The # Hashtag Movement
Insights - Thoughts July 16, 2018 0

The # Hashtag Movement

I do not get the fascination with using them. I understand they are very helpful in bringing awareness to a particular topic quickly. However once that has been achieved, then what?

I am also aware of the latest #me too campaign. The awareness of violence against women is important and this campaign is bringing it into the limelight once again, so it is seemingly a good thing. The issue for me is, if we are to be against violence, should it not be that we are against violence for all human beings whether they be male, female or a child? Why pigeon hole it as only an issue that affects women? If I am for women’s issues, does that mean I am against men, as men seem to be most often the perpetrators of violence against women?

Men versus women seem to dominate the political spectrum too. Political #hashtags were all the craze with the US Presidential campaign. Bernie had his #Feel the Bern, Trump had #Lock her up and #Crooked Hillary and Then there was the #Basket of deplorables. Hillary had # I’m with her. All this and I don’t quite see what was accomplished apart from each side getting further and further divided which I suppose could have been the plan all along?!

I feel the biggest and probably the strongest hashtag from last year was the #Black lives matter movement. I am in no way a statistician to be able to tell you whether police brutality disproportionately affects the black community. However I do think anything that divides us, is often used to control us. Brutality has been and is used as a form of control, and no matter who gets affected by it, they never forget it.

Speaking of brutality we had all the #PRAY FOR, and #Je suis, after each of the terrorist attacks. What after the prayers and the solidarity? We move on and yet for those who have had to bury a loved one or have been injured forever by it, they have to find someway to continue on. So what are these #hashtags meant to do? You post it and it feels good to acknowledge that you are on some level connected to their pain and suffering, yet are we?

Can we be really? If i say to you John’s wife or husband passed away, you may feel some distress and sadness, if they were a distant uncle. However if that were changed to your husband or wife has passed away, that would be a whole different picture, and that is because of these little words, ME and MINE divide me from YOU and YOURS.

I am not a fan of anything that divides us and puts us into a little boxes with a neat little labels on it. Why should we be? We are human beings, with souls that will continue on forever, long after our bodies die. We are as David Icke likes to say infinite consciousness having a human experience.

Division crumbles when consciousness rises!

Happiness
Insights - Emotions July 16, 2018 0

Happiness

Are you happy? Does the answer depend on what has happened to you this past moment? Does your life and it’s related emotions sometimes feel like some sort of trap. I am happy then the next minute I am unhappy. Like a see-saw. Up one minute down the next. Do you live in a world of constant emotions?

Do you believe you are here to be happy? I did. The follow up question one has to ask oneself is well, if I am here to be happy, why do i experience unhappiness? Do you have the answer?

See it all comes down to why you think you are here, on this earth? Do you believe you here to be happy, to enjoy yourself? To do whatever makes you happy, regardless of consequence? If happiness is the goal then unhappiness will seem unbearable. Happiness is usually tied to self interest. When i get what i want constantly, I am happy. However when unforeseen circumstances take place unhappiness sets in, regardless of the happiness you felt minutes before.

Do you see happiness as the be all and end all of life. Do you think if just this or that situation in my life were different, I would be happy. Maybe. However life is cyclical. You appreciate happiness because you have experienced unhappiness. Unhappiness provides you with the backdrop through which you have the ability to appreciate happiness.

So what is happiness? Happiness is that underlying feeling, beneath whatever is going on in your life, that allows you to say, I am okay. I am good. We could call it peace, or joy or happiness. True happiness is the feeling that you can experience even when absolutely nothing in your life is any different or even when things are not as you would wish them to be.  Allowing things to be the way they are and trying not forcing them to be the way you would like.

What it really feels like is peace that passes all understanding, because it needs nothing to be different in your life, for you to enjoy this feeling. You could be on vacation and be unhappy, or you could be doing the work you love and be happy. Underneath all that is happening to you, needs to be the awareness that you need nothing to be happy. You are happiness.

I can hear you say well if it were this easy, everyone should be happy all the time! True. However it is your choice how you look at what you are experiencing. Hindsight is a good example. Sometimes we experience difficulty and after we have gone through it, we think it was good I went through this, I am stronger, I am more grateful, more appreciative, more more more. Yet other times we have thought something would bring us happiness and in hindsight it brought us more unhappiness. So both sides of the same coin. Happiness and unhappiness are based on your perspective in the moment. So know that happiness is you and you are happiness and hindsight will reveal that which only time can bring.