greed | The Direction of Intention

The Fog [David’s blog on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on May 21, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

“The only thing worse than being blind is having sight but no vision.” ~ Helen Keller

A mile to the west it is 75 degrees and sunny. Here, by the lake, it is foggy and 10 degrees cooler. The inland heat meets the cool lake water and produces a layer of thick fog. Standing on our front porch we cannot see the end of the street.

It is quiet in our pocket of fog. Today I welcome the protective solitude it inspires. It provides a magical respite from the happenings of the world. Fog brings permission to unplug, some breathing space from the news of the day. Sitting on the back deck I imagine that we are on the shores of Avalon, disappearing into the mist, becoming invisible to the rest of the troubled, enraged world.

In the Arthurian legend, Avalon is a magical, mystical place. It is symbolic as a place of virtue.

Virtue requires vision. Choose any adjective that describes virtue – goodness, morality, integrity, dignity, honor… – all serve a clear ideal. A vision. A vision based on the capacity to discern between right and wrong, truth and lie, service and exploitation. A vision that follows a steadfast moral compass.

By this or any standard, our current leadership has sight but no vision. The milksop Republicans in Congress play cowboy while sacrificing themselves on an alter of greed. How else do we make sense of their dedicated impotence in the face of the worst constitutional crisis in our nation’s history? It’s a crisis that they could stop in a day if they honored their oath to the Constitution. If they did their jobs. The Republican president sells the national soul to the highest bidder, personal profit the glutton-master he and his peers serve. A fall from grace, our isle of vice is not disappearing into a fog of uncertainty, rather it reveals itself in the harsh light of moral indifference, it adorns itself in a festival blanket of foxy-lies producing angry maga-followers awash in a cultish brain fog. Sight without vision.

There is nothing mystical going on here. The unprincipled disavowal of ethics, the blatant bribery and unbridled greed, the hard right turn away from truth and democratic ideals – all happening in plain sight – renders us worse than blind.

Is it any wonder I welcome the fog and imagine myself disappearing into the quiet of the mystical island, a sanctuary symbolic of virtue?

read Kerri’s blogpost about FOG

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Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Metaphor, Perspective | Tagged: artistry, avalon, Congress, corruption, cowardice, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, dignity, goodness, greed, Helen Keller, integrity, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, morality, story, studio melange, the melange, uncertainty, virtue | 1 Comment »

It’s Basic [David’s blog on saturday morning smack-dab]

Posted on March 15, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

Basic = Fundamental. Essential. Rudimentary. Elemental. What you see is what you get.

What we are seeing in this administration and what we are getting is pretty much what we expected: Corruption. Greed. Incompetence. It’s basic. There is no mystery – at least to those of us who read Project 2025 and were not intellectually-blunted or morally misguided by the fox or any other Rupert Murdoch fantasy rag*.

It’s basic: a reality tv star is…well, made-up for tv. A character. Not real. A contrivance for entertainment. A fiction. And so an empty suit made for tv now sits behind the resolute desk and plays the role of president for ratings but has no idea what it means to run a nation. He certainly knows how to bilk people. He has a proven track record of running organizations into the ground. He is famously unplugged from verifiable truth. A lifelong bully. Is it any wonder the markets are tanking and our allies are holding their noses and walking away?

It’s basic. Predictable. Obvious. We gave an oligarch and a made-for-tv-flimflam-man the keys to the White House so should not be surprised by the rapid pilfering.

Basically, the title of Bret Stephens opinion piece in the NY Times says it all: Democracy Dies in Dumbness.

*“Many of Murdoch’s papers and television channels have been accused of biased and misleading coverage to support his business interests…” [the understatement of the century]~ Wikipedia

read Kerri’s blogpost about BASIC

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Filed under: smack-dab | Tagged: artistry, basics, Bret Stephens, corruption, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, Democracy Dies in Dumbness, elemental, fundamental, greed, incompetence, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, reality tv, story, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

A Curious Silver Lining [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on February 13, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

She opened the back door and instead of the door pushing back the snow as it always does, the snow folded. It was like origami or an archivist gently turning the page of a book. To say our weather has been unusual would be an understatement – as is true everywhere. Folding snow is a curious silver lining to the fluxing cold necessary to produce it.

Yesterday I called up a bit of folklore in Rumpelstiltskin, an imp that weaves straw into gold. An illustration of the imp called to my mind Hungry Ghosts. In the canon of folkloric creations, Hungry Ghosts are currently among my favorite because I see them everywhere – especially now – in everyday life. “Desire, greed, anger and ignorance are all factors in causing a soul to be reborn as a hungry ghost because they are motives for people to perform evil deeds. The biggest factor is greed as hungry ghosts are ever discontent and anguished because they are unable to satisfy their feelings of greed.” Wikipedia

It helps me to think of the current batch of oligarchs and soul-less-politicians as Hungry Ghosts. It helps me to think that they are in anguish, unable to satisfy their feelings of greed. I see – we see – their vast ignorance, the insatiable greed that drives their inhumanity. If not now, soon they will pass on and discover that they are Hungry Ghosts. They will discover that they’ve arrived at the lowest of the low, the very rock bottom of the karmic inferno (forgive my mash-up of Buddhism and Dante). They’ve already arrived at the rock bottom of humanity (as revealed by their inhumanity), “…beings who are driven by intense emotional needs in an animalistic way.” No greater consciousness.

Folding snow. Hungry Ghosts. A curious silver lining, to be sure. We are surrounded by – or living through – a cautionary tale reminding us to keep intact our compassion, to hold the line of truth amidst a roaring forest fire of lies, to believe in the goodness of human spirits that understand service to others is the very thing that cultivates our greater humanity – keeping us from becoming Hungry Ghosts – and is the epicenter of a healthy community, nation, and world.

read Kerri’s blogpost about FOLDING SNOW

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Filed under: DR Thursday, Metaphor, Perspective | Tagged: anger, anguish, artistry, community, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, discontent, evil, fascism, folklore, greed, hungry ghost, ignorance, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, oligarch, service, soul, story, studio melange, the melange | Leave a comment »

Consequences [David’s blog on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on February 12, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

The crescent moon. A sliver in the sky. A symbol of femininity and intuition, reflection as opposed to action. In alchemy, the crescent moon is the symbol for silver. Alchemy: the pursuit of the transformation of matter. Turning base straw into gold. Rumpelstilskin.

Rumpelstilskin, like Cinderella, is a tale that reaches back thousands of years. It pops up across many, many cultures. The Brothers Grimm did not invent it but like all their other tales, they caught it in their folklore net. It’s a story of transaction. It asks questions of value and worth. It begins with a father who wants to appear superior. He wants to be better than others, so he brags that his daughter can spin straw into gold. The king calls the father’s bluff. “Prove it or your daughter forfeits her life.” The father’s bragging has consequences. His daughter is locked in a room full of straw and to save her life has a single night to do something she has no capacity to do: spin straw into gold.

Today I’ve decided it is tale for our times. “The moral of the fairy tale Rumpelstiltskin is that people should not be consumed by greed, lying, or boasting. The story also teaches the importance of honesty, taking responsibility, and not making deals without understanding the consequences.” [A-I]

In a few short weeks we have seen the wreckage of the art-of-the-deal-made-with-a-complete-absence-of-understanding. Fools cutting off their noses to spite their faces. There are and will be consequences.

For years we have been subject to the lying, boasting and greed of the rapist-in-chief, his megaphone fox, and his party of hungry ghosts.

The Brothers Grimm were ethnographers, gathering ancient oral tales and committing them to the page before they were lost to time. Wisdom tales.

I considered sending a copy of Rumpelstiltskin to The White House but I understand no one there bothers to read. At any rate, a wisdom-story that teaches the importance of honesty and taking responsibility would most certainly bounce off, so thick is the fortress of ignorance, so wide is the moat of hubris.

Nevertheless, the moral of the story will find its way in to the halls of power. It always does. When the enchantment fails – as it always does – there will be – as there always has been – consequences.

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE SLIVER MOON

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Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Metaphor | Tagged: artistry, boasting, consequences, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, greed, hungry ghost, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, responsibility, Rumpelstiltskin, story, studio melange, The Brothers Grimm, the melange | 1 Comment »

Make Sense [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on October 24, 2022 by davidrobinsoncreative

I told Kerri she was going to be fired two years before the ax fell. I needed no crystal ball and was not reading tea leaves. In my consulting life I’d seen it happen a few dozen times. When a not-for-profit organization promotes to leadership those who believe everything needs to run like a business, the people holding fast to the actual purpose and mission of the organization have to go.

It makes sense if you think about it. Profit is the purpose of a business. When profit is the purpose, the organizational structures and levers-of-power evolve according to the purpose: profit. People are expendable.

There’s a reason arts organizations, churches, educational institutions,…are called not-for-profit. They serve a different purpose. The organizational structures and levers of power evolve according to the central purpose: service. The creation of art. Learning. Health. Feeding the hungry. Helping the victims of disaster. Worship. The people, usually not well-paid, are dedicated to the deeper organizational mission. Not profit. The people are not expendable. In fact, they are the keepers of the flame. They are very hard to come by.

The quickest way to kill a service organization is to apply the power-levers of business. The purpose dies. The good people – the keepers of the organizational heart – have to be fired, whipped into compliance, silenced, or forced to leave. It’s not rocket science. That process takes a few years.

It’s sometimes hard for us to make sense of what’s happening in our nation and world yet the same principles that apply to organizations also apply to countries. The purpose of healthcare is not profit. The purpose of education was never supposed to be profit. We currently have in our vernacular phrases like “predatory lending” – people making millions from students who believe the dream is only accessible through higher education. It’s the message embedded in our mythology. The levers of business have twisted our vision. Just as prisons should never be money makers, healthcare-as-a-business obliterates the purpose. It profits a few. It crushes the many.

Apples cannot be oranges. Make sense?

What’s happening in our nation makes perfect sense. Big business, regularly bailed out or given tax breaks to the tune of billions of dollars, is protected. No questions asked. Yet, try to correct a corrupt lending scheme, a successful (highly profitable) application of business levers to education, built on the backs of working people trying to go to school, and the “it-has-to-run-like-a-business” crowd will move heaven and earth to keep profit at the center of the mission. Our education system, once the best in the world, is spiraling. Ridiculous. It’s inevitable when protecting the interests of business supersedes serving the purpose.

We may find our way through, we might return to our senses, when we stop pretending that business is somehow sacred, that the making-of-money is moral and a proper north star for all things. It is not. It is great for some things. It is devastating, senseless, for the most important things.

read Kerri’s blogpost about SENSE

Filed under: Merely A Thought Monday, Perspective | Tagged: artistry, big business, business, corruption, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, greed, inequality, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, levers of power, mission, north star, not for profit, predatory lending, profit, purpose, sense, sense making, senseless, senses, service, story, structures, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

Choose To See [on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on October 21, 2020 by davidrobinsoncreative

If there are angels, they speak to me through books. Today’s post is a perfect example. We often choose our melange quotes and images a week ahead of time. The point is to NOT know what to write about until we sit down to write. That is the game we play. See what pops up. This morning, I opened Anam Cara, my current slow-read-book, and John O’Donohue’s thought-string could not be a more perfect angel.

“The human eye is always selecting what it wants to see and also evading what it does not want to see. The crucial question then is, What criteria do we use to decide what we like to see and to avoid seeing what we do not want to see?”

I’m hard pressed to find a more appropriate quote for our times. People deciding what they like to see and evading what they do not want to see. In gentler times – in healthier times – people are more willing and capable of challenging their criteria for seeing. Learning, in this sense, is nothing more or less than seeing what was previously unseen. Expanding the criteria.

“Many limited and negative lives issue directly from this narrowness of vision.”

Sadly, we do not live in healthy times. Isn’t it true that our national divide is predicated on NOT seeing? Contraction of thought, reduction of thinking, shrinkage of seeing is the rule of the day. Dedicated narrowness of vision is a necessary prerequisite for clusters of red hats to gather unmasked during a pandemic and cheer for a grifter. Conspiracy theories like Q are only possible when NOT seeing is more vital than seeing. Fox news depends upon viewers dedicated to narrow vision.

“To the greedy eye, everything can be possessed…It is sad that a greedy person can never enjoy what they have because they are always haunted by what they do not possess.”

Leona Helmsley and the current occupant of the White House are doppelgangers. Motivated by “naked greed.” I once directed a version of The Taming of the Shrew that dove headlong into the question of what happens when people try to fill their spiritual void with possessions. The short answer is that they twist and become grotesque. They bloat and become blind. You’ll never find a better image for the “greedy eye” or the current potus than Paul Cadmus painting of Gluttony & Greed.

“This greed is now poisoning the earth and impoverishing its people. Having has become the sinister enemy of being.”

Expanded seeing is the gift given to those who orient on this earth according to what they bring. Narrowness of vision is the result of those who orient on this earth according to what they get. It’s no longer a mystery why we are so divided. It’s now our choice to either see or to evade what is right in front of our eyes.

Read Kerri’s blog post about THE LITTLE PEOPLE