There are many good sites about the hippie philosophy, culture and symbols.
The history of the drug scene and it's consequences as time went on with organized
crime bringing in speed and heroin and finishing off Hippie Daze is well documented.
It did not take that long for the Hippie style to became fashionable. The clothing designers copied the bohemian style of the way the hippies dressed and it became available for purchase to mainstream America whether they prescribed to a hippie philosophy or not. This was discouraging to the hippies whose desire was to look different from the status quo as do all younger generations. When their mothers tarted wearing their clothes and their fathers started growing their hair, the young people had to come up with something new to set them apart, to symbolize their difference.
Hippie style making it into Vogue magazine, was a sign of the end of it.
The music of those way-ahead times is still well represented and will likely continue to remain so. The music lifted us higher, magically opened our hearts and stirred our minds with new ideas. Music speaks beyond words. It is the 'The Universal Source of Enlightenment'
Music videos/documentaries of '60's and '70's Music Raves / Hippie Daze Hippie Links
The ideal of peace and love were taught to me as a child. Harmony, cheerfulness, compassion were words I heard then read as a child and saw with my own eyes the evidence of their existence in the teachings of my mother the examples of and how she behaved towards others. There were many mysteries and heartbreaksin my young life and I have always been seeking clues to move me to towards understanding. Since my childhood,
I have been interested in learning more about life and love and have studied many religions, and tried on quite a few philosophies.
My generation was not satisfied to simply accept the materialistic values of our elders. We wanted to evolve ourselves and the world towards a higher ideal and explored all possibilities by educating ourselves. Many were especially influenced by the artists, poets, philosophers and visionaries of our own time as well as by reading and studying the greatest thinkers and philosophers in history.
"Then we sat on our star and dreamed of the way that we were
and the way that we wanted to be."...Morrison
" I think each one of us has a non-shirkable obligation to figure out the world on our
own as best we can. The way we behave as a result of that investigation is our real
and practiced Religion." ~ Stephan Gaskin
We
are here to make a better world.
No amount of rationalization or blaming can preempt the moment of choice
each of us brings to our situation here on this planet. The lesson of the 60's is that people who cared enough to do right could
change history.
We didn't end racism but we ended legal segregation. We ended the idea that you could send half-a-million soldiers around the
world to 
fight a war that people do not support. We ended the idea that women are second-class citizens. We made the environment an issue that couldn't be avoided.
The big battles that we won cannot be reversed. We were young, self-righteous, reckless, hypocritical, brave, silly, headstrong
and scared half to death.
And we were right ....Abbie Hoffman
Desiderata ~ A gift my mother gave me as I left home to come to San Francisco
In San Francisco in the '60's and 70's through the positive as well as the
negative experiences I had, I learned that one of the most important things things life is about is making choices.
Our responsibility is to search out our own answers.
You can choose whether to react or respond?
And
I discovered my own heart's true motive.
I chose Peace and Love and
"I sent my Soul through the Invisible,
Some letter of that After-life to spell:
And after many days my Soul return'd
And said, "Behold, Myself am Heav'n and Hell."
~ The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam Poetry
nicole @ S.F.Heart.com organized and sponsored
April peace action 2003 against the War in Irag
Photo © Randi Motson
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