Inspiration, or religion?

Shortly before I write this, my wife will have travelled on one of these. It is a train on the Docklands Light Railway. She is down at the ExCel arena, along with ten thousand others, for one of those motivational-type conferences. You can visit their website at: http://www.inspiredliving.tv/ Tony Robbins seems like one of an endless stream of motivational speakers from the USA, each with their own gimmick and countless people on hand to testify how great he is and how his teaching has changed their lives. Tony Robbins' gimmick is the fire-walk. I don't yet know the details, but I have seen charcoal pits prepared before, where people walk swiftly over in bare feet, based on the clear physical principle that if you move quickly and concentrate hard, no pain will be felt. I've heard that it is an empowering experience, and I would not seek to belittle it one bit. I do sincerely hope that Fiona will enjoy her fiery encounter.

The truth is that I don't know much about this man, or his system. I would merely comment that this seems to be our new kind of acceptable religion. It's limited, involving no long-term commitment, and claims to impact positively on one's life, whilst not taking it over. It's great, it's safe, and it's funded by businesses themselves.

The ExCel Arena, in London's Dockland Area - Holds 10,000 people.

I'm hopeful that Fiona will have a very positive experience there, and one which will benefit her greatly. It just strikes me that here are sufficient religious parallels (see the web site) to ask the question:

"If Fiona wanted her business to fund her attendance at Spring Harvest (a Christian motivational conference), would they be so forthcoming - even if the experience benefitted her greatly?"

Comments

[Aaron]

its raining in London :-(

[Aaron]

did you know that the Docklands Light Rail (or "DLR" as we affectionately call it down here in shandyland) doesn't have drivers! It actually is driven by computer. Occasionally I have seen a person in uniform on there just checking that its working properly (quite worrying really) but I have never heard of the system going wrong...ever. Quite impressive really.