Just to be clear, if you’ve come back and you’re ready for your shake – you get to pay for it. I’m not buying a thousand shakes for you all.

I was saying in my last update about Occupy Wall Street and how those in the protest are wearing their designer jeans and driving fancy cars. I actually don’t know what they were driving or wearing, I wasn’t there. Scanning through the images on Google doesn’t tell me much except it seems the most of them are wearing the same stuff I wear. One thing that seems consistent is that most of the protesters are kids. My first reaction is to call them kids who think they’re entitled to something. That’s a broad attack though. I really don’t know these people. The few TV snippets I’ve seen haven’t put much in the way of a really intelligent crowd though.

I’m questioning the validity of the campaign but more important I’m wondering about the human spirit and how far it’s willing to go to stand up to defend what it (we, humans) believe in. I’ve been reading the Book of Mormon lately and in the book of Alma Chapter 43:45 it talks about the spirit of the Nephites as they fight to defend what they believe in:

45 Nevertheless, the Nephites were inspired by a better cause, for they were not fighting for monarchy nor power but they were fighting for their homes and their liberties, their wives and their children, and their all, yea, for their rites of worship and their church.

During this battle with swords and cimeters the Nephites were defending themselves and their homes from the attack of the Lamanites. I find it hard to imagine myself holding a sword and running into battle. But this entire army was commanded of God to do just that.

47 And again, the Lord has said that: Ye shall defend your families even unto bloodshed. Therefore for this cause were the Nephites contending with the Lamanites, to defend themselves, and their families, and their lands, their country, and their rights, and their religion.

So my real question asks how far are we willing to go to make a difference? Right now it looks like camping out on Wall Street and in other various places across the country seems to be the limits. Ironically there are some capitalists who are making money selling tshirts off this thing. That’s what’s awesome about America. Someone will find some way to make money off just about anything. But then if you make too much money you cross the line and suddenly everyone hates you. One day I hope to cross that line. If I ever do cross that line I promise to do the same thing that everyone else claims they’ll do when they cross the line. I’ll give back to the community and share the wealth because I don’t need that much money.

That was a tangent, sorry – it happens. Back to what I was saying: how far are we willing to go? Who are the largest criminals that we’re fighting against? I really don’t know, but are we willing to go without whatever they produce? Are we willing to give up electricity to fight against the power companies? Are we willing to ride bikes to work to fight the gas companies? Ironically if we were to ride bikes to work the gas prices could come down because of the surplus. When the prices come down we’ll start driving again and we’ll hike the prices back up. It’s all about us and our actions. Accountability isn’t about waiting for someone else to fix the problems. It’s about each of us being responsible for our actions. It’s difficult to imagine the leap in our lifestyle we would need to make to break away, but the results would be a simpler lifestyle where we’re not dependent on what the corporations are telling us that we need. Instead we would live based on what we actually need. I’m not implying that we all quit our jobs are run to some commune in the mountains!

I’ve got 2 beautiful kids that I can’t imagine going anywhere in the car unless their in their car seats. However I remember as a kid I used to like to lay down on the floor of the car. I had no car seat. I have become dependent on car seats to feel like my kids are safe in the car. I can’t leave my house without my cell phone and I don’t even call people and nobody ever calls me. Why is my phone so important? I’m sure it’s because I pay so much for it and it also has Angry Birds on it.

This rambling is getting too long. I’m going to make this a three part series!