[Cog]

[onlooker]

188069.png

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '&')quot;The early saplings of a generation with a spine and integrity is emerging. Take heart all, the times they are changing and a generation with nothing to lose is on the rise."

So true Ibon. Real rebellion doesn't wear false flags and spout slogans. The young here in the US today have been sold a bill of goods.They don't vote or participate because they know it doesn't count. The economic trajectory is down for them.

They are nothing like the old white Tea Party types believe they have taken control of the US government. Laughable. The Freedom Caucus is a complete joke. Those idiots are owned by the US Chamber of Commerce and Goldman Sachs just like the rest of the Repubs, Dems and media. The young don't buy it. They are quietly formenting revolution, not as a theory or plan or group think, but just plain out cynicism. It will be a simple spark that will set it off. Trust me. We won't even see it coming.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('baha', '
')
I realized that the PTB wanted to suck the life out of me and give me nothing in return so by divorcing myself from it I have taken control and they have lost it. I watch the talking heads talk about banks failing and taxes rising and I just grin.

I am hoping to enter into poverty in the next few years and totally eliminate my tax burden

[onlooker]

Agreed, the status quo system is dying of its own accord. It is becoming evident. Disengaging - not feeding the beast is weakening it more. However , danger exists in that like a wounded animal, our elite power brokers can become dangerously desperate at the prospect of losing priviledge/power and lash out with the instruments of force which the govt. monopolizes

[Hawkcreek]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '
')We should be very scared. The old white guys are about to take to the street.

[shortonoil]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', ' ') I may be 70, but I can still put 10 out of 10 into the black at 500 yards.
All I need is some young person to carry my rifle and 200 rounds.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('baha', '
')
So here I am spoiled as shit and thumbing my nose at 'the man'. There is a great advantage to being able to tell him to F*** off.

[SeaGypsy]

The drug test regimes are flipping stupid, about cultural bias not anything real about productivity or safety. When I worked in nursing there were no drug tests, still aren't- but drugs were rife, including surgeons on cocaine or meths, nurses on stolen pharmaceuticals- in charge of life & death decisions every day. As a truck driver- most companies have random testing, plus the police & roads authority have both random & targeted testing- supposedly all about safety- but they only test for THC & meths- despite there being no solid of either being key inebriants in crashes- with zero tolerance. They don't test for valium, opiates, cocaine, SSRIs, which are proven to cause dangerous impairment.

(I used to smoke a lot of herb, my drug of choice, but these days I don't, do any drugs except a beer or two. I like my job too much to blow it over herb. Also I find once it is all out of my system I don't enjoy it- the first hour or so is great, but the 3 days hangover effect is not.)

Ibon- my mother is pushing me to 'buy' a house- (ie-she pays deposit & I pay a loan- here that's $300,000+) I'm not interested & she can't understand why. I basically live out of my car, camp on the fringes of the city, or on a friend's farm, or stay with friends or at my wife & kid's home- never stay 2 consecutive nights anywhere. I love it. I can be in a tent in the forest at 6am, at work on the edge of the city at 7am, drive a truck around until 2-3pm, go to a city gym on the beach & swim, spa, sauna, weights, cardio routine done by time peak hour is over, go have dinner with my kids & be back out in the bush or camped on the beach by 9-10pm. I have no debts. I can save half my wage easily & still do right by my kids. I don't care if people think I'm mad, just explaining to mother that I think most people are is, well, complicated.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SeaGypsy', ' ')I don't care if people think I'm mad, just explaining to mother that I think most people are is, well, complicated.

[Hawkcreek]

I smoked pot almost every day when I was in Vietnam. Then I self-medicated with various substances for the next 40 some years, until I retired.
Now I don't do any of that, partially for medical reasons, but mainly because I just don't feel the need.
Hah, wonder if drug use could possibly be related to the stress of working?

[Outcast_Searcher]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cog', 'I')f there is any advice I could give a younger guy is to take on minimal debt, live below your means, save money, and have another marketable skill besides the one you work in. You can ride out a lot of bad situations if you do this.

[evilgenius]

The thing I was talking about, I called it the need to control, isn't just reserved for old white guys. I think it permeates us all. We can recognize it, and take steps to act in other ways, but we can't really shed it. It's insidious. If you think you are free from it, then you will find it intertwined in your alternative ways, as you arrange to do as you please.

The ability to achieve intimacy with life, to engage others in a manner where you know them and can be known by them, requires involvement. It takes the faith to be able to lose, and still trust that it is for the better. The faith to say to what you apprehend as the wrong thing happening in your life that you aren't certain it is wrong. That you don't know right from wrong, not really, because all you really know is centered on yourself. That's the beginning of finding out why you do what you do, and why the things that bind you hold such power over you. When you come to that you will see how your need to control, to make right be right by virtue of how it relates to you, has been at work forming who you are.

This is what 'consider the lilies of the field' is really all about. How 'taking no thought for tomorrow' really works. It doesn't mean you can't have things. The universe isn't asking you to become a hermit and wear a hair shirt. It is asking you to seek the kingdom of heaven (a different centering) first, though, and its righteousness, and then all of those other things will be added unto you.

[SeaGypsy]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('baha', 'T')his is the bottom up approach...I did what SG does for while and loved it. I only gave it up after I crafted a plan to re-enter the workplace without allowing the hooks to be set. I lived in my RV for the first year as a solar installer and saved money. I bought a house with a 100% VA loan and then paid it off as fast as possible. I drove an antique car to avoid payments. I tackled a new industry partly because I got to call the shots.
When my PV array is done I may focus on making Duke Power miserable I see great opportunities there after I remove my dependence.

[SeaGypsy]

I had a few partners who gypsied with me, the longest was 7 years. I've been married nearly 10 years, we are coparenting & still close, just cannot live together. I'm way too busy for another relationship, & I'm Asianised so in 10 years when the current two are grown up I may consider doing it all again. I will be 60. One of my close friends is 72, with a 32 yo partner & 4 year old son.