What is Best in Life

[Stillwater]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PQ6335puOc

What do all of you think?

Is Arnold right, or is he wrong?

Were the two answers given the same or were they different?

I think this question is both a trap and liberation.

What does everyone feel is best in life?

[Rakkso]

On the surface, I'd say they are both right and wrong.
But you must take into account I do not know the costumes, and traditions of that epoch.
To their families and town they are Heroes. To their enemie's families, warriors, assasins, usurpers, thiefs, etc.
I'd say it is a matter of how you look at it, but I'll have to go with Genghis Khan here just for fun. lol 
Maybe I'm overlooking the other pesperctive. thats the raw. Nice find.

I wont be very creative here because I like what he said, so I'll just say.
To crush your obstacles, see them all falling back behind you, and take from them the lessons learned.

[Stillwater]

But you must take into account I do not know the costumes, and traditions of that epoch.

The story this snippet is from is historical fantasy, so there is a mixture of fact and imagination going on there, that might confuse things a bit. I think you are right to say these folk probably represent the Mongols.

To their families and town they are Heroes. To their enemie's families, warriors, assasins, usurpers, thiefs, etc.

To put it Platonicly, perhaps these men have indeed found their best selves. Those that stand behind them and depend on them would find that hard to argue with.

The piece is fantasy, but I think it does represent reality for the majority of mankind's history.

We live in another time and place though. If that is what was best for them, is there something new best for us?

[Rakkso]

To put it Platonicly, perhaps these men have indeed found their best selves. Those that stand behind them and depend on them would find that hard to argue with.

The piece is fantasy, but I think it does represent reality for the majority of mankind's history.

We live in another time and place though. If that is what was best for them, is there something new best for us?

Indeed, however this men are, however they think, in relation to proceedings/decitions, in what it is that they do, has certainly been proven and written through history as evidence with the blood of those who were conquered and fell and crumbled before them.. whatever choices they made led to the survival of their wifes, children, folks, and going without kevlars and guns, swords and armour and unique strategic, mind as well as physicall skills, is what has proved them superior in courage and so in battle, knowing there were no arrow machine guns that kill instantly would certainly give more than enough courage for men to prove and measure themselves in battle, therefore more likely to survive.

I've experienced high doses of adrenaline, rage, fierceness, that come together with glimpses of hopelesness all around. I took a wolfpack back to the peak by merely standing in the front line, shouting at the top of my lungs "lobos", blinded by shots of adrenaline so high the idea of dying didn't even existed as an enemy but more as a friend. A spell of Invulnerability right there, watching them burn, making them burn, armed only with molotovs, rocks, and napalm some friend made but no drugs ever, although I meet people that did, it worked for them so its monte my business. Im talking of course of the stuff in Vnzla last year.
Yes, we were shot at, and I went to the rally point night after night until sunrise. Lying at home, saying that I was there helping with food drinks and such and such. But I always thought 'If I, one who has the balls to do this, young, fit for it, do not do it for the fathers and mothers who have children to feed, who is gonna do it for me and them?'
People died, people I knew simply disapeared, most were always underage. kids of low resources, of high resources, it didn't mattered there, all brothers. Pussy rich friends too scared of that, felt like being among women. All happening through out the country's main city's. They always had a 'Judas' among us. Intelligence services asking for me at my door...
What did I learned? I learned I changed nothing, I saved the lifes of few, and specially of one brave kid in particular, i got robbed, beated, blinded by gas. Shot by gigant rubber bullets, shotgun rubber sprays.. and for what... It had always being a Childs play for them. Maximun security prisions are 1000000 times uglier..
It all didn't mattered. They got guns we got stones, and proud to only use stones, is it here were failure begins and ends? I do not know. So I just thought next time I'll work smart instead of work hard, without the unnecesary violence too.

But I was Idealistic, I think I still am, I do not know if it is bad in the kind of society we find ourselves in at this current moment in time. I know idealistic people tend to die first. I do not know if it has always been like this. My common sense tells me no... it tells me that science can accomplish everything, or just through God, we could all live equally, and happily in some organized, superior collective being, without lossing the individuality of course.

But what do I know, yes, we had VHS, then DVD and now Bluerays. If we have had plenty of war and corruption and famine and disharmony, why are we not ready yet to have peace, Utopia, Paradise?

This makes me want to ask one question...

How do you fight Fire? More Fire? You let it burn until there is nothing to burn? You burn with it? Or you just throw a big huge massive planet size bucket of water in the age of aquarius...

Somehow, in someway, someday, we All will be better than that. Even if it takes another Universe to happen...

But no, I do not know what awaits us, I'm walking by faith. It has worked before, so why not now?

[Stillwater]

I have had several friends from Venezuela over the years. I remember the stories of the Chavez years.

There were elections... but there would be hell to pay, were it found that someone in your family had not voted for Chavez that year.

Something few people in the west understand, but I am certain you know well, is that in a region with many factions and warring groups, a brutal dictator is often the the safest and most productive form of rule. My own country seems to look upon dictators with contempt, but we have seen multiple instances now of the the mayhem that ensues when that dictator is removed by outside forces, and no strong force is there to take his place. There must be a man who rules by strength of fear. He brings order by being too powerful and too viscous to resist. Somewhere along the line, things may cool down enough that men like that are no longer needed, and gentler forms of order may arise. But yet in very developed places, that order still remains. Putin is clearly one such man. 

I hope that Venezuela may get the form of the government that its people desire someday soon.

Crime from the government, and constant crime from the streets is a rough lot to bear.

How do you fight Fire? More Fire? You let it burn until there is nothing to burn? You burn with it? Or you just throw a big huge massive planet size bucket of water in the age of aquarius...

This is a hard question indeed.

If you are certain that you truly must fight the fire, history shows us that it is best to do it with trickery and deception. Fighting an enemy head on, on his terms is the most expensive form of fight. Best to trick him into wasting his resources... marching his men to a place they are not needed... leaving him confused about where your own power and forces actually are... underestimating where the real threats are. The greatest form of this technique is to trick the enemy so badly that the fight never happens at all. Everyone wins in this case.

But what do I think is the greatest tool against the fire of all? If you have the luxury, and the time, it seems to be ideas that win in the end. The most persuasive ideas... the ones that spread the fastest. Your enemy has no army if his soldiers refuse to fight by principle. The people will rearrange and realign to bolster the ideas they hold most valuable. The great religions show us this clearly. It has always been true, and I expect it always will be.


I support you all through your hard times down South.

[Rakkso]

If you are certain that you truly must fight the fire, history shows us that it is best to do it with trickery and deception. Fighting an enemy head on, on his terms is the most expensive form of fight. Best to trick him into wasting his resources... marching his men to a place they are not needed... leaving him confused about where your own power and forces actually are... underestimating where the real threats are. The greatest form of this technique is to trick the enemy so badly that the fight never happens at all. Everyone wins in this case.

But what do I think is the greatest tool against the fire of all? If you have the luxury, and the time, it seems to be ideas that win in the end. The most persuasive ideas... the ones that spread the fastest. Your enemy has no army if his soldiers refuse to fight by principle. The people will rearrange and realign to bolster the ideas they hold most valuable. The great religions show us this clearly. It has always been true, and I expect it always will be.

Had not thought about that, no wonder why deception works if it is not even talked about in normal settings. Thats how ww2 was won I think.
There is a saying by Einstain, i tgoes something like "the day young men refuse to take on military service will be the day humans will evolve" idk.

Please no worry, I now look back at that with different eyes, I am aware that I was young and an idiot, and stubborn, but there is no way I can grow If can't acknowledge first were my flass lie and to where my ignorance points. Truth is Truth and I want nothing more.

I'm curious about what you, as well as other too seasoned travelers here think about the future of the world, what major changes they see? And where the future of civilization  is located...