Feelings

The title does not refer to touch or other senses. It refers to mood, anger, delight, love, peace, calm, acceptance, judgmental or nonjudgmental. It is about perceiving the surroundings as positive or negative and the many shades in between. Feelings. Temperament maybe?

Opinion. How one understands a concept and what it means to him and others. Frustration. Opinionated. Angry. Rebelling against something or someone. Ideas as enemy or person as enemy.

In today’s political scene they appear as one and the same. An idea evidently represents a person to many people. They rail against the person; not the idea. They rant and rave. Say hurtful things about the person assumed to be the banner carrier of the idea. They turn this rhetoric into personal attack. Demean the other person. Target the person with vitriol, hate, spitting and spewing to the end of their comment, or interview, or blog entry. Detestation? Or frustrated inability to articulate about the idea? Person as substitute to idea. Or thinking.

One wonders what they see in the mirror in the morning? Do they see themselves clearly, lovingly, intelligently? Or do they see themselves as weak, flawed, incapable, unworthy? Is there rant later in the day about themselves or the “other?” I’m sure psychologists and psychiatrists have theories about this. Knowing these theories may help unravel the cause, but in the meantime what do we do with the behavior?

Social communications are in disarray. Leaving comments on a news item is all the rage. Unhappily the “rage” is rant and ugly. It is defamatory not articulate. It is not cool. It is not clever or witty. It is ignorant. Defensive and offensive all at once.

The sadness swells when we realize these voices vote in elections. They perpetuate ugly into government, into process, into social consciousness. How do we pull back the curtain on this stage? How do we expose the viciousness and emptiness? How do we steer public debate and discussion to a more fruitful plane?

Indeed, how do we capture the attention of these folk so they can 1) see themselves clearly; 2) hear themselves clearly; 3) process fact more logically; 4) think creatively about the issues and future; and 5) learn to enjoy shared conversation and different points of view as valued added?

The pendulum swings in a broad arc and slowly. It embraces the rhythm of the universe, the planetary movements. But move it does, without interruption of trajectory. Logically swinging from limit to limit, considering all the degrees of movement in between. Moving forward. Edging toward understanding…and light.

Perhaps the answers lie within the person. When will they uncover their clear self view? How will they arrive at this transformative point? Does someone lead them to it? Does experience? Does art? Does a parent or friends or…

Help me here. Help us! What can we do to pull rage back to wonderment and constructive effort? How do we as a society mend broken souls so they can trust and participate in citizenship that builds to positive ends? Must we always waste so much talent and possibility to destructive selves?

So many challenges exist that have nothing to do with opinion or rants, rages or raves. Just work that needs to be done. Finding new sources of energy which replace petroleum. Building self sustaining communities with minimal carbon footprints. Expanding access to education to all who are able and want it; evolving a life-long employability model for each person. Strengthening the social compact for richer living in community.

Ideology as trump to life. Ridiculous. Wasteful.

February 27, 2012