I have always traveled with food and money. I carry money just in case I need quick fix for emergencies my debit card can't buy me. I carry food so hunger isn't one of those emergencies.
I'm on my way to the airport, walking from my drop off point from the train to the pick up point for the bus. I'm a brisk walker, so I'm weaving through the sparse crowd of people in Union Station. Picking my way toward the ticket counter, I see a homeless woman. She is older than most people I see living homelessly. The skin on her arms and ankles is ashy and flaking off. (Don't know what it is, but seeing homeless people's skin always gets me. Earlier the same day I had given some money to a man who was begging, and he had open sores all over his body.)
Now, she's not begging, so I walk right by. I'm cruising up the walkway when I stop dead in my tracks, halted by this simple thought, "I just walked by Jesus."
As a Christian, this is what I consider one of our most central teachings. Jesus is in everyone. Which makes everyone Jesus... at least when it comes to moral consideration. Christ had a lot of "turn the system on its head" teachings, and care for the poor and lowly. What soever you do to the least of my people...
...that you do unto me.
So I'm standing there, half turned to go back. My realization has kept me from walking by, but there are a few things keeping me from talking to her. On one level, I'm embarrassed. Don't know why. Perhaps nothing more than stranger anxiety. On another level, I'm hurried. Wanna catch my bus. Thirdly, I'm not sure what to say or how to act.
And then part of my brain sets of the I alert. I've just had three consecutive thoughts about me and what I want. Just act.
So I walk up to her, ad I ask, "Do you need anything?" She wasn't asking for anything in particular, so just started there.
She just stares at me. Almost confused.
"Do you need anything?" I say again, "like... money... or food?"
Again, she's still staring. After a moment, she gives me a meek, doe eyed nod, never breaking eye contact.
I pull $5 out of my wallet (I carry my cash in fives as of late... its a denomination I feel I can actually give out and still mean something. What's a one buy these days?). I grab a few fruit and protein bars out of my bag. I hand them over.
I'm about to go, but she catches my eye again. In a quiet, sweet, and unassuming voice she burns seven words into life forever.
"No one has ever asked me that."
I'm floored. I don't know what to say. I say something. I don't even remember what it was. We are just there, in the midst of a moment. I'm realizing in a visceral way that there are people like her in this world so marginalized by her situation that she becomes invisible. She is realizing that there are people like me in this world who can see the invisible.
As I walk away, all my skin is tingling. In that moment I feel simultaneously tiny and huge. Tiny compared to the God I have just given food to. Tiny compared to her humanity. But my strides feel like seven leagues apiece. I can make a huge difference. I just have showed her the immense power of love... and this is just the beginning.
Whatever you do, don't admire me. Don't waste your time. Instead, just start asking people what they need. And mean it. It is not by needing that causes suffering. Needs cause pain. But to be in pain and to be alone, ostracized by your ailment... that is what steals your humanity. That is what threatens your worth and diminishes your purpose.
So ask people. Strive to see the hurts that your world would hide, and look for the people your world would ignore. A moment of truth, it seems to me, makes a world of difference.
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Guilt Farmer
Nobody eats my guilt, my self loathing doesn't purify stagnant drinking water, and no one is given liberty when I wallow in my failures.
Morality is not accomplished by self abrasion. Rather, good work is done or failed to be done by the struggles of human efforts. Sure, my inner world has a ramifications on my behavior, and generally directs my life. But issues of self approval are tools for doing good, not barometers of goodness.
Morality is not accomplished by self abrasion. Rather, good work is done or failed to be done by the struggles of human efforts. Sure, my inner world has a ramifications on my behavior, and generally directs my life. But issues of self approval are tools for doing good, not barometers of goodness.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Fieldguides
When I imagine the format of short entries, side notes, and sketches... there are actually two varieties I think of.
The one is a clearly organized presentation of a set (like bugs, ferns, artifacts). This style is focused on classification and categorization... more like a pictorial encyclopedia. The other is a form is more like a journal plus sketchbook. Organized chronologically, this is an ongoing literary and artistic account of a set of events.
When I initially thought of the field guide, I was entertaining the first style. But the second is also possible. Now, this would involve writing them into a vague story... not that the story would be explicitly told... but that it would seem like there was one going on behind the scenes.
Now, I could make one up. Basically a fictional subplot. But... I could also tell the real one. It could involve the transformation going on in the youth group, my struggles with vegetarianism, trying to simplify my life. It could even end with my reflections about traveling in South America, the poverty there, and our power to fix it.
This could also include pictures, either straight in the document, or taken then rendered into sketches.
Hmmm.
The one is a clearly organized presentation of a set (like bugs, ferns, artifacts). This style is focused on classification and categorization... more like a pictorial encyclopedia. The other is a form is more like a journal plus sketchbook. Organized chronologically, this is an ongoing literary and artistic account of a set of events.
When I initially thought of the field guide, I was entertaining the first style. But the second is also possible. Now, this would involve writing them into a vague story... not that the story would be explicitly told... but that it would seem like there was one going on behind the scenes.
Now, I could make one up. Basically a fictional subplot. But... I could also tell the real one. It could involve the transformation going on in the youth group, my struggles with vegetarianism, trying to simplify my life. It could even end with my reflections about traveling in South America, the poverty there, and our power to fix it.
This could also include pictures, either straight in the document, or taken then rendered into sketches.
Hmmm.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Struggles for Modern Man (and Woman)
Sit through an intro literature class. There are five classic struggles that man (and women, though they were created back before women were quite worth mentioning) could face in the scope of a story. These struggles are no way limited to the narrative. They also sum up pretty well the challenges of real life.
As humankind has developed through history, so to has its ability to cope with these challenges. Indeed, today we are much safer from many of the things that worried our ancestors.
Let's take them one at a time...
Man vs. Nature
Poisonous plants, hostile elements, hungry beasts.
Through systematic classifications, better building practices, meteorology, weapons of self defense and disaster planning we have vastly improved our ability to cope with the natural world. Do you often doubt if you will "make it through winter?" Nope. While the occasional extreme climate event may displace millions, the causalities are usually kept to a minimum in countries with efficient and reactive rescue infrastructures.
Man vs. Man
Theft, murder, deceit.
While our fellow humans still can pose a threat to us, we have locks on our doors, personal firearms, security systems, fraud protection, banks, and safety service personnel. Apart from getting stuck in long lines behind masses of your fellow humans, we tend not to be put at odds with each other as often as in the past. Murder, after all, has been on a steady decline on the western world for 700 years.
Man vs. Society
Oppressive social norms and practices.
This one still gets us from time to time, but things are getting a bit better. The internet offers community for the outcasts, social mobility allows people to relocate and start anew, courts exist to try to bring justice to all. While we are certainly still subject to the world in which we live, there seems to be a growing sense of multiplicity, at least allowing people to have more choice about what world that is.
Man vs. the Supernatural
God, destiny, demons, the Fae.
If these entities are real... they have gotten trickier over the years. We rarely face the supernatural in an overt showing of power, and there are many who outright deny their existence and refuse to deal with them as such. I certainly don't discount their existence, and while I wouldn't say that humanity on the whole has improved in its coping with these struggles, it is true that many religions have "softened" their hard lines in favor of a more open ideology.
and finally...
Man vs. Himself
Restraint, fear, doubt
I don't believe that in the thousands of years of human existence we have improved in regard to this challenge. In fact, in the modern world, this is the prevailing worry. Is Mother Nature going to squash humanity under her thumb? Not likely. But could humanity, in its unrestrained self indulgence, destroy the world and itself in the process? Its seems a growing possibility.
In the midst of developing technology, developing social structures, developing interpersonal models, developing health care, developing building techniques, developing science, developing economics, developing spiritual communities, developing governments, and developing infrastructures... humans aren't really developing.
Imagine the possibilities of better tools, better communities, better relationships, better medicine, better housing, better learning, better business, better prayer, better laws, and better transportation. Wouldn't it seem that with all that better, the world would be so much better?
But is it? Some days I think so. But other days I look around, and I see people up to the same old tricks. New systems become sites for new domination. New resources create new poverties. New rules create new bad rulers. Without self restraint, without the ability to challenge the self, no advancement in the struggle against nature, others, society or the supernatural will ever lead to better lives. The man with no self mastery will squander most of the resources afforded by the other advancements... and the ones that he cannot somehow toss aside, he will learn to ignore out of indolent ingratitude. Soon, the near utopia around him comes to reflect the inner wasteland he never addressed.
We need to quit driving and eating the world into glacieral melting. Quit spending into oppressive deficit. Quit channeling our stress and negativity onto all around.
We are among the most powerful people to have ever walked the earth. We have risen to nearly every challenge. Now its its time to meet the one power who's power grows as fast as us. Our own. Humans are no longer infants wailing for their next meal. We have advanced and developed power in this world.
It is time we wielded that power with a more mature outlook.
Sometimes it seems, that the more powerful someone becomes, the more self righteous they become. The great can do no wrong. But in reality, this is precisely the opposite of true. As we become great, our actual ability to do wrong increases with our power.
If we ever want to see the greatest good come to pass, we must commit ourselves to besting ourselves. We must be devoted to live out our better natures, seek our better destinies, and become our better selves.
True. We have yet to explore space at warp speed. Yet it is our inner struggle, Man vs. Himself, not space, that in our future days will prove to be the final frontier.
As humankind has developed through history, so to has its ability to cope with these challenges. Indeed, today we are much safer from many of the things that worried our ancestors.
Let's take them one at a time...
Man vs. Nature
Poisonous plants, hostile elements, hungry beasts.
Through systematic classifications, better building practices, meteorology, weapons of self defense and disaster planning we have vastly improved our ability to cope with the natural world. Do you often doubt if you will "make it through winter?" Nope. While the occasional extreme climate event may displace millions, the causalities are usually kept to a minimum in countries with efficient and reactive rescue infrastructures.
Man vs. Man
Theft, murder, deceit.
While our fellow humans still can pose a threat to us, we have locks on our doors, personal firearms, security systems, fraud protection, banks, and safety service personnel. Apart from getting stuck in long lines behind masses of your fellow humans, we tend not to be put at odds with each other as often as in the past. Murder, after all, has been on a steady decline on the western world for 700 years.
Man vs. Society
Oppressive social norms and practices.
This one still gets us from time to time, but things are getting a bit better. The internet offers community for the outcasts, social mobility allows people to relocate and start anew, courts exist to try to bring justice to all. While we are certainly still subject to the world in which we live, there seems to be a growing sense of multiplicity, at least allowing people to have more choice about what world that is.
Man vs. the Supernatural
God, destiny, demons, the Fae.
If these entities are real... they have gotten trickier over the years. We rarely face the supernatural in an overt showing of power, and there are many who outright deny their existence and refuse to deal with them as such. I certainly don't discount their existence, and while I wouldn't say that humanity on the whole has improved in its coping with these struggles, it is true that many religions have "softened" their hard lines in favor of a more open ideology.
and finally...
Man vs. Himself
Restraint, fear, doubt
I don't believe that in the thousands of years of human existence we have improved in regard to this challenge. In fact, in the modern world, this is the prevailing worry. Is Mother Nature going to squash humanity under her thumb? Not likely. But could humanity, in its unrestrained self indulgence, destroy the world and itself in the process? Its seems a growing possibility.
In the midst of developing technology, developing social structures, developing interpersonal models, developing health care, developing building techniques, developing science, developing economics, developing spiritual communities, developing governments, and developing infrastructures... humans aren't really developing.
Imagine the possibilities of better tools, better communities, better relationships, better medicine, better housing, better learning, better business, better prayer, better laws, and better transportation. Wouldn't it seem that with all that better, the world would be so much better?
But is it? Some days I think so. But other days I look around, and I see people up to the same old tricks. New systems become sites for new domination. New resources create new poverties. New rules create new bad rulers. Without self restraint, without the ability to challenge the self, no advancement in the struggle against nature, others, society or the supernatural will ever lead to better lives. The man with no self mastery will squander most of the resources afforded by the other advancements... and the ones that he cannot somehow toss aside, he will learn to ignore out of indolent ingratitude. Soon, the near utopia around him comes to reflect the inner wasteland he never addressed.
We need to quit driving and eating the world into glacieral melting. Quit spending into oppressive deficit. Quit channeling our stress and negativity onto all around.
We are among the most powerful people to have ever walked the earth. We have risen to nearly every challenge. Now its its time to meet the one power who's power grows as fast as us. Our own. Humans are no longer infants wailing for their next meal. We have advanced and developed power in this world.
It is time we wielded that power with a more mature outlook.
Sometimes it seems, that the more powerful someone becomes, the more self righteous they become. The great can do no wrong. But in reality, this is precisely the opposite of true. As we become great, our actual ability to do wrong increases with our power.
If we ever want to see the greatest good come to pass, we must commit ourselves to besting ourselves. We must be devoted to live out our better natures, seek our better destinies, and become our better selves.
True. We have yet to explore space at warp speed. Yet it is our inner struggle, Man vs. Himself, not space, that in our future days will prove to be the final frontier.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Random Crap Answers to Questions People Aren't Asking Me
Is this a self help book?
Well, kind of. Its trying to be just as cheesily inspirational as a self help book... its just an other help book.
Is it like Chicken Soup for the Soul?
More like Ducttape and Crowbar for the Soul.
Well, kind of. Its trying to be just as cheesily inspirational as a self help book... its just an other help book.
Is it like Chicken Soup for the Soul?
More like Ducttape and Crowbar for the Soul.
Friday, November 14, 2008
How to Change the World
Whenever I talk about changing the world, I get mixed reactions. Some people are stirred by the idea. Many, however, scoff... and on some days, its hard for me not to agree.
When I flick on the tv, the world that comes streaming through seems pretty immune to improvement. Politics with no accountability. Unchecked warfare. Injustice abounds. Nothing new under the sun, they say, and those days where I hopelessly try to stare down the despair flashing out of that box, I tend to agree.
As I try to peddle my optimistic outlook a hundred stations beam though my body at 200 MHz, offering a picture of the world that is invulnerable to any meaningful change. Is I a fool? Can we really change the world?
The answer to that question depends entirely on which world we are living in.
The world of the tv is a mediated and immediate representation of events on a national and global scale. Huge geographical scope. Tiny temporal scope. Tv answers the question, "What is happening now everywhere?"
So think about it. Can you, on your own, change everywhere now? Of course not! If you live in the world portrayed by your television, proactive movement to improve the quality of the world doesn't even makes sense. Tv channels only go one way. There's no way to interact. No sites for change. And the sheer geographical size of the televisioned world makes it unassailable in the rush of information.
But what if you lived in a neighborhood? What if you paid attention to that which was going on in the next couple of months? Think you could change that world, given that amount of time?
Mass media seductively offers us the ability to interface with the world at large in nearly real time. But what we cannot do is effect that world. Now, I'm not knocking mass media. The free flow if information is a corner stone to the democratic process and improving the accountability of the powerful. But if you live only there, if that is all that you consider important and real, you have decided to live in a place that is too fast moving in respect to its vastness for you to make any meaningful impact.
No wonder people are pessimistic concerning their ability to make change.
Wanna change the world? Set your sights first on that which is around you. Develop a sense of the local. Learn the things that the people around you need. Find out what resources are nearby. Improve the world you pass when you walk, bike, bus or drive yourself to work. Improve your block. Your office building. Your coworkers. Friends. Family.
Change yourself for the better.
Now, I'm not a reductionist. When I said we could change the world, I didn't mean only the local one. Changing that vast world represented by the media is possible. It just takes more time. The timeline of the tube is an unstopping stream of events. No way for ordinary people to influence the whole world that fast. But if you have clarity of vision, sustainable motivation, and a galvanized group... why, you can't help but to make a difference.
So develop a sense of the local. Ask questions about what those nearby you need. Work on your own problems. And when you watch the news... keep your eyes open for ways you can make a difference. When you see it, bitch and brainstorm, find a few others who see it your way, get together, and makes something happen.
That's how you change the world.
When I flick on the tv, the world that comes streaming through seems pretty immune to improvement. Politics with no accountability. Unchecked warfare. Injustice abounds. Nothing new under the sun, they say, and those days where I hopelessly try to stare down the despair flashing out of that box, I tend to agree.
As I try to peddle my optimistic outlook a hundred stations beam though my body at 200 MHz, offering a picture of the world that is invulnerable to any meaningful change. Is I a fool? Can we really change the world?
The answer to that question depends entirely on which world we are living in.
The world of the tv is a mediated and immediate representation of events on a national and global scale. Huge geographical scope. Tiny temporal scope. Tv answers the question, "What is happening now everywhere?"
So think about it. Can you, on your own, change everywhere now? Of course not! If you live in the world portrayed by your television, proactive movement to improve the quality of the world doesn't even makes sense. Tv channels only go one way. There's no way to interact. No sites for change. And the sheer geographical size of the televisioned world makes it unassailable in the rush of information.
But what if you lived in a neighborhood? What if you paid attention to that which was going on in the next couple of months? Think you could change that world, given that amount of time?
Mass media seductively offers us the ability to interface with the world at large in nearly real time. But what we cannot do is effect that world. Now, I'm not knocking mass media. The free flow if information is a corner stone to the democratic process and improving the accountability of the powerful. But if you live only there, if that is all that you consider important and real, you have decided to live in a place that is too fast moving in respect to its vastness for you to make any meaningful impact.
No wonder people are pessimistic concerning their ability to make change.
Wanna change the world? Set your sights first on that which is around you. Develop a sense of the local. Learn the things that the people around you need. Find out what resources are nearby. Improve the world you pass when you walk, bike, bus or drive yourself to work. Improve your block. Your office building. Your coworkers. Friends. Family.
Change yourself for the better.
Now, I'm not a reductionist. When I said we could change the world, I didn't mean only the local one. Changing that vast world represented by the media is possible. It just takes more time. The timeline of the tube is an unstopping stream of events. No way for ordinary people to influence the whole world that fast. But if you have clarity of vision, sustainable motivation, and a galvanized group... why, you can't help but to make a difference.
So develop a sense of the local. Ask questions about what those nearby you need. Work on your own problems. And when you watch the news... keep your eyes open for ways you can make a difference. When you see it, bitch and brainstorm, find a few others who see it your way, get together, and makes something happen.
That's how you change the world.
Day 103
Ok.
November 14th.
Been thinking on a handful of ideas. I am at 33,000 words, and I have begun to really like one of the possible angles for this work.
A field guide for good works.
Field guide works for a few reasons:
Its allows for personal reflections about events (which I think necessary for this particular subject).
It has a focus on practicality (which pervades this project).
It creates a more one on one relationship with the reader.
It could have really cool drawings and overall production edginess.
It encourages the notion of personal responsibility for social change (like, alright, you've picked up the book... read it while you are out doing some good).
Those are my reasons for liking the field book idea.
My vision at this point is a kind of combination of entries, ranging from personal reflections (like field book observations), works within moral philosophical thinking (like the scientific content of field books), tips and pointers on practical moral issues, and prayers or self/group development activities and social change resources.
Whadda you think?
November 14th.
Been thinking on a handful of ideas. I am at 33,000 words, and I have begun to really like one of the possible angles for this work.
A field guide for good works.
Field guide works for a few reasons:
Its allows for personal reflections about events (which I think necessary for this particular subject).
It has a focus on practicality (which pervades this project).
It creates a more one on one relationship with the reader.
It could have really cool drawings and overall production edginess.
It encourages the notion of personal responsibility for social change (like, alright, you've picked up the book... read it while you are out doing some good).
Those are my reasons for liking the field book idea.
My vision at this point is a kind of combination of entries, ranging from personal reflections (like field book observations), works within moral philosophical thinking (like the scientific content of field books), tips and pointers on practical moral issues, and prayers or self/group development activities and social change resources.
Whadda you think?
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