The wisdom in this is deceptive in its simplicity. Speaking our anger openly, examining it in the light rather than letting it fester in silence, transforms it from fuel for resentment into something we can actually work with. The mountain image works perfectly for this teaching - clarity requires elevation above the storm of emotion.
This is a very challenging piece! it's difficult to reconcile this with ignoring what others say about you.
I had a situation recently where someone said some really mean things about me in a meeting where I wasn't present. It was clearly said out of anger and frustration, and not based in any evidence.
In that same group of people, I had always defended this person when he wasn't there.
So I called him on the phone and frankly discussed the matter. And after the call I felt better, but the betrayal still stings and bugs the shit out of me.
The defining conflict of our era runs deeper than parties, nations, ideologies, or social classes. It is a psychological struggle between two states of mind: one conditioned into authoritarian submission and system-justifying beliefs, and another—still emerging—that sees concentrated, unaccountable power for what it is and refuses to grant it legitimacy.
The UDHR can be read as a shared floor for civilization: a minimum below which no person, anywhere, may be pushed if rule is to count as legitimate at all. It encodes basic protections for food, housing, healthcare, education, social security, freedom from torture and degrading treatment, freedom from arbitrary detention and disappearance, and protection from targeted persecution in the name of growth, security, development, or national interest.
It also sets a limit on self-enrichment. No individual, corporation, or state can credibly claim legitimacy for wealth or power built on practices that systematically push people below that floor—through war, debt, ecological devastation, or economic policy.
The UDHR is therefore a measuring device for aligning local and global action around that floor and evaluating institutions, laws, and fortunes against it. It links civil and political rights to economic and social rights as a single operating system for keeping human life above the baseline threshold.
The wisdom in this is deceptive in its simplicity. Speaking our anger openly, examining it in the light rather than letting it fester in silence, transforms it from fuel for resentment into something we can actually work with. The mountain image works perfectly for this teaching - clarity requires elevation above the storm of emotion.
This is a very challenging piece! it's difficult to reconcile this with ignoring what others say about you.
I had a situation recently where someone said some really mean things about me in a meeting where I wasn't present. It was clearly said out of anger and frustration, and not based in any evidence.
In that same group of people, I had always defended this person when he wasn't there.
So I called him on the phone and frankly discussed the matter. And after the call I felt better, but the betrayal still stings and bugs the shit out of me.
Great post, courageous conversations are so hard. I pick and choose when to have them fortunately/unfortunately.
The defining conflict of our era runs deeper than parties, nations, ideologies, or social classes. It is a psychological struggle between two states of mind: one conditioned into authoritarian submission and system-justifying beliefs, and another—still emerging—that sees concentrated, unaccountable power for what it is and refuses to grant it legitimacy.
The UDHR can be read as a shared floor for civilization: a minimum below which no person, anywhere, may be pushed if rule is to count as legitimate at all. It encodes basic protections for food, housing, healthcare, education, social security, freedom from torture and degrading treatment, freedom from arbitrary detention and disappearance, and protection from targeted persecution in the name of growth, security, development, or national interest.
It also sets a limit on self-enrichment. No individual, corporation, or state can credibly claim legitimacy for wealth or power built on practices that systematically push people below that floor—through war, debt, ecological devastation, or economic policy.
The UDHR is therefore a measuring device for aligning local and global action around that floor and evaluating institutions, laws, and fortunes against it. It links civil and political rights to economic and social rights as a single operating system for keeping human life above the baseline threshold.
Great post! Strikes a deep chord inside of me, thank you! 🙏🏻