Knowing when to smile at ignorance and when to fight it.

I was searching for a song or video via Google and YouTube the other day and I ran across a song and lyrics that I hadn't listen to in a long time.  Many moons ago, Sting wrote and sang on his second album a song called An Englishmen in New York.   One line that stood out in that song was "It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile".   I've never forgot that line.  As a kid with low self-esteem, a dad with a dominant personality and four older siblings, I was trained to accept ignorance. Now I didn't smile, but I accepted it, but never forgot it.  As I left my family of origin, got older, got success under my belt and became a parent, I became more assertive and advocated for myself more.  I've detailed how 2011  was a pivotal year in my life.  I lost a long-time job, my first marriage crumbled, I was well on my way to bankruptcy and losing my house and probably most importantly my closest sibling took his own life.  The last event as much as anything broke the dam in terms of me having any serious reservations about standing up for myself.  I realized he never truly stood up for himself properly which cost him the possibility of healthy relationships (and a family of his own), career and financial success and most importantly his dignity.  It's been nearing 9 years, but I still miss him.  I digress, however.

My brother's death, along with the hardships I was going through at the time woke me up to something: The cost of not advocating for one's self properly.   He'd been ridiculed as child, had been take advantage/abused as a child and an adult, had been overlooked as a possible companion and been overlooked as a valuable contributor for a job that suited his intellectual gifts.  All of this weighed on him heavily.  When financial hardship that threatened his ability to 'make it' came, it was just too much for him.  It cost him his life.  I'd been subjected to much of the same thing he had and yet I some how 'made it'.  However, as I previously mentioned, it was not a banner time for me either.  It woke me up.  The old Rich that tolerated any ignorance, slights, being minimized, ignored or shut down and/or being taken advantage of, disappeared quickly.  I was angry for my brother and I realized my role as a dad, especially that I hoped my daughter could be proud of was at stake.  Some that had known me for a long time were surprised by the transformation.  Some were not ready to accept it and I had to 'remind' them that the old me had been sent packing.  This was good and bad.   Obviously, this had been long in the making and had been long overdue.  However, the anger at what happened with my brother, my slights and the slights to my family--including family of origin--drove me.   If I were honest, I'm still processing some of it.  The toxic political climate of the past decade (or two) hasn't helped either, but I digress.  

This all leads to a question.   What is the proper balance between suffering ignorance and fighting it?  I'm not going to pretend I have the right answer or that this is not a work in progress for me.  But then again, that answer may be different for different people.  So, I'm going to explore this subject a little bit, throw out a few ideas and leave it up to the reader to figure out their sweet spot.

Before I delve further let me define ignorance.

• Slights
• Insults/Slanders/Libels/Taunts
• Threats
• Negative actions

Continuing on...  When should I smile and when should I refrain from smiling?

A TIME TO SMILE AND TIME TO REFRAIN FROM SMILING

• Does the ignorance harm you only?
• I believe many people will tell you they can roll with punches.  However, when the ignorance is directed at their loved ones, especially their children, it seems to be a different story. In that case, I believe most people push back more.
• I believe when it is directed at the ones you love, especially where they are looking at you for protection, it is more permissible to engage it to defend on their behalf. 
• I would consider however, if I am undermining them jumping in. 
• Sometimes, they need to practice or learn how to defend themselves.

• How much harm would tolerating the ignorance cause?
• Will the person delivering the ignorance be seen as petty, insignificant and harmless?   If so, it may not be worth the trouble as you could literally get caught up with these types every day.
• Put another way, is the cause even worth it?
• Could the ignorance undermine your authority or cause harm to you, loved ones or your 'neighbors'.   If so, challenging the ignorance may not only be a tolerable course of action, but actually the responsible course of action. 

•  How much harm could fighting the ignorance lead to?
• Is the ignorance too strong to fight at that point?
• Sometimes the timing just isn't right.  Considering fighting the battle another day. 
• Will fighting the ignorance put an end to it have little impact or could it just make things much worse.  
• Sometimes the person who tailgates you and then cuts you off won't learn anything if you lay on the horn.  It won't stop him or her from cutting you again or others.
• Sometimes engaging the idiot driver who cuts you off, could cause further problems on the road.  He or she might get pissed off that you are 'calling them' out and slam on their brakes.
  
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In the Bible, my Higher Power (God) states:
There is a time for everything,

    and a season for every activity under the heavens  (Ecclesiastes 3:1)

So yes, there is a time to suffer ignorance and smile and a time to call it out.  A man (woman) will tend to have a better idea of the timing.  In society today, we could literally spend our time stewing in or dealing with the ignorances we are subjected to every day, but that doesn't move us forward.  That keeps us stuck in the anger and/or resentment.  So, it is best to consider the cost/benefit of suffering ignorance quietly vs. the cost of engaging it and calling it out.

Just some thoughts. 

-- Rich

A negative tends to have a greater impact than a positive.

As Mark Twain was purported to have said, “A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”  Obviously, what he meant was that it is easier to spread a falsehood than to correct it.   I also realized when in was in my first year of college that failure is easier than success and spoke about this concept in The Fine Line: Failure takes no effort, success takes a lot of work .  Most of the time you don't have to do anything to fail.  In fact, I believe that it is doing nothing that will inevitably usually lead to failure.   In more recent years, it has occurred to me that a negative generally has greater impact than a positive.  As a matter of fact, the concepts here actually go hand in hand.   Just as failure is easier than success, a negative tends to be the default or more pervasive state than a positive.

But, think about.  When studying history what do we put more of our energy on?  When we have both good and bad interactions with people, what do we tend to focus more on?  If we have an otherwise good driving record marred by a life-changing accident, what will we and others focus on?   When we have a good work record marred by a very bad screw-up or marred by an unfortunate interaction--especially if we are dismissed as a result--will we feel like a success?  When we have an uneventful or clean deployment that ends with a trauma, what will we be tend to focus on?

I've had some successes in life, but in my later 40s and 50s, I have worked through and processes a lot as a childhood sexual abuse survivor.   The successes have helped me keep perspective BUT they did not completely erase the impact of CSA.  This all leads to the questions:  Why does the negative in many (or I dare so most) cases have a greater impact than the positive?  I'm going to consider that here:

Impact of Negatives vs. Positives

• I think the positives, though we appreciate them, we can take them for granted and not realize their goodness or importance.  Negatives on the other hand I think are harder to dismiss as 'these things just happen sometimes'.  I think we tend to look for a reason or why.
• I think often the consequences of a negative just is more devastating than a positive.  
• I understand a common exercise to teach teens the difficulty and challenges of raising a baby utilizes an egg as the baby. 
• The goal is to take the 'baby' wherever you go without 'breaking it'.
• No matter how many times or days you've handled the egg, if you drop it once on any kind of hard surface, it will break.  Similarly a baby can easily be injured if you drop him or her once.
• I believe we may savor the good or positive times and relive them, but they will tend to become a distance memory. Their impact can fade over time and we won't usually tend to second-guess them.  Bad or negative times, if bad enough, can come to the forefront.  From my experience, if they are not resolved, can come to the forefront very quickly.  Bad times are a lot more likely to lead to second guessing.  That is, how could we have made that choice, said those words, done that thing, etc.
• I believe we tend to view 'negatives' as a moral failure.  Meaning we have a harder time 'forgiving ourselves'.  I think this is especially true if the weak or more challenged our faith is.  The positives we take pride in but we are taught not to gloat too much about them or take too much credit for them.

So believing that negatives tend to have a greater impact, what do we do to mitigate against that?  I don't have all the answers, but I do have some ideas.

Mitigation Strategies (Against the Oversized Influence of Negatives) 

• Make reminders of success prominent in your life.  Not to gloat on them or to show or develop arrogance, but as a reminder to yourself when the bad times or negatives hit that your life has balance.  Meaning that as much of a particular failure or negative hurts, it is not who you are.
• Remember who your Higher Power sees you as.  Yes, it hurts if the world or you in particular sees a negative or failure in your life, but how does your Higher Power view you?  For myself, I've been taught that we are made in God's image and 'God doesn't make junk'.
• Surround yourself with those tend to be uplifting for you.  That's not to say surround yourself with yes men, but those who will be more willing see you in a positive light than a negative.   In other words, while you don't want those who would 'Blow smoke up your *ss', you also don't want those who would "Rain on your parade' either.
• Learn to view negatives or failures as blessing in disguise where possible.  If not that, then at least learn to view them as a learning experience or point along the journey.

Few people can completely shut the negatives in their life and I believe it is human nature to focus on the negatives over the positives.  However, that doesn't have to be a place 'where we live' but instead maybe a place we visit from time to time or a reminder of what to avoid.

Anyway, that's my thoughts for the day or my story and I'm sticking to it.

-- Rich

Knew You Were Waiting For an Advocate

Aretha Franklin died this week and the music world and society is a bit poorer for it. When you think of old school R&B and Gospel, who do you think of?

I remember back in high school hearing George Michael and her on "I knew you were waiting (for me)" and I thought this was probably the highlight of his career (IMHO) doing a duo with a living legend.

In any case, hearing that song attuned me to her music.

While her passing was sad, it kind of hit home a bit for me more. My mom was born 6 days before her and that was music of my mom's era. I felt like calling my mom and relating to her, but as many of you know, she passed in 2014. Aretha's passing brought that fact home again painfully.

RIP Aretha. Perhaps, "She knew He (the Father) was waiting for her. May her music resonate in Heaven.

RIP Mom I still think about you and miss you.

If we are lucky, we have a few people in our lives who "are waiting for us".  By that I mean really advocate for us no matter what.  I mean those who will stick by us through thick or thin.  Wherever she was, she proudly announced that I was her son.  At times, I thought, "oh mom" or felt a little embarrassed, on balance I liked it.  My mom, in her last couple of years was in a nursing home and still did that.  I jokingly said to a few people that I could go on a rampage and she'd say, "I'm sure you are just having a bad day." She was my biggest advocate.

An advocate for us

• Wants the best for us, period.  Not what they think is best for us, but what makes us happy or fulfilled.
• Willing to overlook our imperfections.  Doesn't mean they will never say anything to us about them, but they won't define us by them.  Fixing our 'imperfections' will not be the price of admission to being in a small 'r' continued relationship with them.
• Look for the good in us rather than focusing on our flaws.  That doesn't mean they won't every saying anything negative to us, but they don't live in the negative with us.
• They will tend to take our side, even if it isn't always justified or even if they don't necessarily agree.  
• They realize that sometimes it is more important for us to feel stood up for and accepted than to be 'corrected'. 
• There is a time for revisiting a circumstance/situation later, but they are attuned to our needs now.  

I went through a divorce and someone close to me, whom I confided in, harshly criticized me in the throes of my hurt about it.  That changed my relationship to the person.  While they had some valid points, the time wasn't right.  An advocate would better handle differences of opinion.  But, I digress.

Advocates are a rare breed. When you grow up with them or you find them in life, don't take them for granted or try to 'trade up'.  Yes, there will be other people that will situation-ally or for a time take your side.  But, a true advocate will be there for you, through the good times, the bad times and the times in between.  Just my thoughts.

One Degree off Center: Just Enough to Throw Us Off

I heard someone recently characterize the how sometimes it doesn't take much to separate a person from his or her serenity.  His phrasing was "One Degree off Center".  That struck me as a very apt characterization.  This actually feeds into an idea that crystallized for me as it relates it to stress and worry. 

I've observed in my life and that of others a funny phenomenon.  They are hit with a significant negative and they are seemingly able to shrug it off.  Yet, the same person is hit with a relatively insignificant negative (often easy to recover from--a one degree off center negative).  They literally fall to pieces or have their serenity totally disrupted.  As with everything else in my blog, I have a take on this phenomenon.

I have literally avoided doing much research for what I write about as I want what I write to be organic vs. ideas and thoughts I literally lift from elsewhere.  It was suggested to me that I could strengthen my blog by doing more direct citation.  That is to say, take the kernels of an idea that comes to me, pop them, remove the ones that are burnt or unpopped and flavor it with it citations.  But, at this point I will stick with my 'tried and true' method, which is to write mostly from my soul.

Back to the point at hand.  Why do we shrug when we are hit by a big negative and get stuck on the seemingly small things.  I have a thought on that: It is our sense of control.

• When a circumstance is well beyond our control and it is abundantly obvious to us, there is a sense that there is little point in fretting about it as there is no humanly way possible that will affect the outcome of it.
• When my car was wrecked at the beginning of 2017, I had been worrying about keeping it in good running order for another year or so.  I'd hoped it would hold out, but I was nervous that miles were piling up on it.  This had been in the back of my mind for a while.  When another driver caused a wreck which destroyed my car, literally everything else was thrown by the wayside.
• I no longer had to worry if the car would hold out another 30-40 miles  That choice/concern was taken away from me.
• I no longer worried that day about making it to work on time.  It was pretty clear that I needed to go home and rest.
• I figured that their insurance would pay for it and I'd just get a new car.
• When a circumstance appears to be within our ability to influence or control it is easier to focus on it.  
• I was fairly sure I left my iPod at work vs. having permanently lost it, but I didn't to drive all the way there to get it.  So, despite my best efforts, I had focused on it on and off over the weekend, hoping that I was right about it.  I was right as I did leave it at work.  I wasted my time worrying on something small because it appeared to be in my control.  

In the first point, it was totally obvious I was thrown completely off center, so I had the sense that I just needed to turn to side or turn around and I'd be back at where I'd need to be rather than trying to make a minute adjustment.  In the second point, I was very close to center, but I couldn't quite get there.  Rather than having to make a large and obvious adjustment, I only needed a slight adjustment to the circumstance to be back at center.  Unfortunately, it would have taken some effort to get back to center--driving an hour and a half to get to and back from work.  So, the one degree off center that that situation was causing me was worse anxiety in some ways than completely having to go from scratch to get a new car did.

Moral of the story: Be willing to give up the worry about that which you believe you can control.  Because a) the sense of control often is an illusion anyway and b) somethings just don't make a difference in the bigger picture.

Just my 1/50th of a dollar worth here.

-- Rich