Conversations For Transformation: Essays Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

Conversations For Transformation

Essays By Laurence Platt

Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

And More




Blue Pinstripe Shirts

Alston Park, Napa Valley, California, USA

August 14, 2018



"The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them." ... Professor Albert Einstein

"It's kind of fun to do the impossible." ... Walt Disney
This essay, Blue Pinstripe Shirts, was written at the same time as I am indebted to my son Joshua Nelson Platt who contributed material for this conversation.





Resting in a souk

Marrakech, Morocco

5:22:02pm Tuesday May 29, 2018

Click to expand
Werner Erhard
Photography by Joshua Nelson Platt

Alston Park, Napa Valley, california, USA

6:11:16pm Tuesday August 14, 2018
Laurence Platt
Blue Pinstripe Shirts


Let's face it: what's rapidly becoming obvious, is the ideas which could make the world work for everyone, are not political ideas. They're beyond opinions, beyond the totality of rules, laws, and regulations we've set up over the centuries which govern us, and which to a greater or lesser extent, given they're precedents, determine the way we'll be governed in the future. They're beyond religion and our spiritual concepts (in this realm particularly, "beyond" includes "prior to"). What we've embedded in the way we run our world, puts our differences and our separations paramount to all else. Laws are based on our differences. Politics are based on our differences. In the pure form, religions shouldn't  be based on our differences, no? Yet it sure looks like they are (count how many versions of "God is on our side" are out there).

In my quiet moments, I wonder how we got it all so confused, if perhaps it shouldn't all be a lot easier than this. The root problem seems to be that we've set it all up to preserve our divisions without taking our one-ness-es into account. We ignore our same-ness-es at our own peril. We invest heavily in protecting our separatenesses and their survival - of our tribes, of our countries, or simply of our points of view. Yet for the most part, we pay no attention to the being we really are; even worse, we pay no attention to the being others  really are. If you wonder about the state the world's in (and why), this is what's at the heart of it. It's really that simple.

It takes an enormous commitment to run for a position as a global leader today. It takes an enormous investment of time and money, and an unwavering stand to be heard, known, and trusted. Yet we, as society, seem hell-bent on making that task as difficult as we possibly can. If you don't want your privacy instantly, permanently violated, you won't consider running. In this way, we eliminate at the get-go, most of the people who are best qualified to lead us. It's become the  critical job which, given the stakes, no one wants. And even those who are elected successfully, bring with them questions: will their leadership be more of the same, more of "We're different than them", more of "God is on our side"? Or will they bring with them that essence of being transformed, that getable way of being, whose spark speaks louder than words? Will their way of being, bring with it the assurance that simply given who we (all) really are, it's possible (and it's not even a far-fetched possibility) for the world to work for everyone, with no one and nothing left out? Listen: we all already know it's possible. The question is: who will say it? Who will stand for it?

By now, it's a well-worn cliché that the transformation of our world, begins with the transformation of each individual. And the trouble with all well-worn clichés is that regardless of any inherent, timeless yet urgent wisdom they may embody, we stop listening them (we've "heard it all before"), moving on instead to whatever the current, new flavor of the month is. The problem with doing that, is this particular cliché is not going to go away. Ever. If personal transformation is anything at all, it's living in integrity with the being we really are (it's the being everyone is), as distinct from our survival machinery whose sole purpose is hell-bent on perpetuating our differences. If the world's going to work for everyone, it'll work on a platform that includes our same-ness-es, not on showcasing another ideology of our differences.

It's only a milquetoast  conclusion, to notice how different we all are. Look: it's patently obvious  we all have differences. So noticing we're different, is an accurate observation (for which there's a lot of agreement) yet not particularly profound. On the other hand, it calls for something truly big  to distinguish our same-ness-es which are prior to and foundational to, any and all of our differences. Distinguishing our same-ness-es (which is to say, the willingness  to make that distinction) is really the only game in town  - which is to say it's arguably the only game in town worth playing. To sit at its table, requires ante-ing up something truly big. And that something truly big? It's who we really are. That's what's at stake here. Go for it: ante up big and play big. This is the one game on which our future depends. Really.



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