Against Helplessness: The Call Every Citizen Must Hear

I did something very different for this week’s entry. Something I have found difficult to bring myself to do. And it was so difficult because I didn’t want to be the one to do it, and if I had to be the one, I wanted to do it right and well. I am not sure that I do it justice. I’m certain that given more resources, I could do better. But these are lean, hard, frightening times.

When faced with times such as these, we are left with such situations in increasing frequency. So many of us who have not signed up to be the voice speaking truth to power, who did not have dreams of participating in a resistance, who would never have wished to be there at the fall of a country – we now find ourselves here, facing what was unimaginable ten years ago.

It is overwhelming and exhausting. Over the last several years, we have been trained to lower our expectations, to settle for the lesser evil, to believe that citizenship is a spectator sport. We are disappointed, dissatisfied, and disenfranchised. This is learned helplessness, and it has become the quiet weapon of every corrupt system that fears accountability.

But the truth is simpler and more powerful than that.

We are the nation.

Everything that exists in public life. Every policy, every failure, every triumph. It flows from the moral choices of the citizens who either stand up or stay seated.

Helplessness is not inevitable. It is taught, and it can be unlearned. Each of us carries the capacity to become the stand for something larger than ourselves: our community, our country, our common good. And once enough of us remember that, the tide turns.

This is a call for responsibility. A call to service. Perhaps even a call to adventure – the start of your hero’s journey.

We don’t need permission to rebuild what’s broken. We don’t need to wait for someone else to lead us out. We just need to remember who we are, and act accordingly.

It begins when you stand up again. You won’t be standing alone.

🎥 Watch the video: Against Helplessness: The Call Every Citizen Must Hear

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The Manufactured Enemy