Alright, I promised to post up the two competing monologues for viewing and judging by the public. Please comment, and please say who you are. Of all the things I loathe, people who sign anonymously are at the top of the list. If you don't want someone to know who you are either a) don't say it, or b) PUT IT AS A PRIVATE ENTRY IN THR GUESTBOOK. Because quite frankly, I hate trying to guess who said something. You're all driving me insane! But that's a topic for another day... to the monolouges.
Contestant Number 1 - The Age of Dharma
Dear Editor,
I’m 13 years old – only recently. I’m a product of this globalised, consumer-driven, bottom-line focussed, disposable, superficial and lonely society that we have become. I am struggling to define myself in this world where time is a commodity equated to dollars. How much time, or money am I actually wasting now? The answer is probably between too much and far too much. So much and yet so little.
The real question is, what have the 13 years on this planet taught me? I have this paranoia that everyone has figured it out before me, because sometimes I just don’t get it. I don’t get how we are made by God and yet display, too infrequently, the qualities that he has bestowed on us. I don’t get how humans can have the capacity to be so cruel and yet also have the capacity to love with intensity. I don’t get why some people have all the bad luck and others who seem to deserve it, thrive and prosper. I don’t get why there is so much inequality, suffering and ignorance in the world. I don’t get why people can go on calmly with their lives when the future of humanity is at breaking point.
Maybe it’s apathy – the social disease of the 21st century. It’s contagious and I’ve got it – but I’m trying to kick the habit. There’s just too much information. I’m overwhelmed by it. Too many rules, too much hyprocrisy, too many questions, not enough answers. Too much for so few.
I’m frustrated. I feel helpless. What can I do to alleviate the suffering? How can I make my voice heard? How can I make this world a less lonely place? It’s so ironic that whilst technology can bridge the geographic boundaries, our psychic and emotional distance grows wider. I want to do all that I can do breach this. Take a risk! Give a stranger a smile, greet them, be genuine in everything that you say and do. Don’t betray your humanity – if we only live to survive (physically, emotionally or financially), then we will have not lived at all.
--The Age of Dharma
(switch to other side of stage, switch voices)
Dear Age of Dharma,
That is, indeed, one way of looking at things. But saying you are the product of a globalised, consumer-driven, bottom-line focused, disposable, superficial and lonely society, is buying into the propaganda. You are the product of the extremely personal union of two people, however that came about. You are the product of your friends, family, teachers, lovers. Society only becomes impersonal when you allow it to- when you stop looking at the /people/. And that trend, the trend towards seeing patterns and the 'bigger picture' rather than individuals, is exactly what can bring about the problems you're speaking of.
We say that the gulf is growing, that people are growing farther and farther apart- but is that really true? Or is it that technology allows us such an incredible increase in knowledge that we can now see, almost touch, the plight of thousands, millions, while still having a no more than human ability to affect what we see?
Each person has a huge potential to help the world; and while most don't fully realize that potential, it's a rare person who doesn't make the world a better place. And for those of us who are trying? Those who see what needs to be done, who see the need to fight the propaganda, bring love back, end suffering? Some of us will go on to study, change policies, run orphanages, write novels that affect the lives of thousands. But every bit as important are those who stay home and teach; those who refuse to lie silent, who reach out every day to remind the world how life should be, who smile at strangers, hold their friends when they cry, raise children who know what love is and how to inspire it in the world. Who look every day in the face honestly, who show people how to /see/, with every word and gesture. Who don't rail angrily against injustice, but instead fight it, and never allow it to pass unopposed through their lives.
It would be folly to ignore the pain, the cruelty, the ignorance that is most certainly all too prevalent in the world. But to let it overwhelm you is to lose yourself. See the beauty and the courage in those around you, rather than the ignorance and cruelty; nurture the goodness you find, and lead by example away from the diseases of apathy and hypocracy.
I don't think you, at least, are in any danger of not having lived at all. Keep living as beautifully as your post makes me believe you will, and the world will be a better place for your having visited it.
And thank you for reminding me what I'm fighting for.
--The Editor
originally by: Serendipity and Starlin' - edited by: Your Pixie in Residence
***********
Contestant Number Two - The First Step is Knowing You Have A Choice
(spoken by someone else)
"Ladies and Gentlemen, please welcome Father David Graham to the 2002 annual International Social Aid Workers Conference."
(start here)
Good afternoon. It is an incredible honor to be asked to address this conference - I can remember many years of sitting out there, on those horrible chairs, looking for the insights other people have brought from their work, so that I could take them back and perhaps make that crucial difference in just one more life.
Those of us working with inner city kids know that we have two big stumbling blocks to making a difference: They have to want to change before we can even start, and when we do manage to get them climbing up, 9 times out of ten they slide back down. Our keynote speaker today, Dr. Tokawa, has written several excellent books on the first problem, and I look forward to sitting out there tonight and taking notes. I would like to share with you some of the ways I have found to help deal with the second problem, and discuss some of the philosophy behind my methods.
Life is about choices, and common wisdom holds that some of them are harder than others. I've always disliked that concept, but was unable to find a good way to articulate my problem with it, until a few years ago when a friend of mine who works at AADAC was speaking to a group of alcoholics. He told them 'you have to choose to quit drinking - and you have to make that choice every time you want one.' Since that time, I've been using a lot of the AADAC material in my general work - leaving aside for a moment that inner city work has to deal with a lot of substance abuse - it has been a key insight for me to realize that its the same behaviour patterns that are affecting some of these kids, and in many cases I've been able to stop or slow the slide by treating the street like an addiction. A lot of these kids want a job, or a good pad, or an education, but never try, because there is just too much that needs to change, so they change nothing.
Part of the problem is convincing these kids that the choice *IS* their own, and making them believe that. As a priest, I spend half of my time breaking down the barriers that these kids have set up, because of what they think I'll say or do, or what they've been told I'll require. I'll let you in on a little secret, if you promise not to tell the Bishop. I don't care if these kids go to church, as long as they get off the street. In fact, I'll go a step further - and this probably will get me in trouble - I don't care if these kids get off the street, as long as they know they can.
I try and teach them that the big things are just little things, all strung together. Getting a job isn't a matter of deciding "I want a job" - it's deciding to make a resume, and deciding to shower and shave, and drop it off in person. Deciding to get up in the morning. Deciding to accept something resembling authority. And each of these isn't just one step, they're all little steps strung together. Just like an alcoholic gets up in the morning and decides to drink juice or coffee instead of whiskey, or go straight home instead of straight to the bar. Little things, that are just like the little things that put them in the hole in the first place. None of these kids woke up and decided "I want to be a junkie living on the street" - but a string of littler choices all taken together put them there. Just like a string of littler choices can take them out. Not that making the choices smaller makes them easy - "I'm not going to have this drink" might be smaller than "I'm going to get off the street", but that doesn't mean it's an easy choice. But it's one choice, here and now, instead of a whole lifetime of choices, here and now.
It's also important to recognize and celebrate the little successes, without expecting too much, too fast. Each time a junkie decides not to shoot up is a victory, even if he's still a junkie. One of my favorite success stories is a kid I was working with in Seattle, several years ago. He was a heavy drug user living on the street when I started working with him, and a drug user living on the street when he stopped coming in. Before he stopped coming, he said "Dave, I still do drugs, and I probably always will. But before I do, each and every single time, I think 'Do I need to do this?' and the answer is usually 'No, but I'm choosing to.' - but sometimes the answer is 'No, and I'm choosing not to.'" Last year I got a letter from him, and he wrote "Dave, I still do drugs, and I probably always will. But before I do, each and every single time, I think 'Do I need to do this?' and the answer is usually 'No, and I'm choosing not to.' I wanted to write and tell you that. I also want you to know that one of the guys in my gang has started saying 'No, but I'm choosing to.'" AADAC teaches that the first step is admitting you have a problem. I like to teach that the first step is knowing you have a choice.
I believe strongly that I can offer, and guide, and teach, but not compel. The hardest part of teaching these kids that the choice is theirs is accepting that I won't always like what they do with it.
originally by: James (Shades) Brown
***********
Okay, go vote. Let your voice be heard. Thanks!!
