Archives for February 2018

“Congratulations! You deserve it!”

How many times have you heard someone say this. Their intentions mean well, but there is a problem.

There are two ways of approaching life. One, as if everything is given (a gift, although that word is not appropriate in all situations), and two, as if everything is quid pro quo.

If everything is given, then we recognize that we don’t have control over things. We have work that we are tasked with for sure, but the outcomes are not in our control.

If everything is a quid pro quo, then we are in control of the outcomes of our life. We know that if we do a certain thing, we shall have a particular outcome. While causality is real, we also have an intuitive recognition that there are things outside of our control.

The framework of the gift generates thinking of gratitude, with humility and a spirit of generosity. The quid pro quo framework generates thinking of deserving which brings along expectation, manipulation, and mandate of being repaid for work done.

Where would we rather be?

You may have noticed a little hiccup over the past few days with blog posts not being posted. I found it, too, and am keeping a close eye on the system I use to deliver this writing to you. Every system is ultimately built by people – and people aren’t perfect – so there’s bound to be a hiccup every now and then. Delivery should be back to normal by tomorrow – Feb 28th. Keep an eye out.

Thankful to have you on this journey with me.

Much love,

A-

At this year’s Sundance Film Festival, I saw two projects that centered poignantly around the theme of race. They were Crime + Punishment and Burden. During Q&A sessions with the director and the stars of each film, the sentiment of colorblindness surfaced in unexpected ways.

Each speaker recognized colorblindness as viewed as naive and overly sentimental, and “diversity” the popular solution by much of the public, but offered these thoughts in return:

Quoting his daughter as an example, the director of Burden explained it this way: Our color, height, size, and any other marker, are just descriptors. They mean to carry no more or less information than that. Whatever else we’ve associated with them is the problem. And that is something that we can work to undo.

Meanwhile two of the featured police officers from Crime + Punishment offered this, as they continue their fight with the New York City justice system. When attempting to solve an issue that is rooted around issues of race, it is more important to search for people of integrity, regardless of color, than simply advocate for diversity.

Food for thought.

In the old days messengers would be sent as someone’s representative. They would arrive in the name of the one who sent them. But there were rules governing the treatment of messengers.

Namely, you were not allowed to kill them on account of the message they delivered. If you had a problem with the message, you were to take that up with the one who sent the message, not the messenger.

Times have changed. Messages fly around the world at the speed of light. Online exchanges are filled with personal attacks. We don’t even know where some of the messages originated, so we lash out at the messengers.

Stop. Test the message. If the message is true (even if we don’t necessarily like it), it is better to accept it than to work against it. If the message of false, it is better expose it as a lie than allow it to spread.

If the message is true, be thankful there is a messenger of truth. If the message is false, shouldn’t we act to save the messenger from the lie as well?

The most dangerous lie is the one with just enough truth in it to be believable. Testing a lie is like checking a mathematical proof. Every assumption that the lie stands upon must be tested. Some will prove to be true, others will prove to be false.

Find the false assumptions and expose the lie.

Expose the lie and be free from the deception.

Be free from the deception and show others the way.

Show others the way and the world changes.

Dreams are lofty. They live in the same place as the ideal we fail to embody on our daily journeys. But dreams are necessary to guide the way. They give us a vision for the future that we can walk towards (or away from).

Cynics have weighed down their dreams with reality. The daily battles overtake their minds until any dream seems too simple, too unrealistic. Their vision shrinks.

Both are necessary. The cynic is the resistance training needed to sharpen the dream, and strengthen the dreamer. The dreamer is the lifeline to the cynic, the reminder that the vision is still alive.

Change is good. Progress is good. Moving forward is good. The conversation in the public square often assumes that the change, progress, and movement, is toward something good for everyone.

But there is always backlash.

Backlash has a bad wrap. Resistance to change is often seen as fundamentally negative. Very few people think the resistance could be out of prudence, or caution.

Yes, some of us definitely don’t like change, but maybe someone just doesn’t like the speed or scale at which it is happening.

Maybe backlash is a signal to engage more, to go deeper, and pursue more truth, rather than something to simply dismiss?

After all, we are all in this together.

In the search for what is good and right, and justified, how many of us expect to be changed?

Do we not believe that, if there is an absolute truth, that it will cut everyone equally? Not in the same way, or at the same depth, but rather with disregard for stature, wealth, or reputation. Isn’t that the kind of justice we desire? One in which everyone has equal value in the site of the law giver?

As we search for what is good and right, and justified, don’t be surprised if our own hearts are caught in the change that comes as it is revealed to us.