Lose the hangups. Start to care.

Hello ATS people! I'm not fully certain what I'm trying to express here, but I feel like I'm on the cusp of becoming something better, so I'll just give it a go.

I think one of the greatest things a human being can do is put someone else before oneself.

It's hard to read the news these days. I feel like our society and culture have degraded significantly just within my lifetime. There's way, way too much of "looking out for number one", and the prevalence of total self-absorption is having a horribly negative effect on the way we live together on this spinning rock.

The deepest sorrow I feel as a human being is not an existential crisis, nor the inherent disconnection from our creator. My black cloud of sorrow is the selfishness of the human condition, the way we treat one another. I don't feel like I have a community. I think community still exists, but it is becoming more rare as we become more disjoint and disconnected from one another.

Although utter despondence is brutal, it is valuable to me because without having known it I would not be able to fully empathize with my fellow human beings.

I'm trying to be sensitive to when others are having a hard time in life, and to help out where I can. Difficulties are way, way easier to surmount when someone else is on your side. Human beings need to know that someone cares about them, and we need to share both the joys and pains.

I care about people. I have lots and lots of flaws, and I make lots and lots of mistakes. But in my heart I know how much it hurts when it feels like nobody cares, and I don't want other people to feel that way.

Sometimes it's really hard to care, and it would be easier to just detach. Caring is a feeling, but it is also a decision. I have decided that I will always try to care, even when it's tough, unrewarding, and lonely to do so.

When I was in my teens, my siblings and I had a one-liner that we would say to each other when someone was being unsavory. "Lose the hangups. Start to care." We used it as a joke, but as I think about it more, we really hit the nail on the head without knowing it. The reasons for not caring about others and putting them before oneself are just that --- hangups.

So that's what I'm going to try to do:

Lose the hangups. Start to care.

reply to post by InTheFlesh1980


Hi ITF you used a term that has been a constant for me lately.."Community". Seems it has been playing a large part in my life lately and for the better I must add. There's also been one flying around here that expresses another feeling I've had "Empathy".

These two combined and seemingly and increasingly relative to me and others here, as well as my social circles, may be a sign that there's an awareness or possibly awakening happening amongst society that we are losing something valuable and needing to recover this part of our "Universal Psyche". Then again maybe I'm spending to much time on the forums! Seriously though I can't explain it but there seems to be a bonding happening, it's as if we've strayed too far from the path and need to reconnect to each other in a way that has been missing for too long. I hope this sense of community continues and grows as we need all the help we can get going ahead.

Peace

reply to post by InTheFlesh1980


What you express is my sentiments entirely.
I think we are on the same path.

Keep up the good work.

Kukri
reply to post by InTheFlesh1980

 

Hi ITF you used a term that has been a constant for me lately.."Community". Seems it has been playing a large part in my life lately and for the better I must add. There's also been one flying around here that expresses another feeling I've had "Empathy".

These two combined and seemingly and increasingly relative to me and others here, as well as my social circles, may be a sign that there's an awareness or possibly awakening happening amongst society that we are losing something valuable and needing to recover this part of our "Universal Psyche". Then again maybe I'm spending to much time on the forums! Seriously though I can't explain it but there seems to be a bonding happening, it's as if we've strayed too far from the path and need to reconnect to each other in a way that has been missing for too long. I hope this sense of community continues and grows as we need all the help we can get going ahead.

Peace

Personally I think forums like this which shine a light on our society and ourselves and force us to examine ourselves in the mirror are what are actively guiding the "awakening". Only when the true horror of the world is shown to us can we seek to examine within ourselves ways to make it better for our children and their children.
If reincarnation is a reality, then we only inherit tomorrow that which we create today. Hence "we reap what we sow".
Just a thought inspired by your post.

I didn't have hangups for most of my life.
I was open and kind.
Nice guy.
Damn fool.

As I've gotten older I've learned to care less.

Turns out, treating people like crap is what they really seem to want.

reply to post by InTheFlesh1980


If you want to "become something better" then just start doing it. It doesn't have to be grandiose. An example of this in my life is my work in avatar creations. It makes someone's life just a little bit better, especially when they can be picky and you smile and help them. People walk away feelling like you care.

Step in front of a few bullets for people, and you become a hero. It isn't hard, and I don't mean real bullets.

Great realization. Don't get yourself bogged down in details. just start "doing".

badgerprints
I didn't have hangups for most of my life.
I was open and kind.
Nice guy.
Damn fool.

As I've gotten older I've learned to care less.

Turns out, treating people like crap is what they really seem to want.

Feed people breakfast at a nursing home. You might be the first person to sit with them one on one since their last doctor visit. You will see people who appreciate you, who don't want to be treated bad (but often are).

Like i said, it aint hard. I think I know the neck of the woods you are in. I can promise you that your help is needed somewhere. Just find that "somewhere" and start "doing".

bigfatfurrytexan

badgerprints
I didn't have hangups for most of my life.
I was open and kind.
Nice guy.
Damn fool.

As I've gotten older I've learned to care less.

Turns out, treating people like crap is what they really seem to want.

Feed people breakfast at a nursing home. You might be the first person to sit with them one on one since their last doctor visit. You will see people who appreciate you, who don't want to be treated bad (but often are).

Like i said, it aint hard. I think I know the neck of the woods you are in. I can promise you that your help is needed somewhere. Just find that "somewhere" and start "doing".

Don't get me wrong. Where people are actually in need. I contribute.
I work with homeless and help food banks around the holidays.
I reserve my ire for normal people who have decent lives but treat others poorly.
I also turn into a real bastard when people take advantage of the kindness others (or myself).

I'm fed up with the selfishness of society in general so I've become a real belligerent jackass in my old age.

Well said ITF1980. Very poignantly stated.

Holidays have lost their sparkle, everything seems overdone, superficial and trite. Whatever deeper meaning we had in ourselves collectively has been stripped away methodically beginning with religion. American popular culture is completely disconnected from it like it was an evolutionary relic to be left behind.
The digital age has brought everyone together without being there. It has made us lazy and we seek out the company of others less and less often.

Americans move too often and have little sense of home, to feel like you belong somewhere that you have attachments both past and future with. Much like locusts we mess up one spot and move on leaving the mess for someone else to clean.

We don't know our neighbors and awkwardly wave hello when encountered.
We stopped going to PTA meetings and volunteering for causes.

Too many of us have no one to even share a meal with. I don't know about anyone else but I usually don't like to eat alone, it seems like a chore without company.

I know where we lost it and even how to get it back but nobody's going to give up their digital devices and get off their butts to start being a part of community again.
We're all being made to feel like each of us is a minority with no power, no roots to claim, no story to explain who we are or what we're doing.

Hell, America doesn't even have a national identity anymore. Now when foreigners think of the US they think of Drones, Torture, Spying, Hollywood, Coke and Nike. We're not the country that beat fascism and freed the world from national socialism and Japanese imperialism nor the country that strove mightily to achieve civil rights.

We have cowered from our own government and taken out our anger on countries we have no business being in.
The people have done nothing of significance since the start of the new millennium except blithely accept the new order of heavy handed police state spying and corrupt government. We haven't been able to change anything or even brought any significant part of the corruption to be prosecuted. They are now a criminal class beyond our reach, firmly entrenched side by side with every major bank and corporation.

The last thing they want is for us to feel connected to each other in any way.
When we begin caring for each other they lose much of their power.

reply to post by InTheFlesh1980



Money, technology all that stuff means nothing to me. If need be I will grow my own food. We have become dissociated from what really matters. Don't look for a politician to save you, don't wait for religion to console you, make your own connection with the world, the real one.

AthlonSavage
reply to post by InTheFlesh1980

 

Money, technology all that stuff means nothing to me. If need be I will grow my own food. We have become dissociated from what really matters. Don't look for a politician to save you, don't wait for religion to console you, make your own connection with the world, the real one.

While I appreciate the technology of today and where it has come from, What good is it? Cell phones, IMHO, are only good for emergencies. Computers, developed for war, have evolved into internet connection devices. The entertainment devices we have today like TVs, radios, MP3s, have become food for the sheep. I know, Iknow, I'm using a computer to write this pseudo rant; but in my defense, I built the computer.

Thinking about it, the ATS community (there's that word again), most are smart, inquisitive, militant, experienced people. This is a place I like to visit as much as I can, and I always come away having learned something.