I am sure I am gonna get in a lot of trouble with people, but aside from the breathtaking visuals and awesome animals-from-another-planet constructions, I left this movie feeling totally empty. First of all, I can’t stand faux new age philosophies which are so surfac-ey that they APPEAR to be affecting change but actually don’t do shit. Like “The Secret” for example. Just manifest everything you want in your brain and you can have that!! YEAH, the only problem is that your EGO is doing all the manifesting!! Where is the acceptance of what you have RIGHT NOW? Where is the Acceptance that nothing happens in this universe by mistake? Even your pain is designed to help you spiritually progress. So it all depends on how you use that pain- run from it (by tv, drugs, drinking, eating, negating that it’s there by lame ass “affirmations” etc.) or face it head on? The Secret perpetuates the “I will be happy when…” philosophy that- guess what? Will always keep you miserable. A million dollars and a record deal or book deal or boyfriend or girlfriend etc. is NOT gonna make you happy if you are miserable now (and treating yourself and others like shit.) Trust me in this. So what can you do RIGHT now to be happy? Well, you gotta look realistically at your ego and your unconscious patterning that keep you stuck. I am doing this work called The Process which is exactly that. I have changed a thousand percent because of my willingness to go into the icky crappy mire that is your ego- and to feel the pain. But you need a good guide, and you need support! And also you need to surround yourself with people who are on a similar path so you can lift each other up (and get rid of the people who bring you down.)! My good friend (and the person who put out my first album Strictly Platinum), Jason McFadden, posted this on his Facebook:
People travel to wonder at the height of the mountains, at the huge waves of the seas, at the long course of the rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motion of the stars, and yet they pass by themselves without wondering. — Augustine of Hippo
Which brings me back to Avatar. “Oooh it’s so beautiful, it’s a perfect race of people, in touch with the earth and each other and then the bad white man comes and ruins everything out of greed but look they’re not all bad because they can change! And once they change then they can rule the perfect race!” Which is TRUE (sort of) but it’s so simplistic. It’s all blame and no personal responsibility! What are the bulk of the people gonna do before/during/after the movie? Eat Mcdonalds and act like the same old assholes in their lives. I mean Avatar was BRANDED ON MCDONALDS HAPPY MEALS! There is a total disconnect! It’s so beautiful and amazing and heartwarming to commune with animals and be peaceful and “see” each other’s souls but once I leave this movie nothing is ACTUALLY gonna change in my life and in my actions. Let’s all marvel and wonder at the beauty of animals and the planet but let’s keep eating meat and trashing the earth. It’s much easier to blame “them”- like the General and the war machine is bad- but what about each one of us? What would have been way cooler is if at the end the camera pans back and shows that the General and the perfect people and planet were all inside our own heads- that we contain all of this life inside and it’s up to EACH ONE OF US to not be the asshole General in our own lives.
So don’t get sucked in to the hype. Or see the movie and then see where YOU personally are messing up the chance for us to be on planet Pandora. I know where my ego sabotages me in my life and I am working on it- and that’s all I ask of you. And if you want to turn the sound off the movie and put on Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon or the Mahavishnu Orchestra and watch it, I approve that for proper usage of the film.
