Damn the Beavers

So, I'm out walking this morning, and pick up a Wall Street Journal, as is my habit, and there on the front page is an article about how we're shooting ourselves in the foot with corn-based ethanol. One of the points of the article was that the net effect is raised food prices for the masses of poor, who, of course, can least afford it.

And a concept that has been bubbling in my mind for a while surfaces, and I start the day's pondering.

On Fairness.

And how life isn't. But how it is an expectation with which we've been brainwashed, and by which we live.

They lied to us, as children. A lot. And I don't think it was helpful. They would have done better to tell us the harsh truth, about how life works. To warn us of the potholes of life, and how unforgiving they can be. So we could learn to respect those potholes, and not loiter near them, carelessly, flirting with danger.

The mass media infuse us with misinformation, ever streaming to us data that suits their purposes, not reality. Idyllic life. Perfect bodies. Everyone smiling and blissful in a white picket fence setting. Abundance. Harmony.

Hardship, and the drama that goes with it, is for entertainment, ratings. But REAL people, the person YOU should aspire to be, are in the commercials, and joyously successful in every respect. And, I might add, with little effort. It just is. Don't think about it.

Maybe I'm a slow learner, or stupid, but it took me a long time in life to realize that the Beavers were a fantasy. And Ozzie and Harriet. And the Bradys. That nobody's family was truly like that, least of all a blended one. And don't even get me started on My Three Sons with Katie and triplet babies living with her single father-in-law and his uncle, perfectly, while her husband attended college. That every conflict could be neatly resolved without resentment by just the right simple wisdom from a totally sync-ed-in parent in a two-minute talk. That real intimacy wasn't needed - only pre-packaged triteness, clothed in way-above-average WASP-ish looks.

But Darwin was much closer to the truth, about our species, our reality. We are a dark and selfish race, looking out for number one, even on a mass or corporate or national level.

Life isn't like a set of justice scales, where things are evenly balanced, and if you screw up on one end, you need only balance just the same amount on the other end to re-equilibrate.

Quite the contrary. Life is built more on a snowball system, if you're a cartoon. An activation energy system, if you're a chemist. A static coefficient of friction system, if you're a physicist. There are thresholds that, when crossed, take quanta more reparation than the energy first used to cross them. Emotionally. Financially. Socially. Legally.

And in the smallest ways, too.

For example, a few months ago I was filling a prescription. Because of the cost, I asked for ten instead of thirty, as it was out-of-pocket expense for me. I thought this would save me money. But when I paid, the ten cost nearly as much as thirty, because they jacked up the price per unit due to buying an odd amount. This, on top of the fact that medical services are much more expensive to those that self-pay, because we do not get group pricing, even if we pay cash-on-the-spot for services rendered and the medical services providers pay virtually no administrative costs to spend months chasing their money through an insurance company. And those that can least afford it pay the most. It's not fair... it's Darwinian.

Let's look at credit cards. A single late payment can send one into a whole different stratum of interest rates and fees. Hell, a late payment on an unrelated utility bill can send one's credit card into a whole different stratum of interest rates and fees. And they are severely punitive. Once one falls into that hole, it is very difficult to climb out. The interest and fees snowball and add to each other until hopeless debt is accumulated. And those that can least afford it pay the most. It's not fair... it's Darwinian.

Let's look at trust, and the addict. Through the course of their addiction, they lost the trust of those in their lives (the sober ones, at least). They breached a threshold that caused irreparable damage. Never will their word hold the same integrity, even after years of correction. And well into correction, a single lapse can crumble a base of rebuilt trust, back to nearly ground level, in a moment. Once burned, twice shy. Not: once burned, healed, burn me again and I'll heal again, ad infinitum. Much more like: three strikes and you're OUT.

So the addict has to work harder, for the same trust, once on the other side of the threshold. It seems their descent into the pit may have been a roll down a steep incline, but their climb out is the vertical face all the way. And when they hit sobriety with earnestness, all the damage comes home to roost, in their face, right at the time when trust is most expensive, and everything else is jacked up in "cost," too. It's a harsh reality, but doesn't budge. I don't know if it's fair, or not, but it is Darwinian.

So I know I sound all somber, and bleak, but really I'm not. I'm just thinking, out loud, about a concept that we were robbed of, as children.

That concept is important for us to learn as adults, even now.

The concept is that the set-up of expectations is key.

If you set up your expectations well, you will be better able to manage them down the line. I know, I know, the rooms say we are not to have expectations. Well, sorry, that's like perfect adherence. Never gonna happen. Let's work in reality-based thinking. We ARE gonna have expectations. So, let's learn to set them up and manage them the best we can.

Expectations gone awry are the root of many an addiction, many a codependent behavior, many a dysfunctional/unhappy person. How many times have you heard the storyline in the rooms of "I was self-medicating to ease the pain" - as though it's an entitlement that we should feel no pain? Classic expectation we have been brainwashed with through the media: Life should be easy, and painless, and if it's not, there's something drastically wrong with me.

Expectations gone awry lead to the illusion of entitlements. And when entitlements are not fulfilled, this provides excuses for thinking, behaviors, and actions that are not aligned with reality. It's like trying to build a structure on top of a spherical foundation rather than a cubic one. It's one big wobble, if the expectation is wrong, and doomed to disaster.

Maybe it's semantics. Maybe expectations are those goals that are not reality-based, but rather fantasy-based. Maybe the adjustment is to make sure we build goals, and not expectations.

Now, don't think I'm gonna tell you how to do this. Figure it out. You have it within you. Thing is, it takes active mode, in your mind, not passive.

But that's a whole other post...

-The Traveler