A true western winter day is ahead of us, hopefully with wind speeds below walking speed. I have a joke about it being so cold that I got a frost bite from walking too fast. It is actually possible to get frost bite while you stand still of course, but I leave that out!

The shopping got done yesterday, but it took a bit of slugging through some deep snow, though much of the sidewalk was cleared and I did manage a few pictures along the way. I spent about 90$$ on eighteen items, which makes it about four (4) $$ per. A far cry from the one (1) $ it used to be in around 2000.

To be fair, those would include produce when I made such calculations at the cash register. I tried to estimate how much money I needed to take out of my wallet, so I counted the items on the till’s feeder chute and multiplied the count with the average price I used at the time. So, I had this method and used it in Holland as well. There the mean price for my groceries was 1.03Euro averaged over about half a year during 2002, while gasoline was about that much per litre.

Last night I finalised the user edit feature for the outline hand out of my talk ‘My Believe as Practice’. I find it a neat feature of html5, that the user now can alter the webpage with its own comments and then print and/or save it. It is like the making of notes in the margin when reading a book, as I so often do, read and write in the margin that is.

And as I write this now, so I muse, namely that I may be tempted to add such a user’s note margin into my daily entries. Now, as my erstwhile wife often said: ‘You love a challenge’, and I can just now note this myself. ‘Will it work?, What will it belike to try this?’, that is what triggers my curiosity and since I was born under the Leo sign, I have source to blame for what I love to do:-)! Not that I need one, but I’m playing with it.

I continue to work on a title and description for my January talk. It has to be on spirituality, but in which way? That is the question. This morning I awake with the notion that traditions inform, but don’t direct us any longer today. This is a theme that is active for me right now, as in being ‘inspired’! It is based on my notion that we humans are responsible ourselves for what we do and how we do it.

This view is the necessary outcome of being conscious as human beings, such as we are now. This conclusion in turn is based on what we have discovered through our scientific type studies of nature, human cultural history and human genetic origins. We have discovered to be the result of a process of change, adaptation and development, commonly called evolution for short.

This knowledge and discovery alters the process that we so discovered, were subject to and of which we are now conscious. This being conscious puts us in the driver’s seat. We are now in charge and responsible of where we steer the vehicle of human development. Not that we are uninformed, as mentioned above we have a long and rich tradition that can inform us, but the choices we make are ours.

Conscious as we are, we are responsible for what spirituality guides us.

This is related to ‘spirituality’, because we act on what inspires us. We say that things were done in the spirit of being helpful or of reaching that much desired goal. This often implies that not all things came off the way it was intended. So, spirit and intentions are often related and that brings us to the notion and criterion of responsibility for the actions so taken.

At times dark and unwanted desires may motivate our action and the intentions are intended to remain hidden. This is where responsibility meets ethic and morals, human handed down traditions and our responsibility to act according to …?
And this is where our choice of criteria comes in, what are we trying to achieve and at what cost? In which we am I inspired and what spirituality informs my actions.

Free spirits maybe, but not free for all and certainly held to account.

So spirituality as not just mere spirituality, but it is connected to something and needs to be tested as to intention and consequence. This is where we need to do due diligence, informed by the best of our diverse human traditions.

Free spirits maybe, but not free for all and certainly held to account.
<10:16am
P.S: The sun is now shining on my keyboard and the screen, telling me that it is time for a coffee break!
And 10:50am with the edit.~