Awareness it has been said, is the greatest gift we can give ourselves. Looking at what is around us with fresh eyes, but most of all looking at our internal selves. Not obsessively but with the same keen eye. Particularly when we are uncomfortable or dissatisfied or feeling downright whingey. Which I was last week. Because I forgot not to be surprised at all the mallarkey around me.
I try and stay away from the news these days. It is all rather rotten as depicted by the newspapers and websites I browse. I don't have teevee which is an enormous gift I gave myself over 20 years ago now as when I visit other houses with their housegod CNN, it is all about disasters and crime and drugs and rapes. Which is not the real news anyway, is it? Ne'er a one of those talking heads addresses the doomed economy, our oil addicted culture, and our consumerist lifestyles which has turned around and bitten us savagely in the nether regions.
Meanwhile the pols lie and scheme and more-lie and more-scheme to get the largest slices of the ever diminishing pie for their corporate overlords before their subjugated masses all go arse over teakettle. And I realize I am one of the 1% who are thoroughly ZOMG awake and see it so painfully clearly.
So I made a resolution to myself a few months ago. That I would no longer place any positive expectation on a person, a place or a thing in public life. When political patronage takes place I would just roll my eyes and say "Well, no surprises there, is there?" When the Gulf Oil so-called spill's (tsunami actually)aftermath is now resulting in horrific human health issues along with the fish, wildlife and mammal massacres, I am not shocked, I do not react, I didn't expect it to be better or fixed or cured or confessed. Or even for other insane drilling (and fracking, sweet Jaybuzz) to be stopped. It is just as I predicted. The world is being pillaged and despoiled and destroyed. And American Idol and their Survivory clones keep most sedated.
And maybe that's a good thing.
For who wants to be wide awake for the coming death throes of our once beautiful planet?
Call me a hardcore realist. Or cynical curmudgeon.
And quote of the day, added after original posting:
The place where optimism most flourishes is the lunatic asylum.
- Havelock Ellis
It's not easy to feel otherwise than the way you describe these days, WWW.
ReplyDeleteAs to American Idol - I watch it, as you know (have done since its original first aired as Pop Idol in the UK) Himself enjoys it too. It's a relief of sorts to see youngsters confident that there's a future to be had for them, and by extension for their potential future audiences.
:-) It's our alternative to sports for which we both have a blindspot. I don't mind if you feel like giving it a verbal kick up the ass occasionally. Everybody's doin' it.
;-)
You make a valid point T - to see youngsters confident before everything disintegrates around them has to be a good thing for them and for those who watch and I do say that in my
ReplyDeletethird to last sentence.
Meanwhile, no surprises in Canadian politics either. Let more plundering begin!
XO
WWW
i'm not very optimistic either and sometimes i'm amazed that other don't see what i see (or you see)...maybe i'm the one not looking at things the right way, wish i had some rose colored glasses.
ReplyDeleteHey ,there is someone else out there who thinks like me ,imagine that !
ReplyDeleteI get failed to be moved by things. I thought there was something wrong with me. I see it goes around.
ReplyDeleteIt's all bread and circuses. Keep us fed and entertained and big corp can bleed us dry without anyone even blinking an eye. I have to hold out hope (ever the optimist) that there is a light at the end of this tunnel though...
ReplyDeleteTrust in politicians and politics has plummeted steadily over the last couple of decades, not surprisingly when politicians seem to get ever more corrupt and incompetent. The rot has gone so far, it's hard to see politics ever being a respected activity again.
ReplyDeleteOh, woe be us. We are indeed in a mess.
ReplyDeleteFor those of us who feel wide awake and dismayed it's going to be tough indeed to watch the continued destruction. I do what I can in my little corner but even nice little corners get swallowed in tsunamis. Perhaps we should hie ourselves to the nearest insane asylum...
ReplyDeleteI comfort myself in a fanciful sort of way. I say to myself, the human race will self destruct for sure, but the planet will recover, and then perhaps the rats and cockroaches will do a better job than we have done of surviving while life lasts.
ReplyDeletecynical? or sensible?
ReplyDelete