Ubuntu
Right before I woke up this morning I was having a long involved dream with sick sheep, buck goat advertisements and the hay guy from Loleta and his family.
Yesterday I got much done on the stanchion and got to the point where I needed the rest of the steel. Fortuna seemed a bit more expensive, but I hadn't realized how much more until I called. Not only do they charge cut fees ( 2.00 per) even when you buy a whole bar (20') but their prices were almost double! Well worth the drive to Eureka to save all of that.
Josh and I drove up there and picked that stuff up. He points out that the Boiler works, the Auction yard and Redwood meats all seem similar to him. My hang outs, full of big old dirty equipment and middle aged men.
In listening to NPR on the way home, Clinton (and others) were discussing Ubuntu; how life is relatively meaningless without social contacts.
"I am because you are"
I have been thinking along these lines for a few weeks,; as much as it irks me to realize this, it is true. Who you are is relevant through your relationships with others. (no "man" is an island"
In light of recent developments in my social circle this is really obvious, although not in a predictable way.
Society and relationships should keep aberrant behavior in check; when it's out of balance I think it actually works in the opposite way. Or when personal agenda preys on the weak in spirit.
In this definition of Ubuntu, it really applies to us, here, isolated on the north coast:
It has also been described as a philosophy of life, which in its most fundamental sense represents personhood, humanity, humaneness and morality; a metaphor that describes group solidarity where such group solidarity is central to the survival of communities with a scarcity of resources, where the fundamental belief is that "motho ke motho ba batho ba bangwe/umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu" which, literally translated, means a person can only be a person through others.[2] In other words the individual's whole existence is relative to that of the group: this is manifested in anti-individualistic conduct towards the survival of the group if the individual is to survive. It is a basically humanistic orientation towards fellow beings.
Our small "interest circle", meaning local dairy goat breeders in this discussion, it seems we are all relative to each other. Plus, our limited resources ( information, supplies, genetics) are so much stronger if we can all work together. It may seem petty to apply the concept in this way, but this is my view lately in my "community".
And how can I apply ubuntu to my belief in karma, when bad things happen to bad people, or schadenfreude?
I guess it might come to the struggle for compassion.
Yesterday I got much done on the stanchion and got to the point where I needed the rest of the steel. Fortuna seemed a bit more expensive, but I hadn't realized how much more until I called. Not only do they charge cut fees ( 2.00 per) even when you buy a whole bar (20') but their prices were almost double! Well worth the drive to Eureka to save all of that.
Josh and I drove up there and picked that stuff up. He points out that the Boiler works, the Auction yard and Redwood meats all seem similar to him. My hang outs, full of big old dirty equipment and middle aged men.
In listening to NPR on the way home, Clinton (and others) were discussing Ubuntu; how life is relatively meaningless without social contacts.
"I am because you are"
I have been thinking along these lines for a few weeks,; as much as it irks me to realize this, it is true. Who you are is relevant through your relationships with others. (no "man" is an island"
In light of recent developments in my social circle this is really obvious, although not in a predictable way.
Society and relationships should keep aberrant behavior in check; when it's out of balance I think it actually works in the opposite way. Or when personal agenda preys on the weak in spirit.
In this definition of Ubuntu, it really applies to us, here, isolated on the north coast:
It has also been described as a philosophy of life, which in its most fundamental sense represents personhood, humanity, humaneness and morality; a metaphor that describes group solidarity where such group solidarity is central to the survival of communities with a scarcity of resources, where the fundamental belief is that "motho ke motho ba batho ba bangwe/umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu" which, literally translated, means a person can only be a person through others.[2] In other words the individual's whole existence is relative to that of the group: this is manifested in anti-individualistic conduct towards the survival of the group if the individual is to survive. It is a basically humanistic orientation towards fellow beings.
Our small "interest circle", meaning local dairy goat breeders in this discussion, it seems we are all relative to each other. Plus, our limited resources ( information, supplies, genetics) are so much stronger if we can all work together. It may seem petty to apply the concept in this way, but this is my view lately in my "community".
And how can I apply ubuntu to my belief in karma, when bad things happen to bad people, or schadenfreude?
I guess it might come to the struggle for compassion.
posted by sarah at 10:02 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home