Victor Bout Arrested

To keep you all updated on former Zizzle-Zot People of Note, Russian arms dealer Victor Bout (http://erikgruber.blogspot.com/2007/09/people-of-note-victor-bout.html) has been arrested in Thailand as a result of an American led sting operation.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/07/world/europe/07dealer.html?th&emc=th

People of Note: Oscar Wilde

“Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about.”

Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde, the Irish playwright, poet and novelist, was born in 1854 in Dublin to surgeon Sir William Wilde and poet (and Irish nationalist) Jane Francesca Elgee. Known for his quick wit, his humorous observations of modern culture, and his barbed tongue, he lived in infamy as both a tastemaker (for the hip) and a taste-breaker (for the fuddy-duddies).

Wilde studied first at Trinity College in Dublin (1871-74) and then at Oxford (1874-78), where he joined the Aesthetic Movement (a group with the shared goal of making art of life.)

Upon returning to Dublin in 1878, Young Oscar fell in love with Florence Balcombe. She, in turn, became engaged to Bram Stoker (of Dracula fame). Heartbroken, Wilde fled Ireland and vowed never to return (he went back only twice for brief visits during his lifetime). He spent the majority of his life in London and Paris, and for a short time the United States.

In London, Wilde met Constance Lloyd, daughter of a wealthy Queen’s Consul, and married her in 1884. They lived in luxury and had two sons.

I apologize for boring everyone with domestic trivialities. They seem inconsequential, considering Wilde produced some of the most profound, witty, and enduring works of his generation. Literary achievements such as The Importance of Being Earnest (1895 - play), The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891 – novel) and The Ballad of Reading Gaol (Jail) (1898 – poem) are admired and often quoted to this day. Check out this passage, taken from The Ballad of Reading Gaol:

Yet each man kills the thing he loves
By each let this be heard,
Some do it with a bitter look,
Some with a flattering word,
The coward does it with a kiss,
The brave man with a sword!

Some kill their love when they are young,
And some when they are old;
Some strangle with the hands of Lust,
Some with the hands of Gold:
The kindest use a knife,
because The dead so soon grow cold.

Some love too little, some too long,
Some sell, and others buy;
Some do the deed with many tears,
And some without a sigh:
For each man kills the thing he loves,
Yet each man does not die.

It’s genius, yet here I am talking about Oscar Wilde married so and so on such and such a date. Why? Because domestic gossip is central to the Oscar Wilde story.

Oscar Wilde’s sexuality, you see, was constantly being called into question. Sometimes he was labeled bisexual, sometimes homosexual. Wilde himself described his sexuality as something akin to the male love inspired by the Greek man/boy relationship (known as pederasticism - yikes).

Theories about when Wilde was introduced to homosexuality vary. Many believe he started exploring his own sexuality while at Oxford. By the late 1870’s he had befriended a group of pederastic poets and homosexual law-reformers. In 1882 Wilde met American poet Walt Whitman on a trip to the US, and wrote to a friend that there was “no doubt” about Whitman’s sexual orientation, claiming that “I still have the kiss of Whitman on my lips.”

Trouble starting brewing for Wilde when he was introduced to 22-year-old Oxford student Lord Alfred Douglas in 1891. They developed an immediate friendship, intellectually and emotionally intimate, but not initially sexual. Their friendship turned romantic only briefly, ending soon after it began when Wilde realized that Douglas consented only to please him, and Douglas recognized the reality that he was too old to suit Wilde’s interests.

In spite of this snafu, Wilde and Douglas remained openly living together, and Wilde began looking into homosexual law reform with his upper-class social group (it was a criminal offense in England at the time).

Lord Alfred’s father, John Sholto Douglas, the 9th Marquess of Queensbury, did not look favorably upon his son’s relationship with Wilde, believing that Alfred had been corrupted by, as he labeled upper-class homosexuals, “a snob queer.”

The Marquess plotted a smear campaign against Wilde in an attempt to end the relationship. Known for traveling with a group of brutish bodyguards, he threatened Wilde on several occasions. He planned to throw a bouquet of turnips at Wilde during the opening of The Importance of Being Earnest, but Wilde was tipped off and the Marquess was barred entrance. Finally, while Wilde was vacationing in Monte Carlo, the Marquess left a calling card with an inscription accusing Wilde of sodomy at Wilde’s club (all interviews and first-hand accounts indicate that Wilde never engaged in sodomy).

This was the final straw for Wilde, and he sought criminal libel charges. The trial quickly escalated into a media sideshow as the Marquess’s defense team paraded Wilde’s dirty laundry for all to see in an effort to discredit his case. They revealed Wilde’s association with blackmailers, rent boys, cross dressers and homosexuals. They made public Wilde’s private letters to Lord Alfred, calling the wording inappropriate. The Picture of Dorian Gray came under fierce moral criticism.

Wilde’s prosecution eventually dropped the case after the defense team threatened to bring rent boys to the stand to testify against the writer.

But the problems for Wilde had just begun. After he left the court a warrant was issued for his arrest and he was taken into custody for gross indecency under Section 11 of the Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1885 (“homosexual acts not amounting to buggery”). At Wilde’s prompting, Lord Alfred fled to Paris before the trial began.

In 1895 Wilde was convicted of gross indecency and sentenced to two years hard labor.

Prison wasn’t kind to Wilde, and upon his release he retreated into self-imposed exile, penniless and sickly. He died November 30, 1900 of cerebral meningitis, though not before being received into the Roman Catholic Church.

On an artistic level, Wilde has few peers to match his quick wit, his unique understanding of human nature or his strong voice. He fearlessly and unapologetically flouted cultural norms and in consequence will forever live on in infamy. Agree with his lifestyle or not, Oscar Wilde is certainly a person of note.

Thanks for reading.

PS. Thanks to everyone for the feedback on the Thanksgiving post. I’ll let you know what comes of it. I’m not sure how much of the Zot I’ll be able to work in. It is for a broad, probably older audience, and I don’t imagine they’re quite ready for the revolution. In time, Zizzle-Zotians. In time.

People of Note: Edie Sedgwick

Every artist worth his weight has a muse. For both Andy Warhol and Bob Dylan, Edie Sedgwick was that muse.

Born in 1943 to a family of old East Coast money, Sedgwick was in many ways the predecessor to our very own Paris Hilton. By that, I mean she was famous simply for being famous. Living a life of privilege and splendor, Ms. Sedgwick has become an iconic, mythical figure in both artistic circles and the eyes of aspiring debutantes.

Heavily involved in the social scene of the ‘60s, Sedgwick met Bob Dylan and his close friend Bobby Neuwirth in 1964 while they were staying at the Chelsea Hotel with Dylan’s girlfriend Sara Lownds. Sedgwick reportedly made an immediate impression on Dylan as they spent late nights touring the “poppy nightlife world,” as Neuwirth called it, while Lownds stayed at home with her 3-year-old child.

She would meet Warhol in 1965 and become a regular at his studio, referred to as The Factory and famed for wild parties with guest lists ranging from Mick Jagger to Truman Capote. Upon first meeting, Sedgwick caught Warhol’s eye and he decided to feature the young beauty in a series of avant-garde films including Poor Little Rich Girl, Kitchen, and Beauty No. 2.

The films were rarely viewed outside of The Factory, but Sedgwick’s fame spread nonetheless. It seemed she never left Warhol’s side (he referred to her as his “superstar). She went so far as to cut her hair short and die it silver to match the wigs Warhol would often wear.

By 1966 Sedgwick’s relationship with Warhol had deteriorated. Many believe the cause was Sedgwick’s relationship with Dylan, which caused petty jealousies and insecurities inside The Factory.

The truth, however, was that Dylan had secretly married Ms. Lownds several months prior to Sedgwick’s falling out with Warhol (a fact that Sedgwick was unaware of). During an argument between Sedgwick and Warhol at a New York restaurant, started when she mentioned a film she was supposedly to star in with “Bobby Dylan,” Warhol revealed the clandestine marriage, which he had learned of from mutual friends. Sedgwick went to make a phone call and when she returned announced that she was leaving The Factory. She never went back.

The animosity grew from there, particularly between Dylan and Warhol. Dylan blamed Warhol for Sedgwick’s unchecked drug use, feeling that he ruined her. Warhol felt that Dylan had been lying to Sedgwick, leading her on while knowing full well that he would never be with her; lying to her about their relationship (the exact nature of Dylan’s relationship with Sedgwick has never been verified, but it’s believe that several of the songs on Blonde on Blonde, released in 1966, are about Sedgwick. Also, Edie’s older brother Jonathon has come forward and asserted that she was pregnant with Dylan’s child and had an abortion.)

Sedgwick, meanwhile, became entangled in an intense and tumultuous relationship with Neuwirth and became increasingly dependent on barbiturates. Neuwirth, unable to cope with the drug use, broke it off in ’67. Sedgwick never quite recovered.

By 1969 Edie was committed to the psychiatric ward of Cottage Hospital in California. Here she met fellow patient Michael Post, whom she would marry in 1971. She reportedly quit using alcohol and drugs, but in October was prescribed pain medication for a physical illness. She would often demand more medication, or claim she lost the pills in order to get more.

In November Edie attended a fashion show and then an after party. She died that night of a barbiturate overdose. Edie Sedgwick was 28-years-old

So what makes Edie Sedgwick special? Why is a spoiled, drug abusing media darling worthy of the esteemed honor of being named a Zizzle-Zot Person of Note (any more so than Paris, Lindsay Lohan or Britney Spears)?

Because, in my eyes, her story embodies the tragedy that the lives of the rich and famous all too often are. We live in a society that idolizes and idealizes those who die young. Kurt Cobain, River Phoenix, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, the list goes on. We glorify the lifestyles of drugged out, delusional, desperate individuals. We like to think of these people as truly living; seize the day, Carpe Diem. Always exciting. Always on the move. If only I could have that life, I’d be happy.

But really, aren’t these people dying? Slowly killing themselves as we look on, fascinated by the wreckage.

They are lost and lonely souls with no one to turn to in a sea of people.

Edie Sedgwick, reduced to a simple plot line, was an innocent and naïve girl looking for love, caught in the crosshairs of a world she didn’t understand. She was used and abandoned by men of staggering genius. Men who could compose in her name timeless ballads and priceless pieces of art. Men who could turn her into a goddess, a muse. Men who could give her the world, but were so consumed by their own inner turmoil that they could never give her their love.

Men who, after leading her to drugs and leaving her to suffer alone, would finally kill her.

Thanks for reading.

People of Note: Manfred von Richthofen

Manfred von Richthofen, also known as “The Red Baron,” is arguably the most well-known fighter pilot in the short history of aviation. With 80 confirmed air-combat victories while flying for Germany during WWI, he was a figure demanding both fear and respect.

Von Richthofen was born to a family of old Prussian nobility in the town of Kleinburg (in what is now southwestern Poland). After completing cadet training in 1911 he joined a Prussian cavalry unit, serving as a scout on both the eastern and western fronts during the outset of WWI.

With the modernization of warfare (machine guns, barbed wire), cavalry scouts quickly became obsolete and Von Richthofen’s duties as a cavalry-man were limited to reinforcing other troops. Disappointed by this lack of combat, he transferred to the Flying Service in 1915.

In 1916 Von Richthofen met Oswald Boelcke, a fighter pilot recruiting candidates for his newly formed unit. He selected Von Richthofen, and it was with Boelcke’s team that Von Richthofen recorded his first official air-combat victory while flying over Cambrai, France.

From Boelcke, young Von Richthofen learned to fly by a strict set of flight rules to assure the greatest success for the individual and the squadron. Using a combination of tremendous skill and calculated caution, he quickly rose in the military ranks and assumed command of his own unit, Jasta 11, in 1917.

It was during this time that he was appointed the moniker “The Red Baron.” As a practical means of easy identification, the pilots of Jasta 11 began decorating their aircraft with red colorations and individual markings, with Von Richthofen’s own planes painted entirely red.

The Red Baron lead his new unit to world renowned success, peaking in the “Bloody April” of 1917, during which The Baron himself had 22 kills (raising his total to 52).

In June he took command of the new, larger Jagdgeschwader formations, which consisted of Jastas 4, 6, 10, and his old 11. The Jagdgeschwader soon became a feared force, highly mobile and able to strike quickly with great precision, and earned the nickname “The Flying Circus” for its brightly colored planes and large, colorful tents housing men and aircraft.

In July of 1917 The Red Baron sustained a serious head wound which grounded him for several weeks. He returned to flight in October, but the injury is believed to have caused lasting damage as he would continually suffer from post-flight nausea and headaches (and some claimed a change in temperament).

In 1918, the German government attempted to force Von Richthofen to take a desk job, fearing that the death of a wartime hero with a large cult following would be a serious blow to German morale. The Red Baron refused, and rumors circulated that the British had assembled squadrons specifically to hunt him down, and were offering large rewards and an automatic Victoria Cross to any allied pilot able to kill him.

On April 21, 1918, The Red Baron met his demise while pursuing Canadian Pilot Wilfrid May over the Somme River. During his pursuit he was met with counter-fire from May’s flight commander, Arthur Brown. The Baron turned to avoid the attack and continued his pursuit. It’s believed that during this final stage of the chase Von Richthofen was struck by a single .303 bullet, causing severe damage to his heart and lungs. He managed a hasty landing, keeping the plane largely intact, but died shortly after.

And now, posthumously, The Red Baron makes delicious frozen pizza.

Thanks for reading.

People of Note: Victor Bout

Also known as “The Merchant of Death,” Victor Bout is a notorious Russian arms dealer who illegally provides weapons and military equipment to the highest bidders throughout Northern Africa and the Middle East.

Bouts origins are somewhat mysterious. It is believed that he was born in 1967 to two Russian parents, but his actual birthplace is disputed (he is sometimes listed as Ukrainian in descent). At some point he joined the Russian military (it is not known when) and worked as a navigator, eventually expanding his duties to include the training of Air Force commando troops.

In 1991 Bout graduated from Moscow’s Military Institute after studying foreign languages (he is reputedly fluent in at least six, including Russian, English, French, Portuguese and Uzbek) and went to work as a translator for the Russian Army. This didn’t last, however, as the base where he was stationed was dissolved following the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Bout and his colleagues were out of work, but not for long. The enterprising Bout was highly trained, had access to military equipment and possessed a rolodex full of international contacts.

Bout started by founding the Transavia Export Cargo Company, aiding Belgian soldiers in Somalia. In exchange for a cut of the profits, the GRU (Russia’s intelligence branch) loaned Bout three Antonov airplanes. He used these aircraft to supply the Islamic State of Afghanistan (known now as the Northern Alliance) with ammunition and weapons, making an alleged $50 million. With this money he founded the Trans Aviation Network Group in Belgium.

In 1995 the Taliban drove the Islamic State of Afghanistan out of Kabul. This didn’t stop Bout. No, he had just found a new customer in the Taliban. Around this time word of Bout’s shady empire reached the Belgian government, and they started to investigate. He was forced to move his operation to the United Arab Emirates, where he founded Air Cess.

He used Air Cess to supply African conflicts with “thousands upon thousands of assault rifles, grenade launchers, bullets and other weapons,” according to UN officials. His dealings extended to conflicts in Angola, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Kenya, Charles Taylor’s regime in Liberia, Libya, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Sudan, Swaziland and Uganda.

Former British Foreign Office Minister Peter Hain, the man who invented the nickname “Merchant of Death,” has said this of Bout: “Bout is the leading merchant of death who is the principal conduit for planes and supply routes that take arms, including heavy military equipment, from East Europe, principally Bulgaria, Moldova, and Ukraine, to Liberia and Angola. The UN has exposed Bout as the center of a spider’s web of shady arms dealers, diamond brokers, and other operatives, sustaining wars. Without someone like him we would be much, much closer to ending the conflicts. If there was ever a man for the US to assassinate, he is that man.”

Over the years Bout has built a large network of contacts in both business and politics. This fact, along with his carefully disguised dealings and his constant movement, has made it difficult for authorities to build a case against him. In 2002 he was finally formally charged and warrants were issued for his arrest. He moved to Russia where he remains protected by the Russian Constitution, which doesn’t allow for the extradition of citizens to foreign countries.

Victor Bout is still at large.

Thanks for reading.

People of Note: Steven Biko

“The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.”

Steven Biko (1946-1977) was a prominent anti-apartheid activist during what was arguably the climax of South Africa’s struggle for equality in the 1960s and early ‘70s. His efforts as a community organizer and leader are celebrated to this day and are recognized as a crucial element in the anti-apartheid movement. His controversial death brought the issue of racism in South Africa to the international arena.

Biko was born in King Williams Town, in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. While attending the University of Natal Medical School he became involved in the student activist organization National Union of South African Students. It didn’t take long for him to become disillusioned by this group, as it was run by white men (the very men oppressing him). He believed that Black, Indian, and other non-white students needed their own group to respond to apartheid. As a result, he founded the South African Students’ Organization (SASO) in 1968 and was elected its first president (this group evolved into the influential Black Consciousness Movement (BCM)).

Because of his work with this group, Biko was “banned” in 1973 at the height of apartheid. This meant he couldn’t leave the Eastern Cape, he wasn’t allowed to speak to more than one person at a time, he couldn’t make speeches in public, and it was forbidden to quote anything he said.

In spite of these restrictions, Biko returned to the Eastern Cape and established a community clinic, a trust fund for political prisoners and their families, and an education fund. Biko and the BCM also played a significant role in the Soweto Uprising of 1976 (a little history of the uprising: in 1974 the government passed the Afrikaans Medium Decree. The decree forced black schools to instruct in a 50-50 mix of English and Afrikaans, which is the indigenous language of South Africa. This was seen by many as a method of preventing blacks from furthering their causes through education and a tool of oppression. In 1976 students began protesting, organizing their efforts and refusing to go to school. This culminated with the Soweto Uprising, during which thousands of students organized for a peaceful protest. The uprising was crushed after heavily-armed police shot and killed 700 students). Following this incident, Biko became a primary target of authorities.

In August of 1977 Biko was arrested at a police roadblock under the Terrorism Act of 1968 (allowed the government to arrest anyone suspected of “endangering the maintenance of law and order” and hold them indefinitely without trial – sounds like Guantanamo…weird). He died three weeks later, still in police custody.

The circumstances of Biko’s death were a cause of great controversy amongst his supporters. The official story was that he died as the result of an extended hunger strike. Upon his autopsy, however, it was discovered that he had sustained massive injuries to the head, suggesting he had been beaten.

Thanks to journalist Helen Zille, news of Biko’s death and the reality of what happened to him spread quickly, revealing to the international community the brutality of the apartheid regime. His funeral was attended by several ambassadors and diplomats from the US and Western Europe. Journalist and personal friend Donald Woods authored numerous newspaper articles and a book about Biko’s life and death, for which Woods was eventually forced to flee South Africa.

The police officers responsible for Biko’s death were never brought to justice. At the time, the judge overseeing the case cited insufficient evidence and the lack of a witness as reasons for not charging the police forces.

Five former members of the South African Security Forces eventually admitted to the murder in 1997, but by then the time frame for prosecution had passed under South African law.

Steven Biko was a courageous man. He fought for what he knew to be right despite the legal, emotional and ultimately physical consequences he would inevitably suffer. His nonviolent approach to initiating change focused on the idea that his community needed to shift its mindset, needed to believe itself worthy of equality, and then equality would be won. Biko's efforts restored the pride in a long oppressed group of people and brought the world’s attention to the plight of South Africa.

Thanks for reading.

People of Note: Neal Cassady

One of modern America’s archetypal tragic figures, Neal Cassady was the father of the Beat Generation and the granddaddy of the psychedelic movement. His cross-country travels with the writer Jack Kerouac were the inspiration for On the Road, the manifesto of the Beat legions. Allen Ginsburg also alludes to Cassady in his groundbreaking poem Howl, which is in my opinion one of the greatest American literary achievements.

Cassady was born in 1926 and was raised in Denver by an alcoholic father, bouncing between run-down hotels and reform schools. He met Kerouac and Ginsberg at Columbia University in 1946 and quickly joined their circle of friends, which included several prominent writers and artists.

Over the next year Cassady and Kerouac traveled from New York to Denver to San Francisco several times, also making stops in New Orleans and Mexico. Kerouac’s accounts of these journeys would turn into On the Road, finished in 1951.

Cassady and Kerouac had a falling out towards the end of their travels together when Kerouac developed dysentery in Mexico, and Cassady abandoned him there. Their friendship was irreparably damaged, and they drifted apart.

In 1948 Cassady married Carolyn Robinson and settled down south of San Francisco. They had three children, but Cassady could not escape his roaming past. He was finally arrested in 1958 on drug charges after offering to share marijuana with an undercover officer. He did a brief stint at San Quentin, and upon his release found himself unable to meet the obligations of his wife and children. Carolyn eventually divorced him.

In 1962 Cassady met Ken Kesey (author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and founder of the Merry Pranksters). He eventually joined Kesey’s group of flower children, which included Wavy Gravy, Tom Wolfe, and Mountain Girl (Carolyn Adams, wife of Jerry Garcia).

The Merry Pranksters were, in essence, the psychedelic movement. They believed psychedelic drugs could be used to transform society and attempted to spread this message through events they labeled “Acid Tests.” During “Acid Tests” participants were given LSD (which was legal until 1966) and asked if they could “pass the acid test.”

Don’t get it? Neither do I, but I imagine that’s a good thing.

Cassady was with the Pranksters until 1967, when he traveled to Mexico with fellow Prankster George “Barely Visible” Walker and girlfriend Anne Murphy. They ended up just south of Puerto Vallarta and held legendary parties at their beachside house. It was following one of these parties that Cassady died, in1968, after passing out near a railroad track on a cold, rainy night wearing nothing but a T-shirt and jeans. He was in a coma when he was found and later died of exposure. He was five days short of his 42nd birthday.

The tragedy of Neal Cassady is that he represents that small cross section of humanity that is truly alive. He ravenously consumed life, wandering from experience to experience freely, but far from aimlessly. He was driven by the desire to taste, to smell, to hear, to see, to feel, to love, to hate, to live through suffering and ecstasy alike. He dared to bypass the American dream for the chance to truly come alive, and in the end he lost. He became lazy, finding it easier to artificially manifest sublime experiences with drugs and alcohol, never realizing that these were the very things making him numb to life.

Maybe the lesson to take from the life of Neal Cassady is best coined using his own words: “Twenty years of fast living – there’s just not much left, and my kids are all screwed up. Don’t do what I have done.”

Thanks for reading.

People of Note: Brother Lawrence

Note: To give everyone the heads up, this is the first of a sporadically recurring series in which I will focus on intriguing historical or modern figures that for whatever reason most people (myself included) are unfamiliar with.

Brother Lawrence

Brother Lawrence, born Nicholas Herman (1610-1691) was a Carmelite monk at the Discalced Carmelite Monastery in Paris. His legacy is the text “The Practice of the Presence of God,” which chronicles his intimate relationship with God and the overwhelming joy this relationship gave him.

Herman’s extreme poverty forced him to join the army and serve in the Thirty Years’ war as a young man. It was during this time that he had a revelatory experience which shaped the rest of his life.

By all accounts, the revelation and ensuing realization was simple. As he gazed at a leafless tree in the dead of winter, Herman realized that he too was seemingly dead, but, like the tree, God had new life waiting for him. At that moment, he said, the leafless tree “first flashed in upon my soul the fact of God.” An unfailing love for God consumed Herman from that point onward.

Shortly after this experience Herman was injured and was forced to retire from the army. With his newfound love for God, he set out to find a place where he could “suffer for his failures.”

He entered the monastery as a lay brother, lacking the necessary education to become a cleric, and took the name “Lawrence of the Resurrection.” He was assigned to the kitchen, and amidst his daily chores of cooking and cleaning he developed his philosophy of spirituality and work. He writes “Men invent means and methods of coming at God's love, they learn rules and set up devices to remind them of that love, and it seems like a world of trouble to bring oneself into the consciousness of God's presence. Yet it might be so simple. Is it not quicker and easier just to do our common business wholly for the love of him?"

Brother Lawrence believed that the presence of God, and the medium for His love, was found in daily tasks. Our only calling was to perform our duties wholly for God’s glory.

Because of Brother Lawrence’s profound, if simple, peace, many powerful religious leaders sought him out for spiritual guidance. The wisdom that he passed on to them would become the basis for “The Practice of the Presence of God,” which was compiled posthumously by Father Joseph de Beaufort, one of the many Brother Lawrence inspired.

To me, Brother Lawrence’s life philosophy is amazing in its simplicity. Imagine finding such fulfillment, value and worth from everyday tasks as simple as scrubbing pots and pans. Is it possible for all of us to attain contentment, peace, and ultimately uncontrollable happiness just by performing every task as an act of worship?

Imagine the overwhelming joy we could experience if everything we did was a medium of God’s love. We would never be absent from the presence of God. We wouldn’t get caught up in worldly affairs, in the superficiality of pride, possession, or the external pressures of “success.”

Is such a life desirable? Part of me thinks it would prevent us from striving for higher goals, leaving us stagnant. Is this my pride talking?

Tell me your thoughts.

Thanks for reading.