✡ What is it with people and being ok with mediocrity? I look all around me and I hear people accepting what they see in front of them as good enough! This is not some rant about national issues or even pot holes in the road. I am talking about the way people treat each other in interpersonal relationships.
It would seem that we have become so attached to psychobabel we have forgotten that behind buzz words and jargon there are real people doing some really fucked up things to each other! But instead of putting a foot down and saying, “wow this is fucked up, I am not going to let this happen to me anymore,” people seems to say, “eh, as if I can do better, it isn’t so bad.” Worse yet, people blindly accept platitudes with zero perspicacity.
I am certain there are some parents that sit there and think to themselves that they are so happy their kid grew up to be mediocre, because at least he isn’t in jail. That, may indeed be the case, he may be lucky he isn’t in jail. I am the first to admit that the inequality in society gives us each a somewhat relative sense of achievement. Or to put it bluntly, you have a messed up childhood and you managed to go to school, get a job, and eek out a living? That can be a HUGE and respectable achievement under your circumstances. I get it. I respect it.
That said, I am thankful that the parents I have were some what engaged enough to raise me to want the stars and figure out how to get them – even as I watched both of them do some pretty mediocre things. As my father points out, he taught me sometimes by negative example.
Indeed we have the reverse as well. The guy who is a zero but thinks he is ‘all that’ and deserves the stars but hasn’t made one iota of effort to get them.
We can all think of people we know who are in either state and more to the point: we can think of times when we ourselves are in either state.
The new year is coming, it is time for reflection on the year past and the year next. I challenge you to think about how you fall into either states throughout your life and to become more humble when you are the winner and more driven when you are the looser.