It is a strange quirk of the human condition that we almost universally romanticise the past. T H White captured the sentiment in his lovely book The Once and Future King. The myth of King Arthur and Camelot reflect our desire for an idealised past. As in many such myths (including the Christian one) we […]
I want to extend my heartfelt apologies: To the Aboriginal people we recent invaders dispossessed, To the children that some of us have abused, To those people our intemperate language has offended, To the animals we have been cruel to, To the women we failed to promote to high office, To the “boat people” we […]
The Heidelberg philosopher Karl Jaspers was something of a polymath making significant contributions not only in philosophy but also in psychiatry and theology. According to Jaspers, a broad revolution in Mankind’s spiritual development occurred over a wide geographical spread including China, India, Persia, Judea and Greece over the period 800-200BC. He called this period the […]
There is no doubt that most of my readership might feel we are blessed to be Australians. I know I have had this debate before and some of us maintain we are “proud to be Australian” which is a sentiment I can’t relate to. Having become an Australian by a quirk of fate, an accident […]
Islam was fashioned by Muhammad from a platform provided by Judaism. Muslims recognise the Old Testament and acknowledge the legacy of its Prophets and the biblical struggles of Israel. The Arabs tell the story of Ishmael. The Old Testament hero, Abraham, had two wives, Hagar and Sarah. Each of his wives had borne Abraham a […]
Some twenty five hundred years ago, a Hebrew poet wrote a remarkable parable about suffering. You can find it in the Old Testament as the Book of Job. There is little in the narrative to suggest where to place Job in terms of our modern geography. (Mind you the Old Testament is notoriously unreliable about […]
You will have noticed over the years that I am a great fan of science and mathematics. When I am seeking an explanation for something that is where I would normally turn first. But I have recently been contemplating what can we really know and indeed how can we know it? Foremost in my mind […]
I wrote an essay recently on Generation Y and social technology. In it I quoted an article from Psychology Today whichgave this assessment of this coterie of the younger generation: “(The members of Generation Y) are arguably the most reviled generation in recent history and armies of consultants are hustling to decipher them. Called the […]
In August last year, in anticipation of a coalition victory in the soon-to-be-held election I was impertinent enough to pen a message to Tony Abbott. ( A Message to Tony Abbott ) Now that he has been duly elected Prime Minister, and in the light of my previous advice, I feel compelled to provide some more […]
Often in my coaching practice, when people are amenable to going a little deeper into “what it means to be human” I introduce my client to the Phil Harker model of: Know yourself < > Accept Yourself < > Forget Yourself Just recently I went over it with an executive. I argued that it was […]