That is the key to peace: notice it. What does it look like to you and how does it feel? For me, I notice peace through meditation and writing, even when I am dealing with the most destructive emotions or circumstances. And the truthful, honest fact is that there is always going to be some challenge that you will have to face. Sometimes, it will only be a slight irritation, and other times it will break your back and suck you dry of every ounce of spirit you thought you had.

If you really want to know how to make peace and live that peace, you have to ask yourself the question, “Who am I?” because only when you ask that question can you find, in yourself, the strength to make peace. Every challenge, every struggle, every situation that you are confronted with will throw you off or knock you down. But when you ask the question, “Who am I?” and you answer honestly by acting with love, integrity and respect not only for others, but for yourself, you can live in a state of peace.

In the pool of life, ripples on the surface do not appear without first meeting with the pebble of intention. So what is your intention? What are your ideas about how to cultivate peace and what personal skills have you to make your own ripple? Like it or not, we’re inheriting the world with all of its positives and negatives, and in order for all of us to partake in the miracle known as life, we need more expressions of diplomacy and understanding in our personal, social and political lives. Robert Fulghum, an American writer once said, “Peace is not something you wish for; it’s something you make, something you do, something you are, and something you give away.”

So now I’m asking, what have you got to give?

No one wants to be average.  Everyone wants to be the rock star, the famous player, the one person everyone looks up to.  Deep down, we all want to find something we can call our own, something that makes this world worth living through.  Why is it that we try so hard to find something that is right in front or our eyes?

I wasn’t enough for my family, or so they made me believe.  My dream, it wasn’t enough for them until they saw it could really become a reality, could really make some money.  Dreams aren’t about money, they’re about fulfillment.  No one wants to be the assistant, the plumber, the janitor or even the manager.  Sometimes we try to be something we aren’t because we aren’t given a choice.  I wish we could be given that choice.

What is life to most people?  Why is it that most people just think it’s some joy ride? Why don’t they do what they really want to?  Maybe they think they are doing what they really want.  Maybe they’re too numb to know.  Or maybe they numbed themselves because they were shot down so many times by life. Not by life… by the people in it.

Life is hard, life is tough and harsh but it doesn’t shoot you down constantly like that.  People do.  People tell you that what you think is wrong, that you can’t believe the things you want to.  They destroy your expression ans try to recreate their own in your eyes.  They try to smother everything, almost like they don’t want thought.  We’re oppressed people, but that doesn’t mean we can’t try to express.  i want to express, I want to stop holding it all in.  I want to be me, for it to be okay to believe something else.  I want to be alive.

Sometimes I sit here, looking at the screen, wondering what to type.  There are so many thoughts, ideas and stories just jumping out all at once.  I’ve never given them the chance to breathe.  Well, not me.  People never wanted me to express my own beliefs.  I couldn’t be who i wanted to be around others.  If I wasn’t one way i was some kind of freak, if I didn’t like this genre of music I was weird.  You can’t be different.  If I wasn’t white I was made fun of, if I wasn’t Mexican I was ridiculed.  If you aren’t black you can’t be a part of the society, especially if you’re something else.  Being one or the other wasn’t good enough for either side.  Why is it that color defines who we are?  What if I was pink? What would people think then? How would they categorize me?  Or would they just try to kill me?

Why can’t we just believe that we want?  Why can’t people just accept these things?  Why can’t we be unique?  What’s so wrong with being me?  I want to scream that at the top of my lungs.  What’s so wrong with expression of self? What’s so wrong  with wanting to write, to play video games, to like different things other than the “social norm”.  Why can’t we just be who we were meant to be?  Why is it that we all have to try to fit into someone else’s image?

I’ve tried to answer these questions before and came up with the same things over and over again.  Acceptance.  Well, you know, the ultimate form of acceptance is someone loving who you really are, not just some fake image you show to the world in an attempt to gain fake love, fake acceptance.  But that’s all some people are willing to give.

Narrow-minded, simple men claim that this is an impossibility: “No society could ever uphold such standards of morality!” He is oblivious of what we, as a society, are capable of accomplishing without the leaned cynical nature of closed minded men interfering with our potential.  Standards are kept steadily only during times of cultural stability.  Men cannot be made stable though chemical altercations; that is immediate thought reform, and clearly unjust in a society in which we must not only bare in mind what is best for ourselves, but what is best for society as a whole.

In the end, each individual benefits himself more by contributing to the potential good of mankind.  It is ironic that such connections are not only possible, but are easily obtainable if every man were to give his greatest efforts to the development of a global society that upholds the standards of a strong-willed idealistic society.  Every man for himself ; every man for the good of mankind-the former is rather cynical; the latter is a trust among all who dwell on Earth.

These are the repressed possibilities that hover over the heads of most.  Lies are once again spoken, mockery shouted sarcastically at the mere idea, uncontemplated.  It is true that logic often overrides reason.  Without reason, however, we’d have no personal truths.  Reason is as relative as perception.  Reason will always contradict itself while manifesting itself flawlessly.  It is not definite; it is simply a perception of thought.

One cannot deny the instability of modern society.  All systems are condemned to corruption; theoretically, corruption does not occur inevitably.  It is the nature of mankind that dooms itself in an attempt to escape its fate.  For centuries the question has been contemplated:  Is it possible to achieve a society founded on idealism? Theoretically, yes-it is not beyond the boundaries of the human condition to uphold a state of mind in which we are all equal.

“Man has evolved into a chaotic state of corruption!”  True.  Only an ignorant or overly cynical man could argue that this is the only definite truth out there, that this cannot be changed for the better.

“Corruption has taken over; there is no going back.” Far from the truth.  While it would be oblivious to deny the current mentality of mankind, it is ignorant to deny the possibility of reversing the possibility of reversing society’s faults.  Genetics lay out a platform for knowledge; innovation implants human nature.  The nature of human beings is not a result of evolution passing on genes that affect the psyche from generation to generation.  The nature of human beings is passed on through innovation, by learning from the environment and those residing in it.

Changes have been made thought history, slowly changing society overtime.  Before long, the aspects of the former and latter do not resemble each other-a whole new society has been created though several slight altercations in conformity.  Mass change in society is not an overnight phenomena; it is a slow process requiring decades of patient development.

by Ben Heine

What it is

“Digital Divide” refers to the gap between those who benefit from digital technology and those who do not. It took digital-divide researchers a whole decade to figure out that the real issue is not so much about access to digital technology but about the benefits derived from it. Examining the situation more closely, it turns out that upper-to-middle classes have high-quality access to digital technology because the profit motive pushes technologists to work hard at creating “solutions” designed specifically for them. In this equation, however, the poor are ignored because the assumption is that designing solutions for them will not be profitable. The result is that even where the poor are provided access to digital technology, it is low-quality. Furthermore, the digital technology they do have access to is often of a design that ends up being harmful rather than beneficial. This, in turn, widens the digital divide.

Consider, for the example, cyber cafés. Years ago, many pointed to their spread as an example demonstrating that the digital divide was shrinking. But when a local youth in a Cambodia village ignores his school work and instead spends his evenings playing violent video games at a local cyber café, he is not really benefiting from digital technology. Thus giving to the poor digital technology that has been designed for the rich may actually add to the causes of poverty and accelerate the exodus of the rural poor into cities already bursting at the seams.

The new view is that closing the digital divide will be most effectively achieved through a two-pronged approach, one direct and the other indirect: The direct approach will be for governments and businesses to work together to change the incentives that shape digital markets. The indirect approach will be for them to team up on e-government digital technology initiatives that extend rural health care and quality education to the poor. Through these two approaches, the poor will be able to reap many of the same benefits from digital technology now derived by the wealthy.

Success is not measured by wealth. It is measured purely by satisfaction and personal feelings of fulfillment. To be successful is to die feeling as if something was accomplished, to die feeling as if the wasted time was wasted well. This has nothing to do with money, unless someone gains conceptual value from leaves of green paper and units of copper, something which is highly unlikely.

Consider the lottery. Don't all those numbers tempt you? Imagine all you could do with that money! Then think...what earned you that cash? Not hard work, to be sure. Maybe a dollar or two you found on the ground once, or maybe a measly bet you made with your bestfriend in your younger days won you that.

Point is, there was no substance to it, and that basically sums up an entire life of wealth. After you get bored or overwhelmed, what is there? What's left after your friends became fake? What is there when you realize that nothing you do really matters anymore?

That isn't success. If anything that's failure..

We are living in a supposed era of freedom of information, but in a world were supposedly democracy and freedom of speech and idea hold sway, then why do we still suffer from copyright laws, censorship and why everyday must people fight petty legal battles against conglomerate corporate might. Why still are people still suffering and being repressed for sharing ideas over the Internet, where such ideas should be able to flourish. Why do governments still attempt to control and limit our ability to create ideas and work as groups when groups that promote Nazi ideas and KKK groups are still able to march freely and in public. There is more persecution and censorship online than in the real world. Why is this? Its because we are not intellectually free, and our governments fear our power as individuals to ride outside the system, to present ideas to one another and to be free of thought and mind, in a world that ultimately they have no control over. The Internet and cyberspace, the last haven of intellectualism (if you can deal with all the leet speak that occurs), a place were many ideas can be shared by many people simultaneously. However the Internet is controlled and repressed by the government and commercial organisations that inevitably wish to restrict information and ideas, and want us as people to behave like sheep. A solution must be found, and we have that solution. Independent media sites, community sites, many places on the web that are run by people for other people to use for free, where ideas are shared but unfortunately these are quickly repressed and controlled, but every-time one is taken down another 3 are created. The Internet is free, Autonomous zones are created day by day, where people can do as they please, The Internet is our society, with our rules and our laws. The Internet is a true democracy. It should be The Democracy. The question is: Can we carry this democracy into all areas of life? Can we remove those boundaries to free speech and idea? Can we stop copyright and intellectual property laws? The answer is yes, with time and effort maybe. Already many people globally fight for this sort of freedom. Can we as individuals, with our own minds, do less? No, We must fight for those ideals we believe in. But we need to look at where the problems stem from. Cartels, and conglomerates of companies, corrupt bureaucrats and governments. So what can we do against such a force. An awful lot, Boycott industry and products, Vote for parties that have decent agendas, instead of voting blindly. Or form your own political parties. There are many potential solutions to these problems. At the most radical, overthrow the government. At the most basic, protest against them. We are intelligent people, and we have power. “People shouldn’t fear their governments, governments should fear their people”