I do not adamantly follow politics. It is not that I am ignorant or that I want
to become ignorant. It is that I have a
full intellect at present. I am a researcher
by trade, so with anything that I look at I am compelled to research back to
the source. And because so much of what
we are presented with on our media front is biased by whoever contributes the most
bucks, I am unable to go with the majority of what is presented unless I
tirelessly research, and at present, I do not have the time. I am busy delving into the psychology behind
leadership, because I believe that what makes the best or worst type of leader
is that which compels him or her. I go
to my husband, my friend, Bodie, and my Uncle Allen when I want input,
because they DO dig.
I am neither left nor right.
Having spent years swinging on the chandelier betwixt depression and
mania, I’ve an aversion to extremes, and I do not believe that either has all
the answers. In fact I do not believe
humans are EVER equipped with all the answers, and those who purport that they
do have all the answers are in danger of falling into stupidity.
Strong words? My apologies. I am not angry, just tired of the finite
human mind expecting to know it all.
Because there is a difference between searching for them and positing
that one has them.
I do not often share my ideologies about hot topics, not because
I don’t have them, but because it seems a pointless waste of time to holler
across a chasm of entrenchment to those who are on the other side that they are
wrong when I am not certain that my definition of "right" is the same as theirs.
What I am certain of is that what I think is most often what I believe,
and I have tested and tried my ideologies so that they fulfill the standards
that I have. But however firmly I am
seated in my beliefs, it would be sheer arrogance to assume that the party on
the other side is not as firmly seated in theirs and has arrived at such from a
series of life experiences that have led to conclusions just as mine have. So, I do not argue beliefs, which includes
politics. But I am ever fighting to remain both open and objective in what comes my
way.
I come from a conservative state and a conservative familial
background. And I do not believe that
being conservative is necessarily mutually exclusive with being a Republican. I believe that when we define one thing as
indicative of another, we run the risk of putting on a thin layer of ignorance
that can build up if we are not continually questioning. I am in a very liberal field, psychology, and
I have learned much from my peers and mentors over the years who did not share
my conservative views. The beauty of it
all was not that I changed their minds or they mine, but it was the
process. It was like being given a bag
of items that I could take home and look at to discover their value in my
life. What fit I kept and what did not,
I threw out, but that particular process was never contingent on their being
present. It was and is something I do
internally in the presence of my maker.
My Uncle sometimes gives me the best fodder for thought…He
has no idea. He mentioned something
about another blog and the classifications human being make…that it makes us
feel safer. That has been reverberating
throughout my mind today as I wrapped up the last tidbits for my chapter one of
my dissertation. It rattled around so much
that the noise forced me to stop and ponder.
Why do we do that, categorize, that is?
I keep going back to the finite…Our need to pound things down to a way
or method by which we can process. Is
that good? Bad? I can’t assess that, but I will posit that
much of our need to do that links with feeling safe in the sense that we need
order. When I am stressed, the first
thing I do is clean my house. When I
have a paper to write, the first thing I do is pound the data down into an
outline. I have 280 articles I could
potentially use in my dissertation, and because my chair pleaded with me not to
use all of them, I have avoided the overwhelming deluge of data by pounding it
down into categories that are relevant.
And those are just my examples.
What do you categorize?
My point? Well, my
point is that, for me, answers are never as simple as we would like them to be,
and sometimes it seems to me expedience wins over true thought to take on
rhetoric that SEEMS to sum it all up in a quick fix that assuages our fears,
but the bottom line, at least from my certainly biased perspective is that
there is no such simplification to the human condition.
And often that rhetoric is only accepted because we are too tired or too
busy to really sit down and sort through everything to get down to the source…and
the money maker.
Please do not misinterpret me here. I am not lethargic. Actually, I am Nemesis, my wrath at injustice
rolling downhill towards whoever is at the bottom. I know this about myself. I know that the combination of intellect,
decisiveness, and wrath are lethal, and just as Peter in the Bible, I am
capable of impulsively cutting off the ear of my adversary when that may only
make things worse. I have been learning in
the past forty years how to look at all sides, how to step back, and how to be
empathetic. The one thing I learned in
the wars I have fought is that I am much better as a person when I love. My nature is to rise up and vanquish, but I
have learned to allow my heart to rise up and love instead. That means, most of the time, that I am
unable to commit definitive answers to big questions. I just don’t have enough data, and as people
are usually involved, I have to consider whether they need my assessment or my
love. Mostly though, I am looking to be
wiser, and what I have learned about wisdom is that it observes and is slow to
verbalize. I am working that direction…
I have chosen the areas in my life I fight for. I am one woman who is socially inept,
personally depleted too quickly, and broken in ways that will never mend. I fight for my family, because above they are
the jewels in my crown. My love for them
compounds daily. I fight for the
mentally ill, because they need articulation, and I am one of them able to
straddle the upper echelon of the intellectual world and still have both feet
involuntarily planted in the daily messiness which affords me a voice and a
perspective.
Right now, though, I am really focusing on helping my twelve
year old grow into the kind of man who thinks before he acts, is a man of
integrity, and most importantly, a boy who gets through 7th grade with his
self-esteem intact while knowing no matter what path he chooses he is beloved
by his earthly parents and his Abba. My
plate is full.
Blessings,
L
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