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LaTigresse -> RE: Making peace with the Establishment ? (2/27/2011 5:50:31 AM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: cpK69
quote:
ORIGINAL: LaTigresse
quote:
ORIGINAL: DesFIP
Actually the true sign of maturity is not in accepting the establishment but in the recognition that if you want to change the world, you start by changing yourself instead of demanding everyone else changes to fit you.
This.
While I can see the issue with “demanding everyone else changes to fit you”, I’m still at a loss as to how this works.
What change(s) can one make about themselves that would cause the world to change?
Isn’t there a certain amount of 'accepting the establishment' that goes along with that?
Kim
It depends upon how you look at it. For myself this is how it works. I accept that, as much as I detest them, some things cannot be changed. As for the things that can be changed, first I feel I must look in the mirror clearly. Much of what bothers us is actually a reflection of us. If I change what I am putting out there, it changes what is reflected back at me.
As an example, I hate biggots and prejudice to the point of sometimes wanting to really hurt or do serious damage to those that express such. The reality, at least for the people that I've known in my life, I cannot just walk up to them and tell them to "Stop it!" explain why they should, and have it be an effective change.
Instead, I realized I needed to look in the mirror. Look at habits of behaviour or thought, that I had, that was a reflection of what I despised. I needed to realize that, to a degree, I was a part of the problem. Then, after that rather uncomfortable recognition, I needed to begin policing myself. It is very easy, when growing up and living in a certain sheltered (sheltered being few people that are diverse culturally or by lifestyle choice) environment, to say you are not racist, sexist, whatever the 'ist' is, yet not remove the signs of such from your thought process and vocabulary. I am not talking of the dramatic and obvious, but the more subtle things that tend to give others around you, liscense with the more dramatic.
Other changes can be as simple as refusing to laugh along with the group at a racist joke. Instead I've just looked at the teller and gotten up and walked away. Leaving the discomfort to them and those that found the telling humorous, or at the very least, acceptable.
That is just one example of how I personally, have not necessarily made peace with what exists, but by changing myself, feel I am changing the status quo.
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