Month: August 2013

Feeling Physically And Mentally Overwhelmed?

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Wake Up World  August 27 2013

Try Ashwagandha – an All-round Wonder Herb for Anxiety, Stress and Toxic Overload

With the current state of the world concerning environmental destruction, GMOs and political corruption, it’s no surprise the average person is on edge. Now more than ever, fortifying the body and mind against this relentless attack is crucial. Ashwagandha can help. As a potent adaptogen, it strengthens the system to withstand mental, physical and environmental stress, earning it the title “Indian ginseng.” If you find you could use some support, ashwagandha is an excellent option.

Harness the vigor of a stallion

Known in Sanskrit as “the smell of a horse,” ashwagandha is one of the most vital herbs in Ayurvedic medicine. Renowned for its ability to impart stallion-like vigor and strength, ashwagandha is an ancient herb with many modern applications. Containing powerful medicinal compounds such as withanolides, alkaloids, choline and fatty acids, ashwagandha helps the body cope with mental and physical stress. According to the Chopra Center, 216 studies have confirmed the healing benefits of the herb, including:

– Enhanced immunity

– Antimalarial

– Increased memory, learning and response time

– Balanced blood sugar levels

– Anti-inflammatory

– Cholesterol reduction

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Michael Snyder ~ 22 Reasons Why Starting World War 3 In The Middle East Is A Really Bad Idea

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EconomicCollapse  August 27 2013

Barack ObamaWhile most of the country is obsessing over Miley Cyrus, the Obama administration is preparing a military attack against Syria which has the potential of starting World War 3.  In fact, it is being reported that cruise missile strikes could begin “as early as Thursday“.  The Obama administration is pledging that the strikes will be “limited”, but what happens when the Syrians fight back?

What happens if they sink a U.S. naval vessel or they have agents start hitting targets inside the United States?  Then we would have a full-blown war on our hands.  And what happens if the Syrians decide to retaliate by hitting Israel?  If Syrian missiles start raining down on Tel Aviv, Israel will be extremely tempted to absolutely flatten Damascus, and they are more than capable of doing precisely that.

And of course Hezbollah and Iran are not likely to just sit idly by as their close ally Syria is battered into oblivion.  We are looking at a scenario where the entire Middle East could be set aflame, and that might only be just the beginning.  Russia and China are sternly warning the U.S. government not to get involved in Syria, and by starting a war with Syria we will do an extraordinary amount of damage to our relationships with those two global superpowers.  Could this be the beginning of a chain of events that could eventually lead to a massive global conflict with Russia and China on one side and the United States on the other?  Of course it will not happen immediately, but I fear that what is happening now is setting the stage for some really bad things.  The following are 22 reasons why starting World War 3 in the Middle East is a really bad idea…

#1 The American people are overwhelmingly against going to war with Syria…

Americans strongly oppose U.S. intervention in Syria’s civil war and believe Washington should stay out of the conflict even if reports that Syria’s government used deadly chemicals to attack civilians are confirmed, a Reuters/Ipsos poll says.

About 60 percent of Americans surveyed said the United States should not intervene in Syria’s civil war, while just 9 percent thought President Barack Obama should act.

#2 At this point, a war in Syria is even more unpopular with the American people than Congress is.

#3 The Obama administration has not gotten approval to go to war with Syria from Congress as the U.S. Constitution requires.

#4 The United States does not have the approval of the United Nations to attack Syria and it is not going to be getting it.

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The Greatest Mystery Of The Inca Empire Was Its Strange Economy

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io9  August 26 2013

In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the Inca Empire was the largest South America had ever known. Rich in foodstuffs, textiles, gold, and coca, the Inca were masters of city building but nevertheless had no money. In fact, they had no marketplaces at all.

Centered in Peru, Inca territory stretched across the Andes’ mountain tops and down to the shoreline, incorporating lands from today’s Colombia, Chile, Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina and Peru – all connected by a vast highway system whose complexity rivaled any in the Old World. The Inca Empire may be the only advanced civilization in history to have no class of traders, and no commerce of any kind within its boundaries. How did they do it?

Many aspects of Incan life remain mysterious, in part because our accounts of Incan life come from the Spanish invaders who effectively wiped them out. Famously, the conquistador Francisco Pizzaro led just a few men in an incredible defeat of the Incan army in Peru in 1532. But the real blow came roughly a decade before that, when European invaders unwittingly unleashed a smallpox epidemic that some epidemiologists believe may have killed as many as 90 percent of the Incan people. Our knowledge of these events, and our understanding of Incan culture of that era, come from just a few observers – mostly Spanish missionaries, and one mestizo priest and Inca historian named Blas Valera, who was born in Peru two decades after the fall of the Inca Empire.

Wealth Without Money

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Gifting Circles And The Monetization Of Everything

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Shareable  (Thanks, Ann K., Exopermaculture)

One aspect of the monetization of life that is proceeding nearly to totality in our time is that someone finds a way to commoditize nearly any movement or concept, even those that were explicitly anti-commercial in their conception. This was the fate of “cool”: what was once an emblem of African-American and Beatnik rejection of bourgeois values became a potent marketing device: buy this car, this sneaker, this album, and you will be cool, too.

The monetization of everything is profoundly dispiriting, because it reinforces the suspicion that, in the end, “It’s all about the money.” We encounter someone espousing inspiring concepts about healing, transformation, or compassion, only to find that those concepts have been copyrighted and packaged into some kind of expensive program. We wonder whether maybe the whole thing is about the money and not the healing. Maybe these were just sales gimmicks. And so we develop a wariness and a cynicism that taints our view of life and, indeed, urges us to join the sell-athon.

The concept of gifting, and the spiritual value of generosity, is not exempt from cooptation in the service of profit. I remember as a teenager listening to televangelist called Pastor Mike who, invoking Mark 10:31, promised that God would repay any gifts to his ministry a hundred-fold. “Give till it hurts!” he said, and surely many people did, as he became a wealthy man. I once heard a story on Snap Judgment (my favorite radio show) from a man who had been childhood friends with Reverend Mike’s son, and once come across boxes and boxes of old jewelry that people had sent him with heartrending notes to the effect, “This is all I have to give, we can’t make ends meet…”

Invoking religion in order to manipulate is a tale as old as time. Photo credit: pasotraspaso / Foter / CC BY-SA.

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