As America goes to the polls ...

It doesn't seem so long ago that we were living in the eighties with big hair, new devices, and an ever increasing hope of prosperity and health, fuelled by the promises of politicians.

Since then we've had several crises, notably the big financial hits, roving war and a systematic failure to deliver on the promises they made. Now we see queues at foodbanks, ridiculously high energy bills, greater social division, a plethora of payday loans companies charging interest rates that would make a loan-shark blush, and a distinct absence of hope and expectation for the future. 

Cue an election. Media, celebrities and experts abound. Politicians don their almost-human look and feign interest while delivering their false dichotomies. 

What do the people do? Join in, get passionate and turn up like subservient drones to give their passive acceptance to a continuing dismantling of the thing we used to call society.

When the passion of people who object to the world that has been created is demonstrated they are denounced as deluded revolutionaries, bad neighbours, anti-social ne'er do wells and a disorganised rabble of malcontents; their outspoken paid and unpaid detractors maintain individual struggles as they work hard to support a system they have chosen to believe will see them prosper if only they suffer long enough and don't complain.

All the time, the monied, privileged owners sit in the background, watching the cash roll in. Their position isn't up for grabs, they've already grabbed it. It must be hard not to laugh if you're amongst them, but I guess they'll never tell us that, they don't walk among us and we are not invited.

Happy Illusion Day America. We are watching.

Thanks for your insight, but ...

Sadly for me it's not as useful as I guess you'd hoped it would be, because it's not an insight to my life it's a projection of yours.

I don't have the same views, the same beliefs or the same ambitions you have. I wish you well in yours and may you get all the blessings and gifts you need on your journey. I need something different, because I want something different.

I'm not travelling to the same place you're heading to, so the currency you have for your arrival is of little use to me. Thank you, but no! 

I need a little time ...

I sometimes wonder what the world would be like if everyone adopted a small difference.

Imagine if we all slowed down, just by a fraction.

Our reactions would have time to become responses. Sharp comments that lead to debate might be better understood, or empathically questioned to be better understood, before assumptions set a dispute in motion and it gains pace to a full-blown, no holds-barred, competitive argument.

Understanding another's perspective, as well as our own, is essential in avoiding unnecessary dispute. If we all slowed down, just a little, and kept that change through life, how much quality time would we get back as a consequence of this new way of being, time that would otherwise be lost in argument, together with its emotional and physical effects?

It's ironic to note that slowing down can actually give us time, when we seem to be speeding up and running forward at a break-neck pace through a fear that we don't have enough.

We have one chance to live this life. Daily, we make choices that determine its quality and its impact on others. At the end, our legacy will be what others remember of our presence, our acts, our achievements, our accomplishments, our accolades.

If you want to shape the things you are remembered for, take a small amount of time, right now, to acknowledge that you have the choice to guide that focus. Make the change, and keep it. Otherwise, regret the time you wasted reading this and get back to what you were doing, quickly!

Not a Lost Art, a Discarded Gift

The ability to genuinely connect, with empathy, to another human being seems less common today.

Diminished by years of deferment to technology, eye contact is now not necessary. We aren't in the same room, and we have established contacts that have never been in the room with us at the same time. 

Weird, isn't it? 

No, it's normal.

We learn rapport skills as a precursor to gaining personal influence, to persuasion, and to success in our dealings with others, them, the third parties. Just for now, while we still have to meet them in person.

When gathered with friends and someone asks who did that thing, when did something happen, or who won the cup in 1996, no longer does anyone touch their chin and reminisce. They don't think or remember or relate. They just turn to the nearest person with two thumbs, a smartphone and a signal.

How sad that we cannot go home still pondering the answer.

The mystery has gone; in its place we have certainty, and its midst lies emptiness, a space that may stay vacant for a very long time.

We did that.

Random Acts of Kindness

They do happen. Wouldn't it be good if we had a chance to capture them somewhere, especially if they were shared by the recipients of someone else's kindness?

We should all practise them, and I'd suggest something daily. It's ok, in fact encouraged, to do this and just know your intention was pure and your act was noble. No need to tell us what you did, and in many ways keeping quiet about your chosen act adds to its value.

If the recipient of kindness has somewhere to share the effect of the act they received, maybe, just maybe, more of us would be encouraged to engage and make a difference to another's life.

We need a place like that. In the meantime, to borrow a phrase from a well-known sports goods manufacturer, just do it.

If we all did one thing, just one thing, every day, to lighten the load of someone else, to share a smile if nothing else, what kind of world would we live in?

The Measure of a Man?

Beneath the sharp suit, the tailored shirt and standing in the bespoke shoes is a man. Outside is his car, it may be one of several, or may be a single, exclusive, expensive example.

Ownership and stewardship are factors used by others to make an assessment of personal worth in a societal sense. 

That's the way it is.

If wealth and possessions are the only metric by which we are measured, and other factors are ignored, we will never be truly accepted, understood or valued.

Vincent Van Gogh is valued, and his work is incredibly valuable. He is remembered and revered. How much did he make from his art?

The Perception of Reality

Do you ever feel like you're in a TV show, a play or maybe a movie?

Deja vu occurring as you think something or even prepare to say it, repeating just after you do. A sense of connection but a feeling that somehow it isn't genuine. An echo of your voice in the room that makes it seem as though you're listening to somebody else.

As you read this does it create the same effect or do you know that this sort of thing doesn't happen to you? If so, how do you know, for sure, and what just happened when you asked yourself that question?

We exist at levels other than the simple conscious. How to experience the best of each of these and avoid the demons, that is a quest!