The Pursuit of Peace in a troubled world

A few years ago Will Smith was in a movie called the Pursuit of Happyness. It was a stirring story of a struggling single father trying to make it in a dog eat dog world. The concept was taken from the US Declaration of Independence which states "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.​"

Today I want to talk about the pursuit of peace - peace of mind in the face of darkness. When I was young I wrote a booklet entitled Happiness: the Essence of Enlightenment. I had studied religion and philosophy and came to that conclusion. Alan Watts said the Greek word sin literally meant to miss that mark like an archer misses the target. If our goal in life is to find happiness, then to sin would be to miss the mark or divert us from the goal of finding true happiness. The problem is there are no shortcuts to happiness and some people have different definitions of what happiness is. Some people are shallow. Instant gratification isn't happiness.

Mormons have two sayings that tie in with this concept. One is Men are that they might have joy. The other is Wickedness never was happiness. Both statements are very true yet it goes beyond that. BTO said we're here for a good time not a long time. That's simply not true. Happiness isn't merely having a good time. Happiness involves peace of mind and self respect. As Ecclesiastes once said, he that increaseth in wisdom, increaseth in sorrow. When a soldier dies on the battlefield that isn't a good time yet that sacrifice yields inner peace. Life does not end at death.

Christians are taught to be Christlike. To take up our cross and follow him. Somehow I don't think the scourging and crucifixion was a good time. In fact, I shudder when I reflect on the depth and magnitude of the atonement. Christ wasn't a flower power weasel. He was the toughest soldier that ever walked the face of the earth. People misrepresent him because in so doing they misrepresent life. I like Zen. I always have. I appreciate it's sincerity and simplicity.

I really enjoyed a German comedy called Enlightenment Guaranteed. It was about a German who went on a pilgrimage to a Buddhist monastery in Japan and his recently divorced brother who came along with him. I enjoyed the humor and the message.

Right now there are two mountains of darkness I see that distract us from finding inner peace. One is the cost of housing. The other is the barrage of falsehoods we are constantly bombarded with in the media and in society. Money does not buy happiness but homelessness sucks.

Both my kids have traveled extensively and I have always encouraged that. I have always said get out of the fish bowl and see what life is like in other parts of the world. Yet I had always hoped their travels would teach them the same thing it taught me - an appreciation for home. However, home has changed. The cost of land has added a great stress to daily life.

I always used to say a normal home a single income family could afford when I was growing up became completely out of reach for a double income family ten years ago. You needed two incomes and you needed to rent out the basement to be able to afford the mortgage. Now it is far worse. Across the street from where I live they built new townhouses. They started at $800,000 and are completely sold out. They are still in the middle of construction. Now they're $1,2 and $1.6 million already are they still haven't been built yet. That is completely out of control.

It frightens me and stresses me out. What are my kids going to do? As a parent we always want to leave the world a better place for our children. Clearly, that's not happening. Everyone talks about a housing crash but they've been talking about that for ten years and I still haven't seen it.

A coworker just got a job transfer to Red Deer Alberta. I joked and asked him if he bought a cowboy hat and spurs. He smiled and said yeah. He's Korean. He said here in Vancouver it costs a million dollars to buy a home but you have to pay a million and a half for it because there are a line up of people wanting to buy it. There he was able to buy a spacious townhouse for just over 200 thousand dollars. A significant difference.

I love Vancouver but it's becoming increasingly more difficult to be able to afford to live here. I'm sure it's the same in any big city like Toronto, New York or London. I remember it was insanely expensive to live in New York City back in the /80's. I shudder to think what it costs now.

Home ownership wasn't even an option in London. In many places you couldn't own land. For the same price you'd buy a 100 year lease on the flat or condo. That way when you die you couldn't leave it to your children, it went back to the crown. I assume some rural areas are different judging from the cottage real estate shows on TV. It's a huge stress I find difficult to process.

Then we have the absolutely ridiculous main stream media. That is the second mountain of darkness we now face. They lied about the convoy. They lied about Omicron. They lied about the conflict in the Ukraine. The media constantly lies to us. There is a reason why our parents called the TV the idiot box. Today I was at the grocery store and they kept announcing they have free rapid tests for Covid. They just won't let that fraud die. Flu season is over. Summer is on it's way. They will exploit this stupidity until we own nothing just like they promised.

Why would anyone get tested for Omicron? Why? We all know that Omicron is less severe than the seasonal flue and is the ultimate vaccine the pharmaceutical companies were unable to make. They are pushing testing so they can say cases are rising and bring back restrictions. Obviously cases will rise when you increase testing. Especially when the test gives a 90% false positive. The PCR test is worthless. That's the science.

Renowned virologist Dr Alan Mordue from the UK boldly declared that there is no such thing as asymptomatic cases. For a case to be considered, you need symptoms and a positive test. One without the other is not a case. The media has been lying to us all along.

We all know that Hollywood is fake. Well Hollywood and the media have become one in the same. The recent incident at the grammys is the perfect example.

Hollywood has always been a cesspool of self indulgent materialism but now that the Communist Party of China has bought Disney, the influence they have over Hollywood is insulting. I'm not talking about pedophile rings or Baal worship. I'm talking about the obvious. Not only the erosion of our morals, but the Communist narrative promoting a New World Order of slavery. Why do the rich promote slavery? So they can become slave owners and make more money.

We all know CNN is useless. However, thanks to the media mergers, they all are. Independent media outlets like Rebel News and True North have risen to fill the digital void, but the mainstream media is completely useless and criminally culpable in a dark and malicious misrepresentation of truth. Global News has become an active participant.

The Morning Show came on in the lunchroom at work the other day and I laughed out loud at how ridiculous it was. It's the Canadian version of CNN. It's the View or the Talk filled with misrepresented nonsense. The solution is simple. Cut the cable. Find alternate news sources. Support independent media. Peace of mind comes from a knowledge of the truth.