Tag Archives: society

Adversity

Words from Dic(tionary)

dictionary with letter A

Adversity: (n) difficulties, misfortune: e.g. resilience in the face of adversity

Excuses.

Matter of fact, you could stack adversity up with other made-up concepts, like trials, tribulations, difficulty, hassle and even temptation.

These are not real words. They’re lamentations moaned into the darkness by people who have run away, scared of the reality of this thing called life.

  • If things did not get edgy, we would never change.
  • If there were no challenge to our ideas, we would refuse to evolve.
  • And if life only threw softballs, we could never get into the big leagues.

Adversity is one of those words which is used to explain why we fail to show up for the gig. It is a whiny screech from the soul who has lost confidence in his or her own ability or faith.

Now, I am not unsympathetic to the condition–I frequently visit that defeated profile. But I never get OUT of the dismal dunes by being accommodated or having someone express empathy for my plight. That just doesn’t help.

In case you didn’t know, here’s the way it works:

  1. We decide to be creative and change our lives.
  2. Those around us are uncomfortable with change so they discourage us.
  3. We persevere.
  4. A society that despises perseverance attempts to throw roadblocks in our way to keep us from moving ahead of the crowd.
  5. We inch our way forward.
  6. Bigger bears come out of the woods, attempting to scare us away from our own joy and prosperity.
  7. We stare the bears down.

Look at that process carefully. This is how every piece of excellence has been achieved throughout the history of humankind, whether you’re talking about the introduction of fire into the caveman’s life, civil rights, light bulbs, computers or adding cheese to macaroni to create a new side dish.

Adversity is what small-minded people do to stop big ideas. It has many names, but the mantra is always the same: why don’t we just leave well enough alone?

If you object and want to try to revive hope, faith and love … brace yourself for adversity.

Abelian

by J. R. Practix

dictionary with letter A

Abelian: adj. {mathematics} (of a group) having members related by a commutative operation (i.e. A x B = B x A)

Sometimes I wish we didn’t live in an A and B world. Actually, most of the time.

And if we insist on living in that separation, I wish we all would be more Abelian. In other words, find out that A x B does equal B x A.

There is a great chicanery going on in our society today. It is presented under the magnanimous banner of diversity. But if you look carefully, you realize the reason we want to extol our differences is in order to publicly or privately refuse equality to those who dare to vary.

It’s really sneaky.

Once you determine that somebody is unique–or at least off the beaten path of your lifestyle–you can smile at them, pretending that you appreciate their choices, while internally feeling superior that your particular inclinations are better.

No, we need to be more Abelian in our approach. Long before we discuss differences, we need to establish the certainty of equality. In other words, you are equal with me. Now, let’s sit down and learn about our individual choices.

If you don’t establish what’s equal first, you will use people’s differences against them.

Case in point: women are not different from men unless they’re first equal. THEN we can study, appreciate, argue, celebrate or even fuss about our variations. The discussion will be fruitful because it will be done in an atmosphere of “even-Steven/Stephanie.” If we joke about the differences before we’ve established an Abelian equality, we will never grant each other the dignity of justice.

Tricky, isn’t it?

Let’s find out what’s equal. We’ll have plenty of time to discover what isn’t.