Have u ever been in synchronicity

a long due tribute to Dr Carl G Jung and all the theorists of chaos

Non-dualism in eastern philosophy: the Advaita vedanta

 The Indian mystical philosophies and religions are concerned not so much with the manifest reality we see about us, but with the unmanifest Absolute Transcendent.  What matters is simply the practical attainment of a state of this universal, transcendent, transpersonal existence.  In that state, there is no difference between individual Self (Jiva) and God (Ishwara); there is only the qualityless Absolute (Nirguna Brahman)[1]. In short, they are not a mental or analytical philosophy as we understand the term in the West, but rather a conceptual system for guiding yogic practice, with the goal being the complete transcendence of embodied existence.

Perhaps the most important school of Indian spiritual philosophy, Advaita Vedanta originates from the writings of Gaudapada and Sankaracharya, who in turn were commentators on earlier scriptures such as the Brahma Sutra, the Bhagavad Gita, and the Upanishads.  As with all Indian systems of thought, Advaita Vedanta is at the same time a school of philosophy, a religion, a theology and a doctrine of salvation

It’s basic premise is all that all that ultimately exists is the Absolute Reality, Nirguna Brahman (“Brahman without qualities”).  The phenomenal world has empirical validity.  But it has no absolute reality.  It is ultimately maya - a magical show – and mithya - false (neither real nor unreal).  All that exists is nothing but Brahman. One’s individual self is  ultimately no different from Brahman, hence the importance given to the Upanishadic sayings “I am Brahman” and “that thou art”.  It is only a sort of metaphysical ignorance (avidya) that prevents us from realising our true nature as one with the Absolute – as in fact The Absolute Itself.  Once avidya is removed there arise the experience of the Atman’s identity with Brahman.  One becomes jivanmukti - liberated while in the body – and after death attains Moksha, identity with the Absolute.

extra from wikipedia on the advaita vedanta

Social business is not a strange option

When I founded my first company in italy 7 yrs ago, comergy – complex sinergy, i needed to ground it on solid ethical ground as I would have never sold a single piece of my heart to modern capitalism. So I started supplying Research and innovation services even to those that didn’t understand what i was talking about. As long as they paid. So I squeezed and still do so todate, into business processes uplifting the level of ethics adopted by all and in all processes of the companies I served. It is now time to change, accelerate evolution:

(extract from wikipedia) .:. Social businesses can be defined as follows:

Social Businesses seek to profit from acts that generate social improvements and serve a broader human development purpose. A key attribute of social businesses is that an increase in revenue corresponds to an incremental social enhancement. The social mission will permeate the culture and structure of the organization and the dual bottom lines – social and economic will be in equal standing with the firm pursuing long term maximization of both.1

In his book Creating a World without Poverty – Social Business and the Future of Capitalism, Professor Dr. Muhammad Yunus defines what a social business is and what it is not. It boils down to the following requirements:

1. social objectives: it needs to have positive social objectives (help comes from the altruistic social services that the business provides to the poor): e.g. health, education, poverty, environment or climate urgency
2. community ownership: it needs to be owned by the poor or disadvantaged (dividends and financial growth return to the poor where their fiscal situations are helped bringing them out of poverty): e.g. women, young people or long-term unemployed
3. non-profit distribution: investors may not, after having had their investments paid back, take profits out of the enterprise as dividends.

A social business is driven to bring about change while pursuing profits. Although from a strictly capitalistic perspective it seems foolish to pursue a goal other than profit, social businesses aim to meet certain social and environmental goals. The Grameen bank is an example of a business that combines two of these business models into one; it offers social services and goods to the poor and in addition is owned by the poor.

Yunus postulates a new world of business in which profit-maximising enterprises and social-benefit-maximising enterprises coexist. In addition, a social business would operate much like a profit-maximizing business in that the company as a whole grows financially and gains profits. The only difference is that the company’s shareholders and investors would be re-accumulating their initial investment as opposed to receiving dividends. He calls the latter social business enterprises.

Social Business Enterprises

Social Business Enterprises (SBE) are based on the benefit maximisation principle. They are operated as a business enterprise with the objective to pass on all the benefits to the customer. SBEs are non-loss, non-dividend companies that compete with profit-maximising enterprises and other social business enterprises.

Key ingredients to the success of the approach are education, institutions to make social businesses visible in the market place (a social stock market), rating agencies, appropriate impact assessment tools, indices to understand which social business enterprise is doing more and/or better than others so that social investors are correctly guided. The industry will need its Social Wall Street Journal and Social Financial Times.