I Will Not Die

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While I’m not exactly wealthy at this point in my life, It’s a far cry from how I lived when I was growing up. I’d say I probably sit somewhere in the lowish middle class. Growing up though, was quite a bit different. I often look back on those days and what I feel they taught me. Here’s some of what comes to mind:

There are fewer problems than we think there are

Any quick browsing of a social commentary in a magazine or newspaper will give us a glimpse of a variety of our social woes. We have bigotry, lousy educational institutions, inefficient government, disease, poor literacy, and moral decrepit-ness. Poverty taught me to identify that most of these social woes are really children of the same, single, ugly beast. Follow the money. We can label the symptoms in every colorful way that we want, but the disease will always remain the same. The global and even regional disparities in wealth are the colds we keep calling coughs, sneezes and fevers.

How to be REALLY empathetic

It’s pretty easy to look at someone struggling and to level a series of criticisms on them, even if only privately. We all do it. We become insta-parents of children that are not our own. For example, we might see a poor man on the street and we might become judgmental by saying to ourselves, “well if he would only…[x y z], he wouldn’t be in the position he is in.” Not I said the fly. I’m much more likely to adopt his pain into my own heart and to suppress my accusations and turn them into something a lot more like his sorrow.

How to love the underdog

Man I love the underdog. The story of someone who has absolutely nothing, who can summon the strength and the courage to stand above their lot in life and charge on off into the battlefield in spite of not having a chance, is for me, one of the peaks of human greatness. I hereby bow to the underdog. If no one else ever tells you this, let me be the one to do it: humanity owes you one.

The only real human triumph is faction-less human love

We can label all forms of triumphs and great feats, but once you strip everyone down to their briefs, things get a lot more simple. Once you distill all the “stuff” down to the bare bricks and mortar, nothing stands strong except unconditional human love and kindness. It’s one of the only things that can truly stand on its own. It relies on nothing and needs no excuse, prior act or reason.

Poverty is WAY harder to solve than wealthy people think it is

Climbing up a hill looks really easy from the top. When wealthy people discuss how they think we should solve poverty, it usually sounds a little laughable. The phrase, “easy for you to say,” is completely meaningful here. When I want an opinion on how to solve poverty, I’ll go find the guy at the top of the hill who still has dirty hands.

Most idealism must take a back seat

This has a lot in common with the first thing I mentioned above. What poverty taught me is that, regardless of what advisors might say about the need for education, balanced nutrition, personal motivation, growth, fitness and happiness, without at least some form of relative wealth, none of these things are actually possible. They can say all day long how poor people should get out and exercise, eat nutritiously and get more education, but if you’re in poverty, your focus stays on cheap food and stable shelter. Period.

Most governments are REALLY bad at addressing poverty

This is a bipartisan attack. I’m not singling out political specialities. All I’ll say is this: any form of government who professes to want to address poverty with one mouth, but taxes lotteries and casinos with another mouth, is much worse than insincere.

Dereck :: Aug.03.2008 :: Life, Money, Perspectives :: No Comments »

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