BlueOak

Yes, the proximity of these businesses or specialists formed the closest I've seen to a hub of sorts, where indirectly or directly, the businesses supported each other in assisting others and bettering the community in intelligent ways, not just in commercial efforts. Then I realized this small place had been mentioned as one of the best places to live, and I realized I hadn't just helped individuals with their health problems, but I was part of raising the consciousness of the area. It was a great time. Usually, one person holds the field of consciousness for others. A few working together create a much larger effect. Individuals are interwoven all across society, and like all of us, they can find a place where their talents contribute. They are rarely organized into a single collective because they are and can interact with any stage of development. If you are mostly in yellow you can talk to other stages of development with no real bother, if you are in turquoise, you'll realize they are aspects of you anyway. Unless you have expectations, because then you can always disappoint yourself and get irritated (with yourself). People went their separate ways; eventually, the shop I worked in closed down due to increasing commercial rates, I went with one specialist, but it wasn't the same. The lady running the spiritual group had a crystal shop that closed down too, so that ended. I'd lost contact due to financial difficulty getting there and never knew where she went. Also, one of the organizers died suddenly.

Belarus is Russia from our perspective here. Ukraine would be Russia under their influence. Putin says jump, they jump. So with Ukraine under Putin's thumb, the border with Russia would start at Ukraine from our perspective. You said any country next to Russia is its bitch, and any country next to America is the same. What about Europe? Is their influence not there? That was why I brought up not considering Europe when you wrote it. Is Ukraine not Europe's bitch too in this analogy? Power, influence, population, land, old USSR countries back, a shorter border, gas resources, black sea ports, and gas connections. As long as he can sell it as a greater Russia, he stays in power, and as long as he can pump his ego up, he feels like he's done a good job. Putin is not a hard man to understand. Though the population crisis there is a factor to consider in places like Russia and Germany in what they will do in the future. More European countries are talking about sending troops to Ukraine, Estonia, France, the UK, etc, which is why I am happy to talk about Europe here, as it lets us understand and focus on what's going on. So again, thanks for that and the discussion. Its not the Americans who will suffer the consequences of the war, or ultimately choose to fight a European war if it happens. So it is important to focus on where it's occurring. *I should add that you are right, Russia joining NATO and/or the EU would have completely changed the course of the world, and, it was sad people could not come together when the opportunity was there.

This is nonsense Bobby, I've just quoted why above. What other numbers do you want to see? Do you want America's and Europe's numbers added together? The size of their economies, populations, and militaries combined makes Russia look like a spec on the map. This part of the reason this war happened, because Russia doesn't understand it.

I posted a pro-Israeli channel, and you jumped to the conclusion that it wasn't. They've been singing Israel's praises since this war started. This thread is better when it's just news, but that's only my opinion. There are many other threads for this kind of talk.

This is why I miss my weekly spiritual group, it was like visiting another world for a week :). When I get moving again, I want to find a group. The best I would expect is a search for a partner and friends. For eight years, I was lucky because I found Stage Yellow in what some called the best place to live in the UK. Several specialists were located in a small area with a high degree of awareness and development. Collectively, they would support each other directly and indirectly. Everybody in the local community benefited from the spillover effect. *My only advice is to look for many therapists, behavioral experts, spiritual groups, and private educators in a small location. Also looking for overall happiness levels in that location could lead you in the right direction, low crime rates, low poverty etc. There are tables you can look at for this, then narrow it down to who is helping to hold that place to that level.

This is a news thread, I'm posting news clips, from a largely pro-Israeli channel. If you want my own opinion it's far worse than what that channel would give you. *This reactionary attitude to seeing everything as an enemy is a good surmise of the problem. Without you viewing the material or understanding their own bias, because their show is more inline with yours.

I am looking for a country that is in, or moving into what we might call a progressive phase culturally, and I don't care where in the world that country is, or what language I need to speak. One that values immigrants (because I'd be one), and generally is going through that phase of growth and opening up to the world. Can you name three such countries? Thank you. *This might fit better in a different forum, as its more personal than outwardly political.

Being more conscious is why people do third-eye work, work on body awareness, energy work, or consult their intuition in various forms. Psychosis. Big YOU or small you. You can't plan a spiritual experience, it's either going to come or not. My experience is that it's usually a metaphor, and has many levels of meaning, intersecting with my life for years to come (as infinity is not a flat timeline). Although my ego may have some influence on how I perceive it, it's not running the show. I don't want to get too much into it, because giving you a process to achieve X is how ego works. A spiritual experience is just going to happen, you can be receptive to them, show an interest in receiving them, get in a calm state, develop healthy patterned behavior, raise energy levels, remove toxins in the body, and not drain all your mental energy through over-focusing every day, but that's about it. Someone in psychosis could just be their ego putting thoughtforms in their head and reinforcing them to sustain their reality, they could have had a mental break where two of their personalities (behavioral templates) have completely split from one another, or they could have their third eye open. Any other medical condition I am unaware of. Working on opening the third eye is allowing a wider experience in. People explain it as going through various stages, it can happen all at once sometimes, and that can be unnerving. Myself I got different amounts of perception coming in, or reality-altering. For example, an easy one is the corner of your eyes, you'll start to see more going on there, or you'll see shadowy forms, or on a bright day, very bright forms. For me, that is the beginning. A full third opening would be seeing something entirely differently than what your eyes perceive the surface of it to be. - No drugs or substances are needed, just practice receiving, being open, calm, raising energy, and sometimes decalcifying the pineal gland. Most people tire themselves out with mental stimulation and don't have any energy in those centers to have these experiences.

It won't be tomorrow, but yes, as a long-term goal. I'll miss some things, the sound of birds, the smell of rain, the beautiful countryside (while it's still there), technologies, open speech, and public transport (when they run it), but I am very far away from what England is and where it is headed. I need to travel around and find a better fit for me. @Basman | @Schizophonia I appreciate the thoughts. Thank you all for the suggestions.

@Schizophonia Traditionally, western France used to be a favored destination for English expats because it is a beautiful area to settle in. I've seen a lot more anti-migration sentiment among the general French population in the last five years or so, covered in the media. Would you say that was exaggerated?

@LoneWonderer | @Vrubel New Zealand is definitely on my list to visit, a beautiful place. I had a friend there I used to speak to, and I hadn't considered Tasmania from that region, thank you for the other idea. @Basman I appreciate the thoughts. thank you. I will soon be self-employed again, so work will not be an issue. It's more that I'm looking to be accepted as someone moving there. I can probably travel as I work, so making some visits to these places will let me know more. @Karmadhi I hadn't considered Belgium, and the Netherlands, but I had a great old Dutch friend before he passed, larger than life. Maybe I should have a look, thanks. @Schizophonia You are giving me a story from your head about my head :). I've always wanted to work and travel at the same time. Don't worry yourself so much about other people's life choices. Even if long term I am seeking somewhere that is more aligned with me, rather than railing against the reality here. I should have taken this step a decade ago rather than suffer my own stubbornness. Though I will say, 'your crazy not to want to live in the UK', is one common British attitude I will not miss, there is a whole world out there, and some of it is very beautiful.

@actuallyenlightened Where does the money to pay the poor better wages come from? The rich. If you want to swap one tax for another, that's fine with me. If all jobs had to pay people a wage to get them to a comfortable standard of living, then I would agree, but they don't. The fewer people with money, the more easily they can define the labor market as those individuals like. This instead becomes a fantasy scenario, where you hope people do the right thing, out of a moral or ethical obligation, but they don't. Incidentally, this would reduce the need for unskilled immigration, which everyone complains about, because more jobs would be viable for family men/women, or those who want more than to survive. What you'll find if you take this line of argument, is that most people advocate for a pyramid where some jobs are just for survival (if that), and then justify it. They also wonder why fewer kids are being born when fewer people can afford them. I honestly wish you luck if you believe in raising the wages for average people. So? Are you saying that the more someone is worth, the more assets they should have sitting there doing nothing? For a country, it is including but not limited to: people's quality of life. healthcare, education, crime rate, corruption, technological development, infrastructure health, cultural development, security, political agency, future outlook, and birthrate. Billionaire's vain and wasteful lifestyles. Profits for shareholders will be given wherever they live. A company's buildings don't move unless it's more economically viable to move them, and this already happens. If people tax production, I could understand your point. We are talking about individuals with all the wealth, and to use that wealth to better society, they need to be taxed to get at it. If you are talking about control and a financial center's influence, that's a different (and honestly better) point you can raise. However, I would say it pales against having a functional society that can afford homes, and families and isn't disempowered politically to the point of despondency.

Musks real estate portfolio: https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-los-angeles-homes-real-estate-portfolio-photos?op=1#musk-put-the-home-on-the-market-for-95-million-in-may-2020-but-made-one-stipulation-whoever-purchased-wilders-estate-could-not-tear-it-down-or-remove-its-soul-13 Musks collection of cars. https://www.hotcars.com/every-car-elon-musks-personal-collection/ Musks Private Jets: https://simpleflying.com/elon-musk-private-jet-guide/ I was going to list his boat, but I've seen conflicting numbers for it, consider it hundreds of millions. What was the point again? Most of their wealth is locked up in investments. Yes, that is what makes them money, that's how rich people get richer and poor people get poorer because they pay for it. There is X amount of wealth in society, if the rich have more, the rest of us have less. The argument that they'll move elsewhere is always flawed, and it's kept us in this dire situation for far too long. They already DO move their labor where it's cheapest. The tax is on profit, not production, transport, or distribution. If you are saying they won't sell in our markets anymore, I've got news for you: someone else will. @actuallyenlightened The better and only argument is, that they pass on the cost to consumers, but that is and should be regulated.

None? I heard that Thailand and Singapore were quite welcoming, but this list puts Thailand dead last almost. https://www.statista.com/chart/10804/the-countries-most-and-least-accepting-of-migrants/ I am finding most of the data out of date, this is 2020. Sweden, for example on this list is going through a big anti-migrant backlash. There have to be some countries out there that welcome workers or income. None spring to anyone's mind? I think the official figures haven't fully accepted the new anti-migrant reality yet in most places, that's why I can't find an answer that lines up with my experience. This list: https://www.y-axis.com/blog/top-10-most-accepting-countries-for-immigrants-in-2024/ Living here and talking to people, I wouldn't put the UK on there at all. We are more anti immigration than I've ever seen. What do people think about Canada, Norway, or New Zealand on this issue? It at least puts Singapore up there on this link.

@Karmadhi If we lean more into the Russian perspective, some consider it a civil war. You might understand it better through that lens. Yes, it does make Ukraine fight harder. In life, we often create what we don't want. They have created a much stronger national identity in Ukraine. Russia are also used to violent suppression working domestically (civil war thinking), and this explains why police units were among the invading force, they expected to be suppressing a civilian minority. They'd underestimated how much Ukraine has changed, and still do. Just like people underestimated Putin's will to use force. Because both sides have pulled apart from each other to the point they didn't understand one another. Yes. However, because I am directly being threatened by Russian state TV each month. The UK received a Russian threat every month for most of the war. You can understand why I am not fond of Russia gaining more power than they have. Flip this to the European view, especially those states closer to Russia, and then consider they have a history of being invaded by Russia or having their governments meddled in. You can then understand why they would not react positively to this development. If you threaten to use something many times and then don't use it, the threats become less potent. The power of nukes used to be the fear associated with them, this was much more effective when it was unspoken. Unspoken and unknown threats are much scarier than something that is out in the open to be studied and talked about. As I say, Russian diplomats and top officials, or their state TV threaten to nuke the UK every month or so. It just became expected that they would threaten again. Call it whatever you like as a title, let's not get hung up on semantics, he wants a greater Russia. He's convinced his population and his ego to gain more land and influence as a means to achieving this. Another imperialist power is not good for the world. China is another one doing the same thing. I never liked America doing it because you saw all the wars that happened, do we want a repeat? Because that's what we are getting. This is the first time you've not considered Europe properly in your post. Europe, if it wants to, can take Russia in a straight fight, it has ten times the economic output and considerably more population. What we both understand, I think, is that Europe has many voices, not one. The appetite for violence is not as great as it is in Russia. Which is something Putin banked on in this strategy. The EU = 448.7 Million people Turkey = 85.3 Million People UK = 67.6 Million people Total = 601.6 Million people Russia = 147.2 Million people *Before the war exodus EU's GDP = $19.35 Trillion UK's GDP = $3.495 Trillion Turkey's GDP = $1.114 trillion Total GDP = $23.9 Trillion Russian GDP = $1.862 trillion There is no contest here; if NATO went to war even without America, Russia would not win it. If Russia and China were together, that would be a different scenario. All that said:

This is my turn to grin. I can count the times, on one hand, that anyone in a discussion has heard of any socialist idea I put forward. I've been in a lot of discussions :D. There is maybe 1 socialist in a thousand now, at least in political spheres, more in regular life perhaps. *This is probably an exaggeration in a rare left-wing channel for example like the majority report, but not outside of it. They'll be arguing about two concepts, and I'll come in with a third which makes them both stop.

People associate workable solutions involving the state or a collective group of people, as bad. Before they have even considered them. People should not live in fear of an arbitrary label or dismiss related things under a wide label, without first examining them individually. This is why we have an unending homeless problem, poverty, and a war on drugs. These are parts of ourselves, and our society, that we fear, belittle, or shun because they require socialist policies to address collectively. This keeps us in stage orange permanently. Many of my views are not authoritarian and therefore not communist, so this is not me defending communism. I imagine I'd argue with a communist, but I wouldn't label his points as bad before I listened to them. I understand you probably experienced some of the tail end of these things firsthand, and moved or were moved somewhere more liberal, and that was your or your family's life path. So your bias is to label an umbrella term as bad. I used to do that with authoritarian views, but I have tried to reverse it.

I'm half Scottish and half English.

I didn't write the themes, they were decided on by a collective mind. You'd be hard-pressed to argue that communism isn't the boogieman over in America and the UK. One mention of the communist party sunk Corbyn's campaign, and it is constantly stated as a great evil or something to fear.

I'll copy-paste what I've written before. I bemoan this most in America, as I idealized the country at one point, but understand that I am referencing most of the Western world to a greater or lesser extent.

I did not. I said they embody half of the themes of fascism, and the republicans embody most of them. Combined, they make the government, which means America is almost fascist.

The Republicans embody almost all fascist concepts, and the Democrats embody half of them. Did you read the themes in the link, I've done a few posts on them in the past, and if pressed I can do it again but I might as well just quote what i've written already. I understand that it isn't completely fascist, but it's a relatable enough term at this point. This isn't bashing America overly much, the UK is getting closer to it too, the world is, which is why we are going back to the period when nation-states fought wars over land. That is what the breakdown of globalization means, and the elimination of the leftwing balancing out nationalist and imperialist voices.

Thank you for giving me a bit of culture. @Davino Let me offer someone who is more recognized now, so you may have heard, but still opens up my heart every time he plays. Many of the songs are unique, so if you like any, have a look around on the channel.

Light hits the prism of Earth to split into things you can see, taste, touch, and are affected by. Vibration creates different densities etc. If you mean, how does that happen, you are it. You are infinity, you are everything, and you've created your senses in this body to perceive this type of reality. Study what light is if you want to know more about this particular reality.