Just a quick follow-up to my last note, regarding Holotropic Breathwork. Plus a few other reality-based ideas rattling right now in my head. <\/p>\n
Regarding Holotropic Breathwork — or actually, regarding the facilitator who gave the presentation on HT recently at our zendo — during her talk, she gave an example of the effect that the practice of holotropic breathwork has had on her life. I.e., she was driving home from work in traffic a few days after a ‘very intense’ HTB session. Somewhere along the way, she had a powerful revelation: the world is an illusion!<\/strong> But there were cars driven by fellow commuters all around her, and so she swatted that thought away with another thought: “Najiah, not now!!”<\/p>\n I.e., she was too busy dealing with reality to ponder that reality isn’t really real. Hmmm. You know, I’d feel better about Holotropic Breathwork if it heightened the practitioner’s sensitivity to irony. I suspect that it doesn’t.<\/p>\n Next, another random reality thought: I might yet live to see (might being the key word here) the demise of the public library, the public postal service, and public radio and TV (bye bye Big Bird). Arguably, all have become unnecessary due to the proliferation of the internet, and are too expensive to maintain in an unstable economy (as the American economy is becoming, even if it does manage to fully recover in another two or three years). Back in my day, those things were felt to be essential for a civilized society. Who knows what goes after that — the public school system? Nothing is impossible anymore.<\/p>\n One more reality thought. Barack Obama managed to reform the health care system as to make health care more widely available. In order to do that, he had to address the crisis of health care costs that were rising too rapidly. He chose to rely on government controls and agencies to accomplish this. The jury is not even in session yet as to whether or not this will work. Republicans and many economists say that the better way to control health care costs would be through free market supply and demand mechanisms. Democrats claim (most, anyway, Senator Ron Wyden being a notable exception) that market mechanisms impose too much unfairness, that only the rich will then get adequate care.<\/p>\n