March 6 | Reader contributions: What We Can Do MUCH as I love movies, I rarely have time to go, and I've grown not to trust many of them because of how I often feel sitting in a cinema. Having asked some of my colleagues at Planet Waves for their comments on the Oscars, and getting an overview, I've decided I have no comment, except that I appreciate how many of the nominees addressed serious issues and came from small studios. That does seem like a landmark, and like the choice not to retreat from the apparent debacle of Bowling for Columbine a few years ago. Starting today I'm going to post two reader letters each day (more if they are shorter) on my question last week, "What can we do?" The floor is still open for comments, which you may send to francis@planetwaves.net . However, if Dick Cheney resigns, I'll interrupt the series for five minutes to congratulate him and the rest of us. If you would like to submit a letter on the theme of "What can we do?" lease type neatly in a style as close to the published style you see here as you can do. For example (if your email program permits), please send in an HTML email, not plain text (so that the words wrap), leaving one space between the lines, using no indents, and no fancy characters like "smart quotes." Anyone who contributes to the Internet in any way would be wise to turn off all forms of auto-correct and auto-format, particularly those little "smart quotes" that mistranslate into weird things in some browsers and make everyone wonder why there is an upside down question mark in the middle of a sentence. This will help us copy edit to make it consistent for presentation here. Thank you to everyone who has contributed, and helped select and edit. Pat Bishop writes: Hi Eric,   First, there's no one-size-fits-all "what to do." If you're one of those "yoga people" who focus exclusively on interior work, it's time to get out and act. If you're a life-long activist who's been marching in the streets, some interior work is probably long overdue. If you're a control freak who's used to ordering everyone else around, it's time to get your own house in order. If you've taken orders all your life and never questioned, it's time to start questioning authority. For me, it's an ongoing balancing act between internal and external. When your beliefs change, you have to put them in action or you're living a lie. When I'm in that state of imbalance, crises tend to happen to call my attention to the fact. Unfortunately, the reverse seems to be less true -- that is, if external events conflict with one's beliefs, the pressure to change one's beliefs has to be enormous in order to overcome the mind's defenses. I just wrote a blog entry that included that point, but I'll save that discussion for another time (very important, though).   Second, I've found that inner work eventually leads back to the outside, because you get to the place where you don't just understand intellectually that we're all connected -- you know it, feel it, breathe it. If you go inside far enough, it's as though you enter a black hole or a Mobius strip and get catapaulted out the other side a changed person. It makes your activism much more effective, because you know what's important, what's worth fighting for, and what's not worth your energy.   Third, it's been a long time since I've thought about the politics of repressing the sexual urge. Growing up Catholic, I know all about that one, and I can't even remember at what point I realized that making people feel guilty about something so natural and right meant literally having them by the balls. I never thought about it in terms of broader political control, although I suppose I should have, given that the Church, when it was conniving about all this, WAS in fact the political authority in Europe. In any case, I took back that power (all by myself, no help), and that alone makes my life meaningful, even if I do nothing for the next 20 years but sit on my butt in front of Friends re-runs. I've never heard you mention Susan Block, but I think you'd love her Web site and quickly become a convert. You can find her at http://drsusanblock.com   While I think this discussion of sex is healthy and necessary, I haven't found a way to reconcile in my own mind the sacredness of sex with an "anything goes" open discussion that leaves no intimate stone unturned. I'm not familiar with Reich's work; only the basic premise as you describe in your blog, to which I was introduced several years ago. At the time, I was reading some ancient Sumerian literature -- the first stories EVER written, in all human history -- and I was struck that the narrator, the goddess Innanna (the archetypal woman, like Venus), leans against an apple tree marveling at her "wondrous vulva." She then hops into her "boat of heaven" to visit her father and comes back with the "me," which scholars describe as some sort of natural law, but which I read as creative ideas. The "boat of heaven" is openly acknowledged to be a euphemism for the vulva, and yet no one seems to get that this story is not about a literal visit to anyone, but a journey beyond consciousness (to my father's house), which yields creative ideas that until that time had never existed. And they're coming from a female goddess, not God! If people want to have fun and games with sex, that's great, and it sure rivals using it to beat up on each other, which seems more the norm these days. But for me, there's a vital creative element involved, and this goes mostly overlooked. It makes sense when you think about it in terms of brain chemistry and the nervous system, which maybe Reich does, for all I know, since I haven't read his work.   What I've found so fascinating about all this, and have pondered for years, is not the political control angle, but the polarization and depression angle (in fact, one form of depression is called "bipolar disorder"). Depression is one of the most prevalent illnesses in the world and vastly under-reported -- not to mention vastly misunderstood. The current scientific thinking is that there's a disconnect in brain chemistry, and that this can be fixed with a drug. I see it as a disconnect in society as a whole, and repressed and/or rote sexuality seems to be a symptom of this rather than a cause. Another symptom is inactivity. When you're depressed, you don't have enough energy to do anything. You don't even want sex, so how are you going to get up the energy to protest in the streets? This is one of those topics that is an ongoing inquiry for me, subject to change on a moment's notice if a compelling new piece of new information comes in.   OK, this is already longer than I'd meant it to be, and I have to get going. Thanks again, Eric, for your fine work. Now that I'm out there in the blogosphere, too, I know how much courage it takes to put yourself and your ideas on the line.   Love, Pat We will post the URL to Pat's blog soon. I cannot find it at the moment. Carrie writes: Eric, I know well that feeling of not being able to accomplish things. It is not this that prevents me from writing my thoughts. It is the knowledge that what I have to say is not something people want to hear. The woman who taught me astrology read my chart and told me that I am the person who makes others uncomfortable. They see what I think and do and this makes them feel inadequate or that they fall short somehow. I don't set out to make them feel that way, they just do. She said I attract people that need to hear the message and at the same time, don't want to hear it. Their karma, she said, caused them be attracted to me but to also resent the things I say and do. I have a gift of saying things in a way that makes the issues I am speaking about perfectly clear. Even complex issues are clear to me and I can articulate them well. Even so, I am afraid of being a target if I say what I know or believe. I have long hidden my intelligence -- as early as fourth grade my teacher caught me deliberately writing the wrong answer on tests to keep the other kids from resenting me. I have felt the brunt of people's resentment all my life and do not wish to court that to a dangerous degree because now I have children to protect. So I do this: I raise my children to know the things I know, I teach them about the same things you are talking about, and I write little snippets of illumination in message boards to help others see just a little bit. Maybe it is not huge, but it is what I can do. I would love to write what I know, much like you do. Your blogs and forecasts seem to be telling me to go for it, but I have no idea how to do it or where to even start.   But I am raising four children to be environmentally aware and to eschew consumerism for a better, less greedy life. With love, Carrie