Thursday, February 01, 2007

What I mean, Again

Another shot at what I mean:

If we can decentralize power production of all types (caloric, electric, mechanical) and put the means of production and storage of energy in each individual's hands, then the fight for resources will diminish.

If we can let each individual person generate their own fuel, food, and work, then we'll have less need to hoard that fuel.

If we can reduce our consumption on a personal and at the same time national level, the leftover energy can be used as the power tide that raises all ships.

If we are all encouraged and allowed to be in charge of our own actions and personhood, we'll have less need to fight with each other. Freedom leads to peace, and peace leads to freedom.

Energy Puzzle Peaces

I've been thinking about and trying to act on my dream of World Peace since I was in high school. My life path has done plenty of winding since then, but it's always had that focus. I've always had the dream of Peace bouncing around in my head.

How do we do it? Will it take us all, or just a few to start the ball rolling? Will it be presidents or citizens or both? Will it be against our own apparent natures, or will it be due to a discovery of our true natures? Can we actually turn the war clock backwards? Will a few fundamentalists with a different dream (or a different methodology) roll the war clock wittingly (or unwittingly) forward to our doom?

Since middle school in Kennewick, I've done things to work on my internal sense of peace as well. That took the form of journals, student clubs, Amnesty International, meditation, repairing relationships that I could repair, gathering mentors, being a mentor.

Recently, I've noticed that thing that so many notice and not always early enough: Your right livelihood is the best route to world peace. When everyone is busy doing what they truly love (not just what makes them money, but obviously those two are not mutually exclusive), then they have no time for faithlessness, for doubt, and for the fear that leads away from Peace.

My right livelihood has also taken a fairly circuitous route (mimicking my Peace path?). I have been a can collector, a strawberry picker, a fast food drive-in worker, a youth group advisor, a student-athlete tutor, a foodbank volunteer, a music store employee, a server/bar-back at a golf club, an alternative high school teacher, a camp counselor, a camp education director, an Apple computer salesman, an improvisation actor, a computer network technician, a small IT businessman, a thinktank biz/dev founder, a microprint artist, a business creativity instigator, a Radio Shack sales associate, an office/operations manager, an Apple computer service salesman, a tech editor, a biodiesel advocate, and a Volkswagen sales consultant.

Along the way, I've had insights and failures, revelations and disappointments. Throughout my history, however, I've had a few threads that refused to unwind: Peace and Alternative Energy. Something keeps linking my thoughts about Earth's resource distribution and Peace. Perhaps it was my father Richard's work on photovoltaics at Battelle, maybe it was making money by collecting aluminum cans that were thrown on the trails in the canyon behind my house.

When I decided to get on the big blog wagon, I realized that I wanted to write about biodiesel and world peace first. I had to kind of blow the dust out of my pipes at first, but I can see now that this is a valuable exercise related to my right livelihood. Also, it really is my contribution to the worldwide endeavor to end war and promote peace through energy independence.

Any ideas on how I could more effectively leverage myself in peace-action via alternative energy are welcomed.