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“In the very midst of destruction and decay, we can now find striking evidences of birth and life. It shows clearly and, I think, indisputably, that with intelligence and a modicum of luck the emergent civilization can be made more sane, sensible, and sustainable, more decent and more democratic than any we have ever known. If the main argument of this book is correct, there are powerful reasons for long-range optimism, even if the transitional years immediately ahead are likely to be stormy and crisis ridden”
Alvin Toffler 1980
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anyone else want to curl up on a lily pad and float away
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Sometimes, too often in fact, the world cannot only feel insane, but you feel like you are going insane. It’s a response to stress. Stress on beliefs, stress on mindset, stress on reality (and unreality), stress on time, stress on self-capabilities, stress on resources. They literally can make you feel nuts. It’s the uncomfortable dance between overwhelming and, well, whelming. Often, our ‘whelming’ mechanism is to ignore the larger stuff or always view it through simplistic terms. I actually believe it is a coping system and I tend to, while being frustrated with those people, give them a break. They just don’t know how to understand something so big and so overwhelming and can’t see any way to control it so they see it as a blob and deal with what is in front of them.
Which leads me to lily pads.
Some of us navigate the overwhelming bigness by finding lily pads of certainty in the present – and ongoing presents. That doesn’t mean you don’t feel like you are drowning on occasion and it is also tempting to just stay on your lily pad, but lily pads offer some stability. My own sanity has pretty much been grounded in actually giving lily pads of certainty to people. By giving I get some affirmation that some things can be managed and some things are certain and some things can overcome doubt. I imagine I avoid the allure of certainty by permitting others to touch upon it on occasion. Maybe it is my way of avoiding being overwhelmed because, well, it is an overwhelming world where uncertainty overshadows certainty, facts exist like stars in the sky, but truth resides in combinations of stars (and not enough people look to the sky) and progress can sometimes appear elusive. Maybe lily pads are sane-ish zones in an insane-ish overwhelming world.
Which leads me to sanity.
My sanity most likely resides on lily pads. One step away from drowning I imagine. But maybe they offer small sane stages to dance within an insane world. Maybe everyone needs lily pads. Ponder.
“Complicated problems originate from causes that can be individually distinguished; they can be addressed piece by piece; for each input to the system there is a proportionate output; the relevant systems can be controlled and the problems they present admit permanent solutions. On the other hand, complex problems and systems result from networks of multiple interacting causes that cannot be individually distinguished; must be addressed as entire systems, that is they cannot be addressed in a piecemeal way; they are such that small inputs may result in disproportionate effects; the problems they present cannot be solved once and for ever, but require to be systematically managed and typically any intervention merges into new problems as a result of the interventions dealing with them; and the relevant systems cannot be controlled — the best one can do is to influence them, or learn to ‘dance with them’…”
Professor Roberto Poli