result was that I became out of sorts and was tired quite a lot which is very unusual for me. And even though I love writing more than life itself sometimes, computers, Twitter and email began to irritate me severely. These were cardinal signs to me that I was not honoring my body’s needs and was one of the ingredients in my decision to take a hiatus from business in January.

I naievely thought that my break would begin in January, but no, tying up ends so I actually could take a break took well into February. Then a conference came in March with heavy email, Twitter involvement and text messaging before and after, pushing things even further out.

So drop-dead earnest here, April is my month off. Completely away from the computer. Even cellphone. Don’t send me an EM, IM, DM, TxT or Skypee because I’m nailing the keyboard to the desk upside down and locking the mouse in a drawer. Not kidding.

I’m taking this unplugged break both for my own self-care and health, as well as research for an interesting article, or it might even be a book that I am writing. It keeps extending itself so it could well be the next book. <grin> More much later about that though.

The Moral of the Story Is… that there is no moral imperative around what the body needs. Each of us is wonderfully diverse in our unique makeup.  We all have slightly to profoundly different needs for food, water, sunshine or darkness, sleep or waking, downtime,  romance-time, exercise and alone-time.

That old biblical verse about the plank in your own eye comes to bear here. If someone in your life isn’t configured the same way you are don’t bring your judgements against them. Take care of your own needs and support each other to extreme and joyous acts of self-care, no matter what the hands on the clock say, no matter how different you might be to each others.

Diversity is what makes the world go ’round, be interesting and create genius.

Meanwhile, have a *beautiful* and *joyous* spring!

With Love,
Maryam

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