The id Post: The Haves and Have-nots: Everybody Doesn’t Want or...

The id Post: The Haves and Have-nots: Everybody Doesn’t Want or...: What ever happened to the fanfare for the every-day worker? As our nation’s Capitol becomes a whirlwind of vitriol and name-calling, I r...

The Haves and Have-nots: Everybody Doesn’t Want or Need to Be An Entrepreneur

What ever happened to the fanfare for the every-day worker? As our nation’s Capitol becomes a whirlwind of vitriol and name-calling, I recall the music of Aaron Copeland and his Fanfare for the Common Man; and wonder why the common laborer has been abandoned. Meanwhile, here in the land of the free and the home of the brave, the poor continue to get poorer and the rich continue to get richer. The poor are free to scrap for the crumbs left them after the vulture capitalists have come and gone; and they have courage beyond measure to struggle with daily food insecurity, often with families to feed. And the rich are free to keep writing the rules that sustain this disparity, and possess all the bravery it takes, not to mention the money of course, to buy as many politicians as possible.

How did we get here? Again? The lessons learned in the early 20^th century have long been forgotten it seems, in this new one. Since concern over wealth disparity is often mistaken for envy and memories of unfulfilled dreams, I offer this preface: Having long ago exceeded expectations for a poor Mexican girl growing up in the middle of nowhere in the Arizona desert dust, I envy no one; for my life is enriching already, and often in ways beyond simple measure.

However, the messages delivered to most Americans on a daily basis is one of failure without this particular car, or life insurance plan, or fancy beer or outrageously priced clothes or décor. It is the steady barrage of an aggressive marketplace, always telling us how not enough we are if we don’t have money. And everybody with something to sell wants in on it, especially a market-driven news media, as if that makes any sense in a true democracy, that races to bring us footage of our very own race to the bottom – of everything beautiful and free.

We have now been conditioned to respect and revere those with the most money because that must mean that they are the best people, even though this is exactly the opposite of what is written in most western scripture. Take for example, the TV show, Undercover Boss. Whenever major networks claim to reveal the “reality” of being the boss of a major corporation to the ‘little people,’ I grow profoundly suspicious; but I tried to keep an open mind.

In the particular episode I watched, the CEO of a major airline was being profiled. He was a nice white Catholic man who lived in a great big mansion, complete with an indoor basketball court, and had a whole bunch of kids who all went to private school. When he was working side by side with the people who do the heavy lifting for his airline, of course he was all thumbs. That’s what people want to see, right? The boss making a fool of himself? We all find this very cute and somewhat empowering for the workers, not to mention humbling for the boss.

Prior to this occasion, the boss had no idea how working split shifts and taking on more than one of the major tasks that need to be done because there aren’t enough employees, makes the lives of the workers that much harder. Until he spoke with them, he had no idea how many of them had to work other jobs just to put food on their tables. Moreover, he learned of the hardship that a recent 10% cut in pay had brought to their families, who were already living paycheck to paycheck. So, the answer was to donate some money to charity and to restore the 10% cut within the next three years. Wow! How generous.

Perhaps what a lot of people saw was a good man who was becoming more aware of his employees and their working conditions. Great. Perhaps they also viewed the eventual restoration of a lost pay-rate to be a generous move, even though the workers will still lose purchasing power every year. What I saw was a man who was asking his employees to suffer in order to subsidize his lifestyle, and who was unabashed in asking them to sacrifice, while not noticing that perhaps he could do with less much easier than they could. I understand that everybody does not perform tasks that are as highly valued in our labor market, and that those who invest and risk at a greater level, should be rewarded at a higher rate. I don’t think the new guy in the mail room should make as much as the chairman of the board. But I do think that the new guy in the mail room should not have to work 2 or 3 jobs in order to subsidize his boss’ indoor basketball court.

In many ways and for many years, more and more of the daily financial risks have shifted from being assumed by corporate management to being assumed by the employee. Similarly corporate interests have also shifted their risks, not only to their employees, but to their consumers as well. So we have gone from defined benefit retirement plans to 401ks; from manufacturer and/or owner/occupier liability to mandatory arbitration agreements, most of which nobody reads. All of this means that corporations and those who run them, have decreased their liability and in so doing, have increased their wealth. Additionally, the benefits of our latest economic recovery have overwhelmingly gone to the top 1% of the wealthiest wealthy.

This is not sustainable for a number of reasons. First of all, people are starting to wake up and get pissed off, and if they ever unite, a true people’s revolution here in America could make storming the bastille look like a walk in the park. But even before that happens, markets cannot be sustained by the wealthy alone. Without a middle-class with the means necessary to purchase goods and services, there will be no demand and, hence, no market. This is where we are now, and the situation is made worse by the congressional dog and pony shows of late.

I remember when I was in grammar school, one of my teachers explained the difference in incomes and lifestyles this way: Some people have an entrepreneurial spirit and are somewhat more risk averse than others. So, if this person started a business, having invested the time, effort and capital in the business, then he should be paid a higher salary than his workers. However, if there was not enough to pay himself and the workers, then he had to pay the workers first, because he had to honor his commitments to them. And when there was a surplus, because he took the greatest risk, he was not obligated to share the surplus, and was free to spend it in any manner without question.

On the other hand, my teacher went on, some people don’t like taking risks and prefer a steady paycheck and a safe retirement. And so, this person would get a job, remain a loyal employee whose sustained efforts contributed to the company profit, and when it was time to retire, there would be a nice, comfortable pension in place to sustain the worker and keep him or her from falling into poverty. The key to this model was loyalty – the loyalty of both parties to one another, in which each was able to see to the needs of the other. The worker was loyal to the company and the company was loyal to the worker.

We don’t have that anymore. Conservatives may blame unions for this, although it was the labor movement that created the scenario my teacher spoke of; but I blame congress for everything. And in blaming congress, I blame us, because we were too busy buying on credit to notice that our American way of life -- the one that took decades to build jointly -- was being purchased right out from under us. And we kept electing people who are no longer available to listen to us because they cannot hear us when they are tucked into the pockets of the 1%, et al.

 

The id Post: Another Month, Another Shooting: It’s Time to Stop...

The id Post: Another Month, Another Shooting: It’s Time to Stop...: by M. Irene Daniel Before I record another syllable, I want to start this commentary by expressing my condolences and prayers for thos...

Another Month, Another Shooting: It’s Time to Stop Neglecting Mental Wellness in America

by M. Irene Daniel

Before I record another syllable, I want to start this commentary by expressing my condolences and prayers for those murdered, and especially to their families. I cannot imagine the shock, horror and sadness, not to mention bewilderment. We are all bewildered when someone, perhaps somebody we know, goes to work one morning and never comes home again. We all feel for these grieving families, and we all want to ask why.

Why, why, why? One more time, we witness a bloody massacre at the hands of someone who was, at best troubled, and at worst just flat-out psychotic. The immediate answer for many is to pass legislation that restricts access to certain firearms and big magazines. Perhaps this would reduce body counts and overall damage. But would it change hearts?

And then the counter-attack comes with an angry retort about 2^nd amendment rights and big, bad government. Even more profound is the argument that guns offer protection against “the bad guys,” the “monsters” with guns. To these proponents, arming everyone is the answer.

And then there is the aspect of mental and emotional health, or lack thereof, that is sometimes awkwardly discussed, but because of medical privacy issues, never approaches a sound resolution as to the balance of privacy and public safety concerns. I admit, it’s a tough issue, fraught with constitutional, as well as moral issues. In speaking of morality, I demonize no one, but I wonder over and over again why these discussions offer only incomplete, if any, real remedies.

In all of these discussions, there seems to be a voyeuristic curiosity about the perpetrator of these mass killings. Who was he? What were the warning signs? Were there any? However, aside from the immediate juicy chatter, there is little discussion about what can be done to create less “monsters.” The gun was the tool used by this monster, who was once a very cute little baby; but other tools have been used to kill lots of people.  While less often and with less effectiveness, no matter the weapon, what ends in bloodshed and death, begins as a mere thought in someone’s head.

I know that we all care about the victims -- and their well-being and protection must be our primary concern. But we never seem to really care even a fraction as much about the murderer. We throw him to the dung heap because that is where monsters belong, right? While I understand the sentiment, and can’t say I wouldn’t feel the same if someone I loved was murdered in this manner, nevertheless,  the more we refuse to invest any effort in trying to understand these deeply disturbed and gravely ill individuals, the more these incidents will persist.

I don’t know if there is a disease or evil in our country, but I do know that these people who snap somewhere and move on to mass murderer didn’t get that way overnight. How can we not recognize their illness, their dis-ease with themselves and the world around them? Is there no curiosity as to how somebody went, in 2 or 3 decades, from being a cute little toddler to a mass murderer?

How about, instead of arming good guys with guns to deal with bad guys with guns, we put some focus and some effort in creating less bad guys? This actually seems a much more plausible and effective solution than invading the privacy of those seeking mental wellness, or starting a war over domestic disarmament. While reasonable gun restrictions should be pursued, investigating, and especially educating the public about, mental health issues and how they become enlarged and unmanageable when untreated, would be, in my opinion, a much more effective alternative.

This brings us face-to-face with an incredible, yet not insurmountable image problem. For far, far, far too long, we have demeaned and stigmatized mental disease and defect, and ostracized those who suffered therefrom. This means, of course, that those of us who need treatment are reluctant to seek it because we are afraid of losing our jobs, friends, support, and on and on. We fear our lives and we fear treatment. That leaves us in our own self-made no-man’s-land. For those suffering from serious depression, the world is a dark and ugly place. We don’t care about others because we don’t care about ourselves. I know. I’ve been there. We isolate and ruminate. And if we have a gun handy, who knows where that darkness can lead?

What is required is a paradigm shift in how we focus on mental wellness, before it festers into mental dis-ease. Mental wellness is more than going to see a shrink, which most Americans are loathe to do, when you feel down. While, therapy is one part of mental wellness, it remains a treatment, an adjustment, and not a permanent way of life for most of us. What if therapy became less necessary to get well because we never got that ill in the first place? What if we learned how to attain and maintain our own emotional and mental wellness with skills and tools learned from sustained practice – like brushing our teeth and flossing? Preventive mental health, anyone?

Keep dreaming, you say? It’s not a dream. It is happening all over the globe. For some, it involves mindfulness training, which teaches us how to examine our thoughts before acting on them, and perhaps preventing a downward spiral into depression. For some, it is a combination of mental and physical exercise, like yoga or martial arts. Meditation, prayer, chanting. These are all tools that can be learned and used to maintain a sense of awareness of the present moment and our relationship to it; and keep our thoughts from taking us to places that we don’t want to go. Moreover, this sense of mental wellness creates a greater sense of connectedness with our fellows, and helps us to understand how our words and deeds impact them.

Mental dis-ease is a very serious issue that we must have the courage to face head-on. I know first-hand how deadly it can be, and the long-term effects it can have on families. There are mental health issues on both sides of my family and I have inherited the dis-ease of my mother and grandmother, who killed herself with rat poison at the age of 52 in the throws of menopause. I am named after her, but she died before I was born, so I never met her – this woman who was too ill to travel further in her darkness, and who passed her fears and loathings on to my mother, who passed them on to me.

I used to be ashamed of both of them. I knew about my grandmother’s suicide and I always knew that there was something amiss about my mom. She never sought treatment. They just didn’t do it back then. I was always afraid someone would find out about my crazy family, but right now I am neither ashamed, nor proud. I just am. And I am finally learning that just being me is enough.

Emotionally and mentally sound and happy people, who are satisfied with themselves, are less likely to murder others. Isn’t that a goal worthy of American investment? Creating an environment of awareness, an awareness that includes us all? I hope so, before it’s too late, before these mass murders become commonplace, as it appears the daily murders with smaller body counts already have.

It starts in the mind. This is the truth for all of us. I believe it is easier to encourage mindfulness and to teach it to our children, than it is to keep cleaning up the blood and dressing up for the funerals. And now I know that I am not alone. I could no longer live without meditating now, any more than I could jump off a building and fly.

Come join us. It starts with mindfulness.

 

________________________

For more info on mindfulness meditation go to:  http://www.mindfulnessprograms.com/mindful-healing-series.html.

Or just google mindfulness.

The id Post: Reflections on a Summer of Remembering, and this A...

The id Post: Reflections on a Summer of Remembering, and this A...: I took some time off this month, from blogging and other things. I celebrated another birthday and witnessed my son and grandson celebra...

Reflections on a Summer of Remembering, and this Autumn of Falling Forward

I took some time off this month, from blogging and other things. I celebrated another birthday and witnessed my son and grandson celebrating another year of living.  I cleaned out the spare room in my home, reliving and organizing old family photos, documents and other memorabilia. And throughout the summer I have been reflecting upon all that has happened in my lifetime; and especially how the America I grew up in has changed in the last 50 years or so.

As I watched the commemorations of the March on Washington in 1963, I remember watching it on TV with my family when I was 7 years old. I really missed my mom these past few weeks because we would have been camped out in the front of the TV together, as we have done as a family so many times before. Through celebrations, assassinations, funerals, national conventions and demonstrations, we always shared those moments together: my mom and my two older brothers and me. This year I watched them alone and thought about how much equal rights for all, including the LGBT community, had meant to my mom throughout her life; having grown up in a segregated Ajo, AZ.

I was glad to see so much attention revisited upon how really bad it was before the mid-1960s for all people of color, but especially African-Americans. And even though you can no longer legally discriminate against them, the racial and social accomplishments of the last 50 years are often trumpeted in a manner that drowns out the truth of the still remaining economic injustice and inequality. The wealth gap between black and white grows wider, with Latinos not fairing too much better.

Dr. King’s message was never solely about race, but about legally permitting the demeaning exploitation of others -- for any reason. The color of one’s skin only made exploitation that much easier. And this exploitation manifests itself most viciously and effectively in the manner in which we devalue “the other,” and permit the powerful to discount the labor and the lives of those who are “less than;” the poor, the sick, the “colored.” King’s message was one of exasperation with this vulgar exploitation of his people in the land of freedom for all.

As Labor Day came and went, I lamented the plight of the working stiff with no time or resources to “get ahead” because they are already working 2 jobs and still can’t keep up with expenses. As the daughter of a union copper miner, I am encouraged and inspired by the new voices of labor, those who labor in low-paying jobs at fast-food joints and Walmart; with no benefits and little opportunity for advancement and who are letting their grievances be known. They are the inheritors of the raping and pillaging of the American middle class that has been going on for the last 30 years; since the Reagan Revolution of the glorification of greed. This is where the road to union-busting leads; not the Utopian fantasy of Ayn Rand.

And, as the anniversary of 9/11 came again with all its memories of sadness as well as inspiration, I felt how deeply I missed my mother this summer; more than I knew was possible. Last summer I was too numb to feel anything, but this year I was once again alive enough to feel the loss, and her absence surrounded me more profoundly than I could ever have imagined. Somehow, I don’t know what to do with myself if I’m not driving across the desert every several weeks to visit her, or bringing her back here to stay with me on holidays, and driving her back home again. She used to make that trip by herself on the Greyhound bus, but it had long ago become too dangerous, and her physical capacities too slow and weak to entrust this public manner of transportation. Once, I flew over here with her, because she was always too afraid to fly. I realize now how much our lives revolved around each other, and how empty my time and space are now.

I have plenty to do, but seem paralyzed most days. I do what I can and it never feels like enough, especially on days when I am fatigued, lonely and lost. It almost seems that the space in my life occupied by her – her paranoia, her needs, her company – is sacred somehow. I remember one day a couple of years ago as I was driving home to see my mom, when a thought popped into my head that acknowledged all the time I had spent on the I-10 freeway going back and forth to see my mom to take her shopping, or to a movie or to see an old friend or relative. I wondered what I would be doing with myself otherwise. Now I know.

Last summer, and all last year essentially, was just a void for me. It is as though I was sleep-walking. This summer has been one of remembering, as well as preparing to move on. My grief for my mother is not gone, nor will it ever be. I can feel her presence sometimes. I can hear her laughing and talking to my grandmother, who I never met but still know deeply and am so honored to carry her name – Irene.

And I hear them both telling me that it is time to get back to work and time to get a new housekeeper because I can. I can hear my Nana’s heavy sigh of lament, watching me doing some strenuous cleaning, it’s as if she is saying that she scrubbed a lot of floors and washed and ironed a lot of other people’s clothes so that, maybe one day, her descendants wouldn’t have to work at such back-breaking tasks. While I know that it has been good for me physically and emotionally, I know that they are right. And I am ready now, to fall forward.

I fall forward into myriad administrative matters that need tending to; into once again putting myself out there, personally and professionally; into reaching out and reconnecting; and most of all, into writing, writing, writing.

The id Post: I am Made of Syllables, not Words

The id Post: I am Made of Syllables, not Words: I am made of syllables                 Not words I am made of sounds                 Some yet unheard   I conjur up new ...

I am Made of Syllables, not Words

I am made of syllables

                Not words

I am made of sounds

                Some yet unheard

 

I conjur up new verbage

                And order sounds about

Sometimes I add music

                Sometimes, I can’t work it out

 

For who am I without words

                Old and new

What have I to offer

                What am I to do

 

Before I was a mother

                Before I learned the laws

Words were my first addiction

                And disguised many flaws

 

And now they are my comfort

                My life-long inner soul

I read, I write to my heart’s delight

                Those syllables of gold