Struggling with Change

Periodically someone is able to see things differently.  All of a sudden new choices emerge and create a whole range of completely new possibilities.  As an example, the cave man who saw a form of transportation that could come from a continually rotating object, Voila! – the wheel.  Rotating objects had been around for a long time.  But this cave man saw them as though with new eyes.

Christopher Columbus once said, “human progress is never made with unanimous consent.”  So I’m sure that there were a few others in the clan that hated the idea because it would probably bring a drought.  Voila! We now had politics – progressives and conservatives.

With each new observation comes the tug and pull of the masses; those who take advantage of the opportunities that emerge from new insights.  Those who are certain that only ruin can come in their wake.  Marcel Proust was correct when he wrote, “the real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.”  Unfortunately, new eyes almost always need the protection of safety glasses.

From the ancient practice of burning women at the stake to our post modern conflicts  between evolutionists and creationists, the struggle between transformative and  resistant forces define our species.  We seem always to be in an asymmetrical state, somewhat like a giant tug-of-war:  Each side, in turn, pulling the other until one falls into the chasm.  Fortunately for our species its usually the conservatives who fall or we would still think the Earth is the center of the Universe.

I believe the current tug of war is reaching a crisis point because the losing side is using dirty tricks and Hail Mary tactics.  Who’s the losing side?  As usual, it’s the conservatives.  One of the favored ways of moving the struggle in your favor is to put more effort into reducing the resistance than pushing against it.  As an example, if you’re losing the struggle of ideas, attack the character of your opponents.  If successful you weaken them, thereby reducing their resistance.

To the critical observer, that move is seen for what it is; desperation.  To the vacuous  “cheerleaders”, its genius: Hit them again, hit them again, harder, harder!”  None the less, cheerleading and Hail Mary passes only delay the inevitable: The only constant is change itself.  Ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus told us as much when he said, one cannot enter the same river twice. 

What’s my point?  It would be better to recognize and manage the process, instead of resist it.  We waste so much energy and intellectual capacity fighting amongst ourselves – liberals and conservatives, that is.  Here’s a thought, why don’t we cooperate to get a handle on the inevitable continuing flow of changes.  I don’t mean lay down and submit.  I mean tackle the ever present problems that inevitable change brings:  Tackle them together to our mutual benefit.

Some years ago, General Electric Company used a slogan that said that “Progress is our most important product”.  For America today its, “Progress is our most important problem”.  I still believe that people working together can always come up with better answers.  Oh and by the way it wouldn’t hurt to start calling our problems, “questions”.    

You see, questions have answers.  But our insistence on having wars on everything that we want to resist just gives energy to our “problems”.  You tell me, how are these wars working out:  Drugs, poverty and illiteracy?  They aren’t!

Well I know that the American psyche sees every “problem” as best resolved through  competition. It’s just not true.  Cooperation always produces better and more sustainable answers.  I want to stand side by side with those who disagree with me and hold the “problem” out in front of us, not between us.  As long as it’s between us we will only see our differences.

Robert DeFilippis