Inkican

Like you, I’m overwhelmed by the madness of current events. This is a different time, an angrier time. A time of wrath. A time of madness. A world where people stupid themselves to death. A world where innocence and humanity wash away in the inexorable tide of cruelty. Over and over, one word echoes into the darkness, one single word missing from all of this chaos: empathy.

Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference, that is, the capacity to place oneself in another’s position. As human beings, we gravitate to those who show us empathy. We respond to those who relate to us. Sadly, we live in a time where empathy is a commodity, a sign of weakness.

In fact, when you think about modern civilization it’s clear our culture thinks that the strongest person in room is the one who cares the least.. Our culture values those who demand that everyone relate to them while relating to no one but themselves. ‘I’m the center of the universe,’ they say. ‘You revolve around *me.*’ Our culture takes its cue from that toxic mindset and says ‘okay, well since I want to be strong this is what I gotta do.’

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Our culture thinks that the strongest person in room is the one who cares the least.

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I can cite a hundred examples of what I mean based on the news this week, but next week you won’t remember them. We seem to be trapped on a treadmill of loathing and animus, and I’m not sure where this lunacy will end. So I’m not going to discuss in detail what is already known and lost. The world is not showing empathy, and it’s apathy seems to beget more apathy.

Nobody is perfect. Even professional facilitators recognize their own weaknesses when it comes to fostering environments of reciprocal empathy. Our disruptive age challenges cultural norms of what empathy is, and what it isn’t and it’s created confusion.

For guys in particular, there are experts who say ‘men are experiencing a clear tension point between the expectation for them to be empathetic and emotionally connected spouses and fathers, to the equally strong expectation for them to be manly providers for their families … this tension seems to be at breaking point; men just don’t seem to know who or what they are supposed to be in 2018 and beyond.’

So yes, showing empathy is hard, but it’s a vital part of humanity. Horrible things happen when we let greed and apathy run the world. When Charlie Chaplin talked about the ‘passing of greed’ in The Great Dictator, he did not know the world was staring down the barrel at the Second World War. He talked about being victims of a system that makes men torture, but we live now in that system and it’s of our own design. There’s no mistaking that our world has become vicious and repulsive.

It’s difficult to show empathy to cruel people. The only advice I can offer is ‘learn to deal with them.’ Don’t take what they say personally. Don’t try to make them understand. Distance yourself from them, and their influence. Cultivate and nurture relationships with people who deserve your trust and your compassion. Recognize that you are valuable, no matter what other people think, say, or do.

We can’t save everyone. We can’t fix everyone. A college professor once said: “You all have a little bit of ‘I want to save the world’ in you, that’s why you’re here, in college. I want you to know that it’s okay if you only save one person, and it’s okay if that person is you.” Even if the light inside of you is small, let it shine! It will help others find you in the dark.

Write on!

Love,

Jackson

 

 

Quick Housekeeping Note: this blog post will either make you or break you. If that’s not something you’re up for, feel free to pass this one by. One of the big ideas I talk about in Mesh are harsh truths, and here’s one of them: Sometimes, you will lose at life before you even get started.

I know Forrest Gump says life is like a box of chocolates, but that’s nonsense. Sometimes life is like playing a game you know you’re going to lose. Suiting up for a game that starts out 1000 – 0. Boarding a plane you know is going to crash. For many people, including kids, life is the torture of seeing a finish line they’ll never reach, but trying for it anyway.

These are some harsh truths to talk about, but the kids who enjoy Mesh will get what I’m saying. Too often, adults sugar-coat the truth because they don’t know what else to do. Bad circumstances, bad childhood, bad role models … any number of things can wreck your shot at life. No fault of your own, nothing you could have done differently. Life can and will break your wings before you get a chance to fly.

“That’s not true,” people will sputter. They’ll cite example after example of people who solved their problems, overcame their obstacles. They fail to acknowledge is that life is complex. What works for one person may not work for another. All those little differences can add up to what engineers call a ‘cascade effect.’ Sometimes all the weak points of your life align at the wrong time, becoming a catastrophic failure.

Plus, in this low-empathy / boring dystopia world, your life isn’t just a struggle; it becomes work just to have you around. Kids exploring humor and empathy will make cruel jokes. People have to be willing to show compassion to make room for you and your circumstances. Hard times bring out the best in good people, and the worst in bad people. Not everyone is up for that kind of choice every day so they check out; even those who promised to be there no matter what. That’s a soul-crushing reality to accept.

I know there’s a common myth that any problem can be overcome with a sufficient amount of willpower and determination, but for many people including kids, that isn’t true. Some are born into life hampered by circumstances they can’t change, imprisoned by walls they cannot climb.

For those experiencing a loss at life, you should know that you aren’t alone. The bitterness that comes after realizing your best isn’t good enough? The anger and sadness from living a life dealt a raw hand? That’s something I talk about a lot in Mesh.

That anger, that sadness, that bitterness doesn’t have to be the end of the story. After all, if you relate to anything I just said, you might be asking yourself a reasonable question: If I’m going to lose, why try at all? What’s the point of playing, if there’s no possibility of winning?

I’ll tell you why. Buckle up, buttercup.

We try for one simple reason: we don’t know everything. We might be wrong about our chances, we might be wrong that our circumstances won’t change. We might be wrong that people won’t care, we might be wrong that things will never get better.

‘Losing at life’ is what happens when your narrow definition of success is unattainable. ‘Losing at life’ is what happens when you think there’s only one way to be happy. ‘Losing at life’ is what happens when you think only superheroes can be brave.

We might be wrong about all of those things and sometimes we have to lose at life, be screwed before we get started, before we can start to see all the ways we can win.

I’m not going to lie – my life, my actual life, is pretty messy. That’s one of the primary reasons I write: writing helps me keep my frustration, my anger, my depression under control. I describe all my negative stuff with this example.

Louis L’Amour talks about something called ‘creep’ in his novel about the Nevada Silver Rush Comstock Lode. Clay mud, compressed between plates of rock for millions of years, were suddenly freed. There was nothing the miners could do to stop the clay from coming, billions of tons of pressure forced the clay out like gray toothpaste. Instead, the miners had to work to keep the creep cut back every day – otherwise the clay would fill the tunnel.

I admit it: this is a complicated, obscure metaphor. If you can think of a better one, please feel free to share it. Until then, this is best way I can rationalize why I write and why writing and publishing are important to me. When I don’t write, when I don’t create, that dark stuff starts crowding in quick. Daily work to create, or build the Inkican platform, is what keeps it cut back.

One of the biggest challenges of these truths is to realize you don’t have all of them. I have no idea what the true answer is to all of this for me, or anyone else. All I know is that this is keeping me from giving up, and I talk about that in Mesh because there are many kids out there struggling on that journey with no idea how to take the first step. It’s important to me, then, for Mesh to help show Roman taking those first steps and getting the help he needs.

So the end of this blog post is really the beginning of a conversation. Mesh is a deeply personal project, as I’ve said. Now you know a little bit more about why it’s personal. I’m hoping that Roman, Zeke, and the rest of the Snow Foxes become friends for the other kids just like them. We’re all working to figure out what to do with the rest of our lives, now that life as we know it has come to an end.