Quote of the Week...from Max Ehrmann

Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.  But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.  Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.           ---Max Ehrmann

When calamities, accidents, and sudden illness befall us, the first tendency...at least for me...is to go into crisis mode, with the adrenaline spiking and the threat of panic close at hand.  But then reason and reflection, once any immediate danger has been properly addressed and diminished, should gradually assume a more dominant role in dealing with the troubles.  This, I believe, requires a personal level of courage and faith that can lift one out of despair and fruitless worry while remaining in a state of enlightened and realistic vigilance while the situation remains problematic.  It does oneself no good to overthink during these times about worst-case scenarios and then emotionally react to them as if they actually happened. The above quote is taken from writer Max Ehrmann's 1927 prose poem Desiderata, and it addresses this very human tendency to overreact to negative events in people's lives. We can only do what we have the power to do, and beyond that, learning to look at things with a more realistic perspective can contribute to a greater personal sense of balance, serenity and gratitude.  I know...easier said than done.  But "done" it must be...

Quote of the Week...from Max Ehrmann

As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.     Max Ehrmann, Desiderata

The above is the second line in American businessman Max Ehrmann's famous 1920s prose poem Desiderata, nothing less than a guide to living.  Line number one, which I've discussed three years ago on this blog, leads directly into it: "Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence."  In today's stressful and divided era of pandemic, economic crisis, social injustice and fractured electoral politics these opening lines are more relevant than ever.  I'm not here to preach them to others but instead bring them up primarily to remind myself where my priorities need to be.  It's easy for me to watch the news, gather the information and mentally process it all to come up with what I think are the correct solutions and reactions. However, other people behave and speak in ways that I find indicative of denial and false narrative...how could they be so selfish and foolish?!  Yet I stand in community with many of them and should, as Ehrmann stressed, work to maintain...without sacrificing my beliefs and personal responses...their good will in the face of stark differences between us.  I'm finding this increasingly difficult to do...it seems as if a creeping madness is settling over our society and that too many of us have decided to let a select few do our own reasoning for us...

Quote of the Week...from Aldous Huxley

We cannot reason ourselves out of our basic irrationality.  All we can do is learn the art of being irrational in a reasonable way.                                   ---Aldous Huxley

Aldous Huxley was a famous English writer probably best known for his 1932 dystopian novel of a future consumer-based society gone to extremes titled Brave New World.  His above quote about irrationality screams outs its relevance in today's virus-stricken world of mass reaction, much of it without any semblance of reason.  In any crisis, there is a tendency for people...myself included...to react in an irrational way...here are some of those possible ways:

--Panic
--Anxiety
--Scapegoating
--Inventing or subscribing to conspiracy theories
--Revisionism
--Critical hindsight
--Denial

I think that panic and anxiety are self-evident, scapegoating reveals itself whenever people of east Asian ancestry are attacked as if they had something to do with the disease, conspiracy theories are abounding...split between China's nefarious aims, the "fake" news media and the Democratic Party, revisionism is seen with politicians claiming they were on to the virus from the start when they weren't, critical hindsight whenever news reporters practice "gotcha" journalism to put politicians on the spot about previous statements and actions instead of what's currently happening...and denial, probably the most prevalent...and dangerous...of the irrational reactions to this still-spreading pandemic. I've noticed that along with denying that COVID-19 is anything more dangerous than the ordinary flu is often an accompanying social culture of bravado that assumes those who follow the social distancing rules are governed by fear...that is, part of their irrational denial is to accuse others of irrationality...

Once again, we're all irrational beings and are as such predisposed to reacting unreasonably to crises, especially those that seem to mandate drastically changing our social behavior patterns, even if only temporarily.  There are rational components to each of the areas I have listed above: concern instead of panic and anxiety, informed curiosity about the virus outbreak's origins instead of scapegoating, an acknowledgement that coincidences actually do happen and that the simplest answer is the often the true one instead of convoluted conspiracies, "manning up" and explaining one's own inaccurate or misleading statements instead of trying to reinvent the past, placing hindsight in the context that no leader is perfect and all will fail at times...especially in unique circumstances, and optimism that acknowledges...not denies...the urgency of the situation while looking forward to great things ahead for us after this crisis subsides...