Ludwig Wittgenstein – Enneagram Five

By in Parenting, Spirituality Tags: ,

Reading about Wittgenstein (1889-1951), who I studied at UCLA. He created the notion of language games, which I didn’t appreciate learning about at the time, and I still don’t like very much.

But, I’m intrigued with this guy. He was one of the most influential philosophers of the 20th century.

And…

Devised a new kind of sewing machine as a child.

Then studied engineering in Berlin.

Went to Manchester, England, and studied aeronautics.

Didn’t really speak English, but figured it out.

Found out he was actually interested in mathematics.

So he met Bertrand Russell and G.E Moore in Cambridge and became one of the most annoying and intriguing students, arguing with professors and winning their respect for his tireless devotion to understanding.

Then was drawn to an isolated farmhouse in Norway where he wrote philosophy.

But in 1914 decided to volunteer for the Austro-Hungarian army.

Was a prisoner of war in Italy where he completed his Tractatus-Logico-Philosophicus, a pure masterpiece in modern day logic and philosophy of language.

Happened upon Leo Tolstoy and decided to devote himself to the Gospel and an abstemious life as a village teach in his homeland of Lower Austria.

Wanted to become a monk, but decided not to.

Instead, became an assistant gardener in a monastery.

Became interested in architecture.

Designed houses.

Then decided to get his Ph.D.

P.S. His father was and extremely wealthy steel magnate. When he died in 1913, 24 year old Ludwig became one of the richest men in Europe. But he soon became disinterested in the wealth — not wanting to spend that which he had not earned — and gave 100% of it away to relatives.

Learn more about the Enneagram and the test: https://www.enneagraminstitute.com

My Next Campaign: Children

By in Parenting, Politics, Religion, Spirituality, Teenagers Tags: , , ,

I am humbled and pleased to announce that I have been named President and Chief Executive Officer of Royal Family Kids, Inc. (RFK) — a California non-profit organization that brings healing and support to thousands of foster children each year who are victims of abuse, neglect, and abandonment. 

As you might know, during my run for U.S. Congress, I received the formal endorsement of human rights crusader, Bill Browder. His story had captured my heart and, ironically, will now serve as a driving force behind my new work.

Bill, who founded an investment firm in Moscow in the 1990’s, was later named the top investment fund manager in the world. But on November 16th, 2009, when his tax attorney, Sergei Magnitsky, was tortured and murdered by associates of Vladimir Putin, he made a vow to seek justice for those responsible. He gave up his lucrative career to crusade on behalf of the many victims of Vladimir Putin and his accomplices. 

In 2012, Bill’s work compelled the U.S. government to impose sanctions on the responsible Russian oligarchs. A new bill, called The Magnitsky Act, received overwhelming support from both houses of Congress.

Vladimir Putin immediately “retaliated” by banning the adoptions of thousands of Russian orphans to American families. 

Because many of these orphans suffered from birth defects, fetal alcohol syndrome, HIV, and other ailments, many were effectively sentenced to death, given a lack of medical resources in Russia. Tens of thousands of Russians took to the streets in protest of yet another one of Putin’s gruesome acts.

As a former Executive Director of an international youth campaign that encouraged and inspired thousands of at-risk teens, and as a former executive with the March of Dimes, a foundation devoted to helping newborns with birth defects and illness, you can imagine how Bill’s story touched me, especially Putin’s decision to penalize innocent foster children. 

As I learned more about these orphans during the campaign I often asked myself, How might I use my influence to help the kinds of desperate children that Putin violated? 

My answer came in mid-June when I received an email from an RFK representative who asked if I’d consider this role, and meet with their search committee. I took the meeting. For the past two months, I’ve been involved in a long process of informational meetings with RFK leadership, and many interviews. 

Earlier this month, I was selected to lead the organization as the new President and CEO.

I really don’t have words to describe this organization. I’ve honestly never seen anything like it. This video is just a small sample of the work RFK does at its 5-day camps, treating children like Samantha as “royalty.”

During my campaign, I learned too well how divisive today’s political environment can be. But we can all agree on one thing. We can all agree that all minor children are innocent, especially those suffering from abuse, neglect, and abandonment. And given that approximately 80% of our prison inmates were former foster care children, and 60% of all child sex trafficking victims have histories in the child welfare system, I could think of nothing more compelling for my next step than leveraging my advocacy convictions — to bring real change to countless children.

Working in partnership with Child Protective Services in 40 states, RFK has helped change the lives of over 100,000 kids, over the past 30 years. This year alone, we will have encouraged and mentored approximately 10,000 kids. Like Samantha, 

But with approximately 500,000 foster children in the system today, the work before us is daunting.

Three weeks ago, I attended my first RFK event, a 5-day camp with 71 children, ages 6 – 12. I served as a volunteer along with over 100 others who gave up their vacation time to work all day and night in 95-degree heat, mentoring and serving these precious children. I wrote about two of my experiences here and here.  

Each camp has a “Birthday Party” with gifts and cake and ice cream and games — because so many of them had never had a birthday party before.

I learned that many camp counselors and volunteers end up adopting the children they mentored at camp.

The highlight of the week was when one of the boys at the camp, an 11-year-old named Miguel, who was a victim of physical abuse and severe neglect, asked me if I would be his father. 

There are no words to describe how that moment — I realized there and then that hundreds of thousands of abandoned children like Miguel are in such desperate need of hope, affirmation, positive experiences, and love.

This new work of mine will be my part in helping those innocent children.

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To learn more, about Bill Browder, please visit www.billbrowder.com.

To learn more about Royal Family Kids, please visit www.rfk.org.

A Week With 71 Foster Children, Part II

By in Parenting Tags:

 

There are two older couples at Royal Family Kids Camp. They are the camp “Grandmas and Grandpas.” Because many of these children, given they have no parents, have no grandparents. And as many of you know, grandparents can be a very good thing for children.

I wouldn’t be who I am today without the remarkable influence of my grandparents.

So, one of the camp activities includes grandma and grandpa time. We take our kids into a room — 10 of them, just boys. We sit on chairs in a semi-circle. We are facing the two couples, the “grandparents.” They are in front of a fireplace. They are older and married.

The kids are squeamish, as always. The grandparents introduce themselves, not as “Bob” or “Mary,” or “Mr. Thomson” and “Mrs. Thompson,” but as “Grandpa Bob” and “Grandma Mary.”

As they speak, you can see that the objective is to model kindness, calm, wisdom — something these children see little of.

They gently, with such calm and patience and eye contact and all that good modeling, ask the children to listen. I’m inside so I can’t wear my sunglasses but tears stream down my face because I’m sure these children have never experienced anything like this; they act out, and these older authority figures gently steer them in the right direction.

I hate that sometimes that I can be so emotional. I got it from my maternal grandfather, my Nonno. He was strong and gruff and full of life, and he cried whenever the circumstances warranted it.

You could see the children being tamed.

One of the grandmas begins to read them a story. She sits and reads and shows them the pictures. It’s a story about a boy who grew up a slave in the Deep South. His name was Denver. And later ran away to a big city. He became homeless. He was illiterate. He had no family.

He became angry because he “wasn’t like the other people.”

Grandma gently told the children, with poise and grace, how sadness can turn to anger when life is hard. All implication, no sermon, nothing about their respective circumstances.

The 20 eyes fixed on grandma with each word.

The story ends with a couple reaching out to Denver. They teach him to read. They love him. He becomes a responsible and respectful member of society because he chooses to not let sadness and anger rule him. He starts an outreach to the homeless. He is honored in the White House by President Obama.

And the moral of the book is about how we are all uniquely different, and nobody is better than someone else.

One of the grandpas takes out his Taylor guitar. He sings a cheesy song about a father’s love. I’m cringing a bit; the kids aren’t. I keep thinking about how these kids live on video games and smartphones and here are these four old people singing this cheesy song and how it’s not relevant.

Apparently, it was. Because they are paying full attention.

The song ends. Then the grandpa says, “I’ve never known my dad. I never met him. I don’t know his name or what he looks like.”

I cry some more.

Four hands are raised. He calls on one of the boys.

“Me too.”

The I hear three others say “me too.”

One says, “I know my father’s name. His name is Richard. And I have a picture of him. But I’ve never met him.”

The grandpa who doesn’t know his father then talks with such precision and grace about how God is a father that will never let us down.

One boy talks about how parents can let us down but “if you trust in God he never leaves us.”

I don’t even know how the Grandparent time ended. But after it did, one of the camp photographers (there are a few of them) asked the boys if they wanted to have a picture taken with “your new grandparents.” The cynic in me (I’m sorry to admit this) immediately said, “These cool, hardened, customers are not going to want a picture taken with these old, white, folks.”

One of the grandmas pointed to me as a mob rushed to be first in line to help navigate the photo session. I had to find a way to back them up so the shoot can begin.

One after one, the boys sat on a chair, with each grandparent couple to his left and right.

The smiles of the boys. We can’t show pictures of them. But those smiles.

They will never leave my heart.

My Week With 71 Foster Children – Part I

By in Parenting, Religion Tags: ,

 

I am at a one week camp for foster children. It’s called Royal Family Kids Camp. The organization has a contract with Child Protective Services, in 40 states. Some of the children are orphans; others simply have no parent that wants them. Or, the parent or parents are in jail. Every single one of the children has experienced abuse or neglect, or both.

Every one of them has experience abandonment of both birth parents.

The idea of “Royal” is to, for a week, treat these children like royalty. So, for example, the busses that transported them weren’t those cheap, yellow, school buses — they were those chartered versions, the kinds professional sports teams hire.

I arrived on Sunday. The children arrived yesterday, one bus for the girls, one for the boys. They are between 6 and 12 years old. The 100 plus volunteers greeted them with cheers and signs, each with the name of a child. This is my first camp, but many of the volunteers have done this since the 1990’s.

It was hot. We are at this beautiful site in Southern California. Pine trees and Aspens and Oaks and an amazing swimming pool and archery and a woodshop and tea parties and, on Thursday, a “Birthday Party.”

Some of the children have never had a birthday party.

I’m glad I have sunglasses because we are outside much of the time. And, at 4,000 feet, it’s sunny all day long.

And, they disguise my tears, which began yesterday when the children got off the busses. To the cheers. More than tears — crying.

I cried for the entire 20-minute ceremony. I cried all day long.

You could feel love. And the boy that didn’t simile or high-five the counselors wearing the “True Religion” t-shirt. Old shoes and old clothes and old suitcases (some only had bags) and the reality that life is not fair — these precious children are victims, innocent, in need of love and acceptance.

I want to write more about the one sitting down during sports, looking at the ground, saying “I’m sad and I don’t know why.” His shoes were off. He had multiple holes in his socks.

The one who kept running away last night. As soon as a counselor turned his back, he’d sprint into the darkness. It took hours to get him to finally fall asleep.

He told me, “I’m a bad person.”

The 11-year old I taught to swim. He kept saying, “Please don’t leave me!” He stammered. During dinner, he kept telling people, “I know how to swim!”

Children are innocent, always. Abused and neglected children, the most innocent.

I have a feeling I might spend the rest of my life finding a way to bring more hope to them.

I Didn’t Run To Open Any Doors; I Ran To Knock Some Down

By in Politics, Uncategorized Tags: ,

 

Before I ran for Congress I would write freely. I called it “Freewriting.” You write whatever comes to mind.

But I stopped because you have to be more cautious when you’re a running for office.

I’m no longer running for office, so…

That lady with the fake Rolex at 11 o’clock. To my left. Eleven o’clock is always to your left. Left of 12. She’s outside the window — the window to my left. I know it’s fake because I can see it ticking. A real Rolex won’t tick; the second hand does all these really tiny ticks, so much that it looks like it’s just gliding.

The man with gray sweatshirt black shorts black shoes black sunglasses.The Volvo keys to the right of this computer. On the brown table.

I am at Kéan.

I care more about abused and neglected children than I do almost anything else.

Red head kid.

Few works of art move me as much as Salinger’s Catcher In The Rye. I used to feel bad that I loved complex dramas or even disturbing dramas like Shine or Midnight Express or Schindler’s List so much. Then as I studied more about Enneagram Fives and INTPs it started making more sense.

I just don’t even get how Salinger — in the 1940s — could write something so honest and raw and lacking in pretention.

The pen is without question more powerful than the sword.

That election. Opened so many doors. I didn’t run to open any doors; I ran to knock some down.

I will post this but I’m always a bit nervous that people will think it’s weird. That my writing is weird. That my thoughts are weird.

That I’m weird.

I think my wandering thoughts are like those of most people.

Nobody is more creative than somebody else. We are all equally creative.

Just some people are willing to put their art and thoughts and voices and inventions out there. They are willing to be criticized.

I’ve been criticized since I started my blog almost three years ago. I’ve been praised since I started my blog almost three years ago.

That’s probably the biggest and saddest thing I learned during my run. If you are a politician half the country will hate you. We live in the weirdest times where literally Republicans hate Democrats and Democrats hate Republicans.

But the Republicans are way worse than the Democrats.

I prefer warm coffee to hot coffee.

I prefer cream and sugar. Whole milk and sugar. Never ever non-fat milk because it makes the coffee look dirty and doesn’t even alter the taste.

Millions mourned when Stalin died even though he murdered tens of millions. Weird how thug autocrats can be lauded by so many. I think it could be happening again, this time in the USA.

No such thing as being non-political.

No such thing as being non-religious.

Ooooh, that lady has those new shoes. Those super trendy trainers. They say the most comfortable shoes in the world. Air buds or Airwalks or something like that.

I’m obsessed with shoes but you’d never know it. I think about buying new shoes every day. I go online and salivate but I rarely buy any. Running shoes are my weak spot. I hate Nikes. I love New Balance. It’s weird that Adidas and Puma were started by two brothers who went separate ways. Adolph stared Adidas; Rudolph started Puma.

Mostly what caused their split was Rudolph’s greater affinity for Nazism.

I heard that the lady that made the Nike swoosh stipe was paid like sixteen bucks by Phil Knight way in the beginning. He later gave her stocks for it. So kind of him.

Steve job relished in not giving a dime to the early founders of Apple. I don’t get it. I think Steve Wozniak was really disturbed about it once they went public and all these guys became instant multi-millionaires. Woz went to Jobs and said they should both match each other in giving at least some stock to the employees. Jobs said something like, “Perfect I’ll put in zero and you put in zero.”

I had a dream a few months ago. I was piloting a small airplane. I was scared. I was on the runway. I pushed the lever forward. I don’t know if there’s a lever and, if there is one, whether you push it forward. On a car, you pull the lever backward. You pull it back into drive. But it seemed natural that when piloting an airplane that you’d push the lever forward.

Why is that?

Fast, faster, heart beating. It is quiet. When I used to travel a lot I would fly business class and sometimes first class. It’s quieter in the front of the plane. You don’t hear the friction from the air against the wings.

The plane slowly starts to lift off the ground. My heart pounds.

Then, a song I haven’t heard on decades jumps into my head.

Up Up And Away in my beautiful balloon. Up Up And Away in my beautiful balloon. 

Heartbeats harder and faster.

Wake up in a panic with that song. Attached to my brain.

Then I think about the mind/body problem.* Somehow that tune had been embedded somewhere in the carbon of my brain — the actual meat in my skull — for decades.

How can that combination of lyrics and melody and rhythm — things that are nonphysical — be stuck to a brain, something physical?

 

*  The problem, in short, is about how something non-physical (will, decision, love, deliberation, choice) — the mind or soul — can interact with a purely physical brain. How could something non-physical cause something physical, to move? You can geek out a learn more about it here.

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