Licking the Razor's Edge (2015)

*Harm #03: RESIGNATION ENSURES the EXTINCTION of HUMANITY …
Sociological studies have shown that hopelessness is not only a personal challenge – but
that it is contagious as well. In fact, our own resignation easily spreads not only to those
in our immediate surroundings who are feeling “down”, but also infects many of the
people who offer us their assistance in such times.
Let’s face it, our species is already wobbling on the brink of our next epoch of violence &
despair, and the only way we are going to transcend this impending “Dark Age” is for a
small-yet-significant critical mass of us to have the courage to set aside the “facts” about
how hopeless it all is – and to start doing something anyway.
“Worrying is using your imagination to obtain the things you do not want. Resignation is
doing nothing about those things once they arrive.” ~ anonymous
“People who call themselves ‘realists’ are actually simply the folks who have given up on
Happiness.” ~ inspired by Marty Rubin
“In the last analysis, the individual person is responsible for living his own life and for
finding himself. If he persists in shifting his responsibility to somebody else, he fails to
find out the meaning of his own existence.” ~ Thomas Merton
Resignation -- A Way OUT
“There’s no sense in being pessimistic. It doesn’t work anyway.” ~ unknown
“Acceptance doesn’t mean resignation; it means understanding that a situation simply is
what it is, and that there’s always a way through it.” ~ inspired by Michael J. Fox
“How strongly that poisonous net holds when one is unaware of what it is made of, and
yet how easily it falls apart when one consciously begins to countermand its malicious
urgings.” ~ Clarissa P. Estés
As I pointed out in the first part of this chapter, it is psychologically reasonable to
entertain the belief that we are all essentially powerless to effectuate any meaningful
change in our lives. And yet, even more important is the practical Truth that this belief is
a lie – an illusion born in our primitive history, strengthened by our cultural leaders (both
political & religious), and crystallized by our own cowardice.
The simple yet oft-ignored fact of the matter is this:
WE ARE ALL INCREDIBLY POWERFUL BEINGS!
Each & every one of us, regardless of the circumstances in which we find ourselves, can
choose to act in ways that literally transform lives – both our own, as well as those
around us. In fact, the “worse off” we happen to be, the more powerful we become …
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