Good Morning Digital Neighbors! How about a visit to some more of the quotes and statements by various psychologists? When we last visited this little book we had an extended stop with William James and perhaps that is a good place to begin.
We may be in the Universe as dogs and cats are in our libraries, seeing the books and hearing the conversation, but having no inkling of the meaning of it all. - William James
Humility. A humble mind and a strong will is a fairly good set of attributes to cultivate in individuals and groups. Humble about our certitude of the big picture and more courageous to act in our daily sphere of interaction. Zealotry of any kind is a great drug for making people adhere to a set a beliefs without much thought and subsequently treat neighbors with the same lack of thought and consideration. One aspect of zealotry is old time "othering". Once I have identified "them", how I treat them is less of an issue in wrestling with the messiness of ethical behavior and the ugly consequences they might suffer. Sustained zealotry, cultivated contempt, widely accepted disdain for neighbors can lead to generational or centuries long oppression. Most of the world and its history is about our inability to recognize our neighbor as similar to us and add injuries of past atrocities and loss of loved ones to the bonfire of zealotry that fuels division.
We can't lay all the blame at the feet of zealotry, but I think we can admit that many can be lead down the path of uncritical acceptance of "leaders" and "experts" and taught to pivot from "we are all in this together" to blaming the doubters and punishing the critics. Banned, fired, cancelled, destroyed has become a normative reality. I tend to be ambivalent about Alex Jones and don't care for him stylistic bombast, but the recent result of his lawsuits and how many people agree with them as fitting is a good illustration of the unmooring of common sense for many.
The desire to make sense of the meaning of it all can be lost to so many. I may even be among them without knowing it. I know it is often attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt but it is a good check on our mental feeding habits. Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people. How we feed our minds, nourish our souls, tend to our time is so essential to a more complete or a more empty life. I know that statement is suspect since we are all participating in the internet, but meet your neighbors where you find them.
Human beings are born into this little span of life of which the best thing is its friendships and intimacies … and yet they leave their friendships and intimacies with no cultivation, to grow as they will by the roadside, expecting them to "keep" by force of mere inertia. - William James
I hope we all have the tools to cultivate our friends. I wonder if many have lost the ability the recognize the tools for what they are. While we don't need an abundance of friends, a few good ones are needed to round out life. Left to our own devices we are all on the path of blind exaggeration, of championing the marginal cause or causes fed by the one reliable fact or indisputable experience we have made the interpretive tool for reality. Good friends expand our toolset and help check our exaggerations. Bad friends feed them. I hope your life is fed with good friends. Happy Tuesday ADD Irregulars, Friends, Refugees, Phamily, Seekers and Triggeratti! Happy Tuesday to all the rest of you digital neighbors and the varied and wonderous niche' you inhabit and share on Locals.
Ouachita Cabin - Arkansas
Today marks the three hundred and thirtieth birthday of the Frenchman François-Marie Arouet, better known by his nom de plume, Voltaire (1694-1778).
Born into a bourgeois family during the reign of Louis XIV, the “Sun King” (r. 1643-1715), Voltaire suffered tragedy at a young age when his mother died. Never close with his father or brother, Voltaire exhibited a rebellious attitude toward authority from his youth. His brilliant mind was fostered in the care of the Society of Jesus, who introduced him to the joys of literature and theater. Despite his later criticisms against the Church, Voltaire, throughout his life, fondly recalled his dedicated Jesuit teachers.
Although he spent time as a civil servant in the French embassy to the Hague, Voltaire’s main love was writing—an endeavor where he excelled in various genres, including poetry, which led to his appointment as the royal court poet for King Louis XV. Widely recognized as one of the greatest French writers, and even hyperbolically referred to by ...
Padre - Tom Miller invites you to a Coffee Talk, Speakeasies, Schmoozes, Tea Times, Afterhours and other gatherings.
https://teams.live.com/meet/93792382189049?p=DiBHsYfuECPgDrG7vO
2026 Coffee Talk with the ADD Irregulars
Thursday, January 1, 2026
6:00 AM - 8:00 AM (CST)
Occurs every day starting 1/1 until 12/31/2027
Coffee Talk - Daily beginning at 6:00 AM Central Time Zone - USA
White Pilled Wednesday - A break from the heaviness of news and current events to focus upon things more personal & positive for the first hour of Coffee Talk.
Afternoon Chats - Most Tuesday, Friday & Sundays 2:00 PM Central
Other chats as posted in the community.
XIII
The Proud Minister
One day there came into the Garden a man in torn clothes badly bruised and cut, who said to the Lover, “In the name of the Beloved I demand your help.”
So the Lover and the Disciple let him in and dressed his wounds and prepared the best of the vegetables from the Garden for him to eat. When his wounds had been dressed and he had eaten and rested the Lover asked him how he had fallen into this plight, to which the man replied, “I was Minister of the Beloved in a city near this place, where I preached His gospel and expounded His doctrine to the people. I pointed out to them how their sins had made them wholly hateful to the Beloved and how therefore they were utterly beyond the range of His love and He would condemn them to eternal torments, whereon some fell into despair and wept bitterly but many were angry. One day the magistrates called me before them and begged me to leave the city and preach elsewhere for they said I had made many people so angry and desperate that they feared there might be a riot and they might not be able to protect me but that I might suffer some injury. I, however, very zealous for the Beloved and believing that the magistrates only feared that their own sins might be proclaimed, preached the more vehemently, denounced the magistrates and made it abundantly clear that the whole wicked city was foredoomed to eternal punishment by the just provision of the Beloved. Whereon a mob, stirred up no doubt by the corrupt and venal magistrates, fell upon me with sticks and stones, nearly killing me and driving me out of the city in the state in which I came to you.”
“My friend,” said the Lover, “this was not a good deed of yours, for besides denying the unfathomable compassion of the Beloved, you have by your obstinacy caused these people to commit a grievous sin, and this cannot be pleasing to the Beloved, that through you who profess to be His minister the people should become worse. Surely you remember that He Himself said, ‘If they persecute you in one city flee to another.’”
Therefore the man was very angry, and cursing the Lover, said, “I see that I have had a very false report of you and I do not believe that you are a servant of the Beloved at all. When I came to you so injured for the Beloved’s sake you set before me only herbs and fruits although the garden is full of birds which you could have killed to make me a worthy meal. I shall proclaim everywhere that you are no true servant of the Beloved but a mere falterer who dares not suffer in the cause of the Beloved. Be sure that you are foreordained to eternal torments who suffer nothing here.”
For the man was so blinded by his own pride that he could not perceive the scars on the hands and feet and the brows of the Lover nor how the cloth beneath the armpits of his tunic was dyed with a red dye. So he went out of the Garden cursing and shouting.
But the Lover looked sad and said, “A man like this does much harm to the cause of the Beloved, for by thus speaking falsely about the Beloved he may bring men to fear Him but none to love Him, and by love alone can any man approach the Beloved.”
