Garden

The music of Laura Mvula - Green Garden, is really cool. Because it is different, some will dismiss it as weird but like life, surprises await us in times of change and risk. For me, this makes me want to go outside to the green garden and go wherever life takes me, despite rain, "nobody out there but it's OK now, bathe in the sunlight, don't mind if the rain falls,"

I feel free from the worries and fears that may have trapped me. I thought I needed new circumstances to feel good again. But it's the other way around, the better I feel, the better my circumstances will become.

"And I'll fly on the wings of a butterfly

high as a tree top and down again

putting my bag down, taking my shoes off

walk in the carpet of green velvet

Dance in my garden like we used to..."

Script

Free will is often debated against fate. Its either or. In Christianity, the Calvinist insistence that salvation is predestined is often debated as free will versus a predetermined outcome.

What if the predestination was only a script or a software program that defines our inclinations, natural preferences and fears. And like any movie script or software code, can be rebooted upgraded and interact?

The key to change is information and understanding which form our habits. A good example is the News. It really did not exist until broadcast systems like radio, TV and periodicals were invented. Its easy to be lazy and believe everything you read hear and see. The message is embedded in information and our understanding is our accepting new input to our personal script/software.

Free will is our personal influence on the script/software. Not the outcome.

Propaganda is a skillfully crafted message that caters to a social status quo. It can be designed or just happen out of habit. In Hong Kong the news is often reported by saying the same thing in an headline, repeated several times until the audience believes the message as the standard. Whether by design or habit propaganda is broadcast.

This kind of message for the masses is used in sermons, the classroom, meetings...  If unchecked can change group behavior. Many still want to do this in education. The ruling classes in Hong Kong believe you can re-educate the youth to avoid future protests.

It is no coincidence that academics whose discipline is to question and evaluate common understanding is seen as dangerous by authority. For the re-program the powerful want to control is challenged by reason and logic.

So there are influences to our personal script/program which we can choose to follow or not. Free will.

Comédie

One of the first cultural changes I encountered was the comedic culture in the US and Britain. Hong Kong used to have one too but it became too sensitive because you could no longer laugh at our rich visitors.

A sense of humor is vital to progress and change because it forces us to face our inherent silly prejudices and habits that exist out of stubborness and to safe guard the powerful. One of the first cultures to frame a sense of irony and humor are the Greeks.

Over 2 thousand years ago when China was busy unifying under our first emperor and India was undergoing a religious revolution in Buddhism, the Greeks were writing philosophical and political treatises as well as performing theater.

So advanced were the forms called tragedy and comedy, they still exist today. I believe the cultures that can embrace humor and honest fun is better. For comedy is a light hearted way to see ourselves and change without condemnation.

This is the best way to improve.

Tragédie

Why not just use the English word tragedy since it looks so much like the French one. But the meaning is different. The French use it more like the "Greek tragedy" as a theatrical style rather than the literal judgment of outcomes the word tragedy often conjures.

For me I have grown so much and faced up to so much personal sewage over the past few years, I have come out feeling the comédie of a satirical look at life. Yet something still felt bad. Misfortune came to define my psyche like a Greek tragedy: where the pride of success causes blind mistakes that causes the dominoes to fall destroying the very fruit of success.

In my case, pride was what I gave up. Yet the dread of tragic outcome still casts shadows in the sunlight. I just realised I just needed to change my definition back to comédie where I learn to poke fun at my life again.

There is power in our definitions.

Toxic

Most times I see the good in people. I've learned cultural flexibility to accommodate many types of people. It always pains me to give up on people or leave. Sometimes I feel like I failed.

When I'm asked to leave relationships I found it easy to accept I'm no good when I'm not welcome. Of course it does hurt. But when I'm welcome by others who are different and new, it's like a blue sky cleared of clouds.

A counselor told me there are toxic relationships. I tend to shy from such harsh words because it feels like I'm condemning someone. But it's about the relationship that needs to end.

I'm learning the truth of this everyday. Some of the best most well meaning people can affect me badly because they don't see how it affects me. And the reason may not be selfishness or anything mean. But it often is about blindness, stubbornness and some obsession other than relationships. It often is placing money above all else.

When any obsession overshadows personal growth and enjoying life with loved ones... It is death in the making. Therefore toxic.

Sometimes miracles happen and people find growing, support through thick and thin. Love. Which is anything but toxic.

Time

It is only in recent history that we are so obsessed with measuring time. We even talk about it as if it existed. Does a millimeter exist? They are all just abstract measurement of something. But unlike the physical measurements, time is about change. If things never change, then time is almost useless.

So isn't it funny that many who are most impatient often do not want change. The calendar, the schedule, the countdown are useful if we were at the Olympics of Life where doing something faster, or arriving on time can mean a gold medal.

Time is also called money. Both are useful but if they define our lives, we are in trouble. It is no wonder that money can be seen as evil if they reduce our humanity. If time is money, our schedules can also be evil if we let them take over.

The difference between a slave and a free person is choice. An addict is just a slave who forgot about freedom.

In my hard journey of late, both money and time became the biggest oppressor. Hurry up and earn your keep. Why is the project taking so long? Many for practical or other reasons have ignored my plight.

Despite the seemingly desperate situation because it seemed to take too much time to make money, I only just began to see focusing on these measurements don't help me to make money fast. Thus the more I say hurry up and get income, the desire itself oppresses.

The main problem is having money and a schedule don't really give us what they promise. Security and life aren't really about lots of resource and activity.

In the years of yearning for a schedule of dependable income, I came to see that it is always about how we treat people. People are our bosses, our clients, our colleagues. Measuring our relationships based on time and money is death.

God did not create time or money. We did. Useful though they are in science and finance, we have let them enslave us so we forgot how to nurture relationships and enjoy deeper engagement with loved ones. Always running away to make money. And abiding by schedule that guarantee things don't change.

If change is so important to keep us entertained, keep life fresh and improve our world, we need to see time and money for what they are. Opportunities. Let's focus on a cry for help, eagerness to learn, yearning for change... for they are the honest opportunities that will make life better for all involved.

Then both time and money begin to flow and we are no longer so bored as to check the clock or the balance sheet, instead of seeing the human gems that are waiting for us to harvest.