Tuesday, May 21

We Deny We are in Denial.


I read the news every day and lately find myself incredulous at the shear audacity of denial going on in the world. We live in a age where folks are simply dismissing  reality. As Adam Savage of Mythbusters famously put it " I reject your reality and substitute my own." . It seems to be the motto of everyone from politicians, fundamentalists, educators and those claiming to know better than scientists.

This is nothing new. It's always been around- revisionist historians, paranoids who see conspiracies under every rock instead of the obvious, propagandists skewing events to suit their purposes. I think a lot of it is based on fear of change and a desire to frame events into something controllable or understandable rather than the subtle and confusing nature of the mystery of why things really happen. The greater the denial the greater the fear. We are very afraid these days.

Instead of looking at someone else being at fault, the way to release this fear is an acceptance of the forces at work. We are in a vast ocean; we can't command the currents but we can go with the flow. We can overcome powerlessness by choosing to change one thing in the world and by doing so change everything.

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