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''' THESE BRUTALIZING
TIMES '''
ON THE WORLD STUDENTS SOCIETY - the exclusive and eternal ownership of every student in the world - millions of students the world over are struggling, with how to remain sane in these brutalizing times. I have no easy answers.
IN PROUD PAKISTAN : I get overwhelmed and mobbed by people and students and protesters and parents demanding vision and answers and prayers. '' We're living in brutalizing times, '' I say to them, quoting David Brooks.
MANY YEARS AGO, in my penchant for philosophy, I spoke over and over again to the esteemed Global Founder Framers of !WOW! of what awaits them. Engineer and Founder Syed Hussain Ali remembers and recalls all those happenings and moments.
Scenes of mass savagery pervade the media. Humans have become vicious toward one another amid our disagreements.
Everywhere I go, and everything I read and encounter people are coping and losing against an avalanche of negative emotions : shock, contempt, pain, anger, anxiety, fear, hopelessness and helplessness.
HUMANITY is faced with even more fatal and existential challenges. Along with the Israeli and Palestinian War, Kashmir is sizzling with emotions.
In times ahead, two nuclear states will sword fence at the precipice. The only hope for Mankind is The World Students Society, -led by the students of America.
The question for these times is how to stay mentally healthy and spiritually whole in this armageddon unfolding? How do you prevent yourself from being embittered, hate-filled, calloused over, suspicious and desensitized?
Ancient wisdom has a formula to help us, which you might call skepticism of the head and audacity of the heart.
The ancient Greeks knew about violent times. They lived with frequent wars between city-states, with massacres and mass rape. In response, they adopted a tragic sensibility. This sensibility begins with the awareness that the crust of civilization is thin.
Breakdowns into barbarism are the historic norm. Don't fool yourself into believing that you're living in some modern age, too enlightened for hatred to take over.
In these circumstances everybody has a choice. You can try to avoid thinking about the dark realities of life and naively wish that bad things won't happen. Or you can confront these realities and develop a tragic mentality to help you thrive among them.
As Ralph Waldo Emerson would write centuries later, '' Great men, great nations have not been boasters and buffoons, but perceivers of the terror of life, and have manned themselves to face it.'' And that goes for great women, too.
This tragic sensibility prepares you for the rigors of life in concrete ways. First, it teaches a sense of humility. The tragedies that populated Greek stages sent the message that our accomplishments were tenuous.
They remind us that it's easy to become proud and conceited in moments of peace. We begin to exaggerate our ability to control our destinies.
We begin to assume that the so-called justice of our cause guarantees our success. Humility is not thinking lowly of yourself : it's an accurate perception of yourself. It's the ability to cast aside illusions and vanities and see life as it really is.
Second, the tragic sensibility nurtures a prudent approach to life. It encourages people to focus on the downsides of their actions and work to head them off.
As Hal Brands and Charles Edel write in '' The Lessons of Tragedy, '' Greek tragedies were part of a wide culture that forced the Greeks to confront their own '' frailty and fallibility. ''
By '' shocking, unsettling and disturbing the audience, the tragedies also forced discussions of what was needed to circumvent such a fate.'' In this way, people are taught resilience and anti-fragility - to be prepared for the pain that will inevitably come.
Third, this tragic mentality encourages caution. As Thucydides would argue, in politics, the lows are lower than the highs are high. The price we pay for our errors is higher than the benefits we gain from our successes.
So be careful of rushing into maximalist action, convinced of your righteousness. Be incremental and patient and steady.
This is advice I wish the Israelis would heed as they wage war. This is the advice that Matt Gaetz and burn-it-all down caucus among the House Republicans will never understand.
Fourth, the tragic mentality teaches people to be suspicious of their own rage. The lesson is that rage might feel luxurious because it makes you convinced of your own rightness, but ultimately it blinds you and turns you into a hate-filled monster.
The Honour and Serving of great writings, continues. The World Students Society thanks author David Brooks.
With respectful dedication to Mankind, the esteemed Global Founder Framers of The World Students Society, and then Students, Professors and Teachers of the world.
See You all prepare for Great Global Elections on The World Students Society : wssciw.blogspot.com and Twitter X !E-WOW! - The Ecosystem 2011 :
Good Night and God Bless
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