Honesty

Take a moment and try a little thought experiment: look around you, right in our own immediate environment. Take a good look. Now expand your view to include more like the town in which you live or country. Then think about the world.

OK, and now make a list (either mentally or write it down) of all the things that really function well. A rather short list, isn't it?

If your list is long, I'm going to suspect that you didn't take a very honest look. All the news we hear is bad news, so nothing's working there. We have social, financial, political, and technological problems. To be perfectly honest, paying very much attention to it all is rather depressing. It's really enough to get you down, and I'm not surprised at all to hear about the rates of heart disease and depression we've got.

So, now, the second task as part of our experiment: be honest, but how much do you think you personally can do about any of it? Give it some serious thought and make a list (either mentally or write it down) of all the things you can do to make things better. A even shorter list than the first one, eh?

For all of you that ended up with long lists, I'd appreciate if you'd get in touch and let me know how you manage, and, of course, to give me some suggestions about what I can pass on to others to help them get started turning things around.

Don't think it can be done? Oh, I think it can, but it'll demand of you the absolutely most courage you've ever been able to muster. I'm serious. You are going to have to find the courage to change not just what you do, but you have to change how you think. You've got to re-evaluate your priorities and put then in an order that doesn't favor just you, but favors the most of everybody you know.

Oh, I know what you're thinking: why should I be the only one? You know very well that none of your friends are going to go through with it, don't you? And now for the last demand of honesty: what does that tell you about your friends? And that's why things are as they are: not because of those big, bad others. No, things as they are because we are as we are.