ya, get out of your tree and walk, mun

so what does a good parent do when a child refuses to eat, they find another way to present it. 

Desmond Tutu said something the other day that made me smile. he said "we are family. if we could get to believe this we would see that to care about one another is not really altruistic, it's the best form of self interest", then he bust out laughing. 

he's so right on. this style of thinking is so incredibly simple and yet so very effective it's a bit surprising that more people don't use it. 

re-wrap it!

a friend gave me an example once of a man living in India who was a devout Hindu and followed the practices of bathing, doing laundry, dumping waste products, etc in the Ganges river. now the man was also a scientist, so these practices troubled him on an academic level because he was aware of the health risks that were promoted by bathing in the same water that was being used as a dumping ground. 

when he approached his fellow man to refrain from polluting the water, he was met with distain. this was their mother Ganga, a living breathing being who would protect them and accept all they were doing. he went home to ponder his dilemma. 

the next time he talked with his people, he approached them differently. he asked them to respect their "mother" and not "hurt" her by polluting. 

the response was different this time. the people could see now that it was in their own best interest, as well as their "mother's" to address this issue. together they worked, and today, are working to create water treatment plants.

re-wrap it!

Mr Tutu's speech reminded me of another conversation i'd heard one day. 

Two women were talking about a tragedy one of them had endured. One of the women asked the other what she was going to do. The other replied "forgive". 

This nearly floored the first woman, but the second woman defended her decision saying "forgiveness is not about them, it's about me. I'm the one who benefits from this. By forgiving, it will allow me to release the negativity that holds me captive, and allow myself to move forward with my life. By forgiving, I put an end to the escalation and continuation of that pain"

re-wrap it!

so whether it's moral, environmental, or political, and you're having trouble moving ahead, Tutu's message seems to be to shift it around to a positive form of self interest. no one can control what comes at them from the outside, but everyone has the ability to adjust what comes from the inside.

moot or hooey?

evolution is the change in a population's inherited traits