Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Friday, November 14, 2014

Cause and Effect

I am starting this post with no idea where it is going to go, or how it will end ...

It's strange what inspires one to write.

Inspiration has been somewhat lacking recently (as you may have noticed). The book is done, and almost out, and I have not found, or even sought it out. For me inspiration has to come from the outside ... at least the trigger does, or perhaps better - the frame. The frame gives the thoughts inside my head a shape worthy of sharing. This inactivity may be because the book contains everything I want it to say, and to say more would just create noise. Like an over painted painting, or a recipe with too many ingredients there IS a time to stop. And until I get questions and critiques, there really is nothing more to add.

A couple days back, however, some floating thoughts found their matrix, and apparently the impetus to speak out loud again has followed :-)

It could be because of the mid term elections here in the States, perhaps conversations on line, comments overheard, or posts on Facebook I read. In any case I got to thinking about time, how we perceive it, how we use it, and far ahead (and back) into it we tend to look.

And no, this is not going to be a tirade against the supposed short attention spans of people these days because I actually think this shortness of focus has been around for a long time, at least since people moved away from the land and the progress of the industrial revolution. It may have gotten worse ... but it is certainly not new.

Everywhere I see people pointing at 'problems', in themselves, and in society, both physical and psychological, and trying to come up with ways to 'fix' them. Some even try these fixes, but most seem dissatisfied with the 'results'. Over and over again.

So the thought occurred to me - Why do people expect the first thing they try to work? And secondly, why do so many rush straight at a problem, guns blazing as it were, thinking that the 'other side' will just capitulate? (You can see the parallels  to sword play here no doubt ...)

Where's the subtlety? Where's the 'long game' Where's the understanding that there are short, medium, and long cycles to change? Any student of conflict resolution from one on one sword play to international politics knows that resolution can be a circuitous path - admittedly faster in a one on one setting with pointy objects than in major world affairs, but still, it's not always the direct path. And then there's the delusion that blurting out exactly what you want, ultimately GETS you what you want.

Everything you do and say sets up the relationship you are going to have with your adversary. The adversary is already your adversary. This we know. But what kind of adversary ....? You want them to be the kind that YOU WANT THEM TO BE and YOU CAN CONTROL THIS by how they perceive you to be.

Getting your way, getting what you want, is rarely about getting the adversary to admit they are wrong, or to admit you are right. It is about getting them to do what you want as though it was their idea all the time.