Have you ever been in a brawl
or in a crowd during a riot? or standing minding your own business when a crowd
SURGES? I hope not, but I sure have, more than normal probly, and it's really
something. You have no control over your body in space and there is nothing you
can do about it.
I hold a suspicion and I
believe it's true, although I wish it weren't. You know, especially if you
spend time with babies, that it's a universal Given that we are born with a
wellspring of JOY. it bubbles, it gurgles, it overflows out of nowhere and for
no, or for the silliest of reasons, and as we get older, it's our
responsibility to keep that pump primed and active, and the benefits of joy,
the outward sign of that inward grace, are happiness and good tidings and
camaraderie and ease, contentment, and my grandmother said, "a good
countenance and clear complexion."
When people don't wanna play
along, play the glad game, then sharing joy is not easy because you have to be
available to catch the spark that gets the fire going. Now, I'm not talking
about someone who DESERVES a pity party, we all need those, that's what
jukeboxes and #GirlsNightOut are for, for heaven's sake. But if someone
defaults to being curmudgeonly, you often have to leave them to burrow in their
misery until they wanna come out again, and some people never want to come out
again. Some of them are really good at gaslighting though ... they'll get you to
thinkin' they WANT help out of that rut, then you turn around and it's years
later and you realize they only wanted COMPANY in the rut and instead of you
re-igniting their joy, they're got you singin' THEIR song of Gloom, Despair,
and Agony On Me (#HeeHaw #UrWelcome)
This is good to know: You know
what spreads like WILDFIRE? PANIC, HATRED, ANGER, and the filthy laughter that
comes from making fun of someone or mocking them. Honest to ETHYL, you gotta be
careful about that. Think about it ... you can be in a huge gathering of
people, finally get them all on one Joyous page, but if you were to yell FIRE?
You know what's gonna happen? Survival instincts kick in, and it's gonna be
like George Costanza at The Birthday Party pushing over old women and throwing children
across the room so he can get out first. I watch those Trump rallies and you
see all manner of what look like Good Folk laughing HILARIOUSLY at the bile he
spews, and I wonder if they watch themselves when they get home and have any
humility that what they've participated in is repugnant? can they truly be
proud? there just is no concept of "shame" anymore, is there ...
We prayed (actually we chanted,
gorgeously, of course) during The Great Litany last week that we might be
delivered "[f]rom all blindness of heart; from pride, vainglory, and
hypocrisy; from envy, hatred, and malice; and from all want of charity,"
and I think that's it ! I think that level of profoundly wicked behaviour DOES
BLIND us ... it whips in to a frenzy and SURGES us in to all manner of
depravity without our conscious permission.
James Clear says that for
"most of our evolutionary history, our ancestors lived in tribes. Becoming
separated from the tribe or worse, being cast out, was literally a death
sentence. Understanding the truth of a situation is important, but so is
remaining part of a tribe. While these two desires often work well together,
they occasionally come into conflict."
“Faced with a choice between
changing one’s mind and proving there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets
busy with the proof.” J.K. Galbraith
“The most difficult subjects
can be explained to the most slow-witted person if s/he has not formed any idea
of them already; but the simplest thing cannot be made clear to the most
intelligent person if s/he is firmly persuaded that s/he knows already, without
a shadow of doubt, what is laid before her.” Leo Tolstoy
“People are embraced or
condemned according to their beliefs, so one function of the mind may be to
hold beliefs that bring the belief-holder the greatest number of allies,
protectors, or disciples, rather than beliefs that are most likely to be true.”
Steven Pinker
“If a brain anticipates that it
will be rewarded for adopting a particular belief, it's perfectly happy to do
so, and doesn't much care where the reward comes from — whether it's pragmatic
(better outcomes resulting from better decisions), social (better treatment
from one's peers), or some mix of the two.” Kevin Simler
A Twitter employee wrote,
“Every time you retweet or quote tweet someone you’re angry with, it helps
them. It disseminates their BS. Hell for the ideas you deplore is silence. Have
the discipline to give it to them.”
James Clear says our time is
better spent "championing good ideas than tearing down bad ones,” and he
advises not to “waste time explaining why bad ideas are bad. We are simply
fanning the flame of ignorance and stupidity.
The best thing that can happen
to a bad idea is that it is forgotten.
The best thing that can happen
to a good idea is that it is shared."
Let's spend as little time as
possible talking about how other people are wrong. Let's feed the good ideas
and let bad ideas die of starvation, shall we? Selah xoxo
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