I thought this would be a good extension of some of Dr. Joel Wade's "Virtue of Happiness" philosophy and techniques (q.v. Earn a Good Reputation With Yourself). Fine political - and life advice - for anyone. Left, right or center:
You Have to Pick Your Team
By Sonya Vetra Tinsley, as told to Paul Rogat LoebEvery day presents infinite reasons to believe that change can't happen, infinite reasons to give up. But I always tell myself, "Sonya, you have to pick your team."
It seems to me that there are two teams in this world. And you can find evidence to support the arguments of both. The trademark of one team is cynicism. They'll tell you why what you're doing doesn't matter, why nothing is going to change, why no matter how hard you work, you're going to fail. They seem to get satisfaction out of explaining how we'll always have injustice. You can't change human nature, they say. It's foolish to try.
From their experience, they might be right.
Then there's another group of people who admit that they don't know how things will turn out, but have decided to work for change. I see Martin Luther King on that team, Alice Walker, Howard Zinn. I see my chaplain from college and my activist friends. They're always telling stories of faith being rewarded, of ways things could be different, of how their own lives have changed. They'll give you reasons why you shouldn't give up, testimonials why we've yet to see our full potential as a species. They believe we're partners in God's creation, and that change is really possible.
There are times when both teams seem right. Both have evidence. We'll never know who's really going to prevail. So I just have to decide which team seems happier, which side I'd rather be on. And for me that means choosing on the side of faith. Because on the side of cynicism, even if they're right, who wants to win that argument anyway? If I'm going to stick with somebody, I'd rather stick with people who have a sense of possibility and hope. I just know that's the side I want to be on.
Emphasis mine - and something I'm pleased to see in many of my own comrades in arms. Loeb adds:
"I love the concept of "picking your team," choosing the team of hope and that of cynicism and despair. We don't know whether or not we'll prevail. But if we give up, we create a self-fulfilling prophecy of defeat. And if we keep on, hope emerges from what Nelson Mandela called "the multiplication of courage," when individuals join together to work for what we believe, no matter how difficult it seems, and despite all the risks and costs."
This maxim applies equally on both sides of the political aisle. For as long as we remain alive, hope, honesty and courage are three things we can always share.
This is an excerpt and commentary around the themes of The Impossible Will Take a Little While: A Citizen's Guide to Hope in a Time of Fear, edited by Paul Loeb (Basic Books), named the #3 political book of Fall 2004 by the History Channel and American Book Association. Reprinted here with permission. This essay was originally published in Loeb's Soul of a Citizen: Living With Conviction in a Cynical Time. Sonya Vetra Tinsley is an Atlanta activist and musician.
It's a little more complicated than this bumper-sticker philosophy, I'm afraid. Ask yourself: what team were the communist revolutionaries on?
And which team Sophocles, Aeschylus, Shakespeare (at least in his tragedies), W.B. Yeats and TS Eliot (before his conversion) were on.
Well gee. I guess we know what team #1 and #2 are on.
Frankly, I'll take Dr. King over Shakespeare any day, unless I'm specifically looking for a well-done tragedy.
What about the team that says change isn't necessary, things are pretty good the way they are, and change--especially the kind promoted by the likes of Zinn--will most likely make them worse?
Fred,
Whatever team Yeats was on, I don't wanna be on it. I can't stand that guy. Gee, this just gets more confusing, doesn't it?
Paul,
"I guess we know what team #1 and #2 are on."
No, we do not. You know what happens when you assume. My point was that life is a little too complicated to be captured in neat little feel-good, black-and-white dichotomies. For what it's worth, I believe people are mostly good and mostly rational, but also very ignorant and only slightly malleable. What "team" does this put me on? Five seconds, starting... now.
Unimaginative pessimism leads ultimately to stasis and stagnation; unbridled optimism leads ultimately to frustration and disaster. Both approaches are about equally bad. True progress requires a willingness to look unflinchingly at the world as it is and figure out what is in the realm of the possible and what isn't, combined with the imagination to find the best possible course of action and the courage to take it. Looking at only one half of this combination is a recipie for failure of one sort or another.
RE #1: Ask yourself, in return, when we started winning, and what kind of shifts within conservatism made that possible. If a better future isn't part of the program, [a] it's an un-fun ride to be on, and [b] you're gonna lose.
Conservatives in America didn't get happier after they started winning. They started winning after they got 'happier.' After they spent less time "standing athwart history, yelling 'stop!' " - and more time talking about a positive vision.
Optimism matters, as Ronald Reagan (peace be upon him) would be the first to remind us.
Now, per comment #5, optimism and hope for the future must be based on concrete things - you know Winds doesn't believe in thereapeutic "self-esteem" B.S. that's unrelated to anything real. Having said that, it's necessary to be able to have optimism and hope, and worthwhile to look to a level that can and does deliver reasons for both (rather than getting hung up in any kind of "it's hopeless" routine).
Once you have that, the "multiplication of courage" effect is real.
Which, incidentally, is why content still matters too. If the results of one's efforts are obvious decline or millions of skulls, eventually any hope of change for the better vanishes. The old mantras are repeated, but they get more and more forced and hollow, more and more for rote and ritual, more and more shrill, less and less alive. We can look around us today, and see the results.
Not the kind of team I want to play on.
Which is why sensible people, should they ever conclude that the team they're on can't offer real optimism and hope, need to focus on changing their team (in either sense of the phrase).
Joe,
We seem to converge; my quarrel is not with you, but with Ms Tinsley. If the choice is between believing that progress is possible and believing that it is not, then obviously I (and most people) would gladly throw my lot in with the former. But then that just begs the question of what we mean by "progress", which is where the really important issue is.
I mainly took issue with the article because it made no reference to substance -- indeed, it explicitly stressed "faith", which is precisely the opposite of substance. Given the (false) dichotomy between True Believers and Nihilists she seems to present, my reaction is "a pox on both your houses". When I see statements like "You can't change human nature, they say. It's foolish to try.", phrases like "men are infinitely malleable" and "New Socialist Man" start running through my head and I shudder. The cynics are a drag, but at least they never killed anybody.
In any case, I agree with you completely on the importance of optimism (though I prefer the word "confidence"), as long as it's checked by an openness to criticism and devotion to finding what works rather than what we wish would work. Eyes looking confidently ahead to the horizon, but feet firmly planted on the ground.
Each team wants to be the good wolf:
A Cherokee elder sitting with his grandchildren told them, “In every life there is a terrible fight – a fight between two wolves. One is evil: he is fear, anger, envy, greed, arrogance, self-pity, resentment, and deceit. The other is good: joy, serenity, humility, confidence, generosity, truth, gentleness, and compassion.” A child asked, “Grandfather, which wolf will win?” The elder looked him in the eye. “The one you feed.”
But actually, as I have at the top of my blog, there are two Wolf Packs. Each pack has good and bad wolves. Feeding the pack with mostly good wolves means feeding the bad wolves in that pack; and not feeding the good wolves in the other pack.
More realistic, less black and white. Justice is Grey. (Like me!)
Optimistically in favor of: a World Without Dictators. That's the team I'm on right now; and happy about it.
Matt,
No doubt Yeats was a major flake. But he wrote some of the most beautiful and profound poetry in the English language. The point of my comment was that truly great art requires recognition (at least) of the irreducibly and irremediably tragic elements of the human condition.