Daniel Lubetzky

I was surfing through TIME Magazine’s Top 10 Everything of 2009 list. While many of their choices seem random and uninspired at best, some gems hidden among their finds included their choice of Adam Lambert’s "Mad World" among their top songs. I read the lyrics several times, pasted below, and listened also to the original Tears for Fears performance (also below). 

When I was a kid in San Antonio, Texas, newly arrived from a sheltered upbringing in Mexico City, I enjoyed the song but didn’t relate to it – or understand why it resonated so much among American kids who "had it all." 

In Mexico City, in every corner on popular streets there was an indigent kid begging for alms and struggling to survive, so kids that had a home and a family didn’t generally question their lot.  Why then, would kids who could eat American cereals for breakfast and go to Malibu Grand Prix feel deprived? 

In retrospect, this song hits such a chord with the alienation and loss of meaning that many feel in modern society, primarily in the developed world.  Serious challenges of course are faced every day by struggling kids. But much of it also has to do with the framing of those challenges.  "How bad do I have it relative to the 30,000 children who literally starve to death every day?" 

The search for depth and meaning, and reaffirmation of our special fortune amidst so much wealth and excess, and of our role and duty to find our own way to make this a better world for others, are critical to the health and happiness of future generations.

In very real ways, thinking of others and kinding others (ie, doing conscious acts of kindness for others) gives us meaning and fulfillment.

Mad World lyrics
Songwriters: Orzabal, Roland;

All around me are familiar faces
Worn out places, worn out faces
Bright and early for their daily races
Goin’ nowhere, goin’ nowhere
Their tears are fillin’ up their glasses
No expression, no expression
Hide my head I want to drown my sorrow
No tomorrow, no tomorrow
And I find it kind of funny
I find it kind of sad
The dreams in which I’m dyin’
Are the best I’ve ever had
I find it hard to tell you
‘Cause I find it hard to take
When people run in circles
It’s a very, very
Mad world, mad world
Mad world, mad world
Children waitin’ for the day they feel good
Happy birthday, happy birthday
Made to feel the way that every child should
Sits and listen, sits and listen
Went to school and I was very nervous
No one knew me, no one knew me
Hello teacher tell me what’s my lesson?
Look right through me, look right through me
And I find it kind of funny
I find it kind of sad
The dreams in which I’m dyin’
Are the best I’ve ever had
I find it hard to tell you
‘Cause I find it hard to take
When people run in circles
It’s a very, very
Mad world, mad world
Mad world, mad world
And I find it kind of funny
I find it kind of sad
The dreams in which I’m dyin’
Are the best I’ve ever had
I find it hard to tell you
‘Cause I find it hard to take
When people run in circles
It’s a very, very
Mad world, mad world
Mad world, mad world
A raunchy young world
Mad world
© ROLAND ORZABAL LIMITED;

Jason Alexander often shares with prospective OneVoice supporters that the first thing that drew him to OneVoice was not the creativity, courage or logic of our plans, but the parental empathy he felt when my friend Mohammad Darawshe. 

Mohammad spoke about his efforts to steer his then 9 year-old son Fares away from the commitment to become a Shahid. Back in 2001, Fares had told his Dad that, just like he had met his commitment to make the soccer team, and just like he had met his pledge to score the highest grades in class, he now was committing to achieve martyrdom.  These were heady times, when Israelis and Palestinians were engaged in one of the deepest cycles of violence in their history. Mohammad  took the warning signs seriously.  He more than succeeded in steering Fares towards positive ways to lead his people, and today Fares attends Kings Academy in Jordan and is – like his Dad – one of the brightest hopes that Israelis, Palestinians and internationals have for peace and reconciliation.

This powerful article by Ethan Bronner made me think of Jason’s emotional connection with Mohammad’s plight.  Back then I had no children.  Now I do.  And this piece made me shed more than one tears of hope.

December 31, 2009

A Mideast Bond, Stitched of Pain and Healing

By ETHAN BRONNER, New York Times

JERUSALEM — He can be impulsive. She has a touch of bossiness. Next-door neighbors for nearly a year, they talk, watch television and explore the world together, wandering into each other’s homes without a second thought. She likes his mother’s eggplant dish. He likes her father’s rice and lamb.

Friendship often starts with proximity, but Orel and Marya, both 8, have been thrust together in a way few elsewhere have. Their playground is a hospital corridor. He is an Israeli Jew severely wounded by a Hamas rocket. She is a Palestinian Muslim from Gaza paralyzed by an Israeli missile. Someone forgot to tell them that they are enemies.

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I was really touched by Maureen Dowd’s eulogy column about Abe Pollin.

He follows the tradition of frugal leaders like David Ben-Gurion, and characters from Isaac Bashevis-Singer’s shtetl stories, whose Judaism was about helping those in need.

This is a great little vignette…

Even though some see David Brooks as the token “conservative” columnist for the New York Times, I have always thought he is more of an independent – a rare thought leader who can fairly analyze and criticize protagonists, issues and institutions from right to left, without dogma or ideology but more with thoughtful thinking, depending on the issue.

In this article, he points out that independents don’t tend to have a “home” or platform to advocate for them:

“Liberals and conservatives each have their own intellectual food chains. They have their own think tanks to provide arguments, politicians and pundits to amplify them, and news media outlets to deliver streams of prejudice-affirming stories. Independents, who are the largest group in the electorate, don’t have any of this. They don’t have institutional affiliations. They don’t look to certain activist lobbies for guidance. There aren’t many commentators who come from an independent perspective.”

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I just finished watching Happy-Go-Lucky, directed by Mike Leigh.  Initially I was jarred by the ebullience of the lead character, played with Golden-Globe-winning excellence by Sally Hawkins.  But I stuck through it and discovered a well-executed character study of a woman with an eternally sunny personality (and her impact on others, including an irascible driving instructor solidly played by Eddie Marsan). 

If you think about it, it is pretty rare that we delve into understanding "excessively" positive people, compared to studies of darkness.  Yet the introspection pays off, and really delves nicely and naturally into her philosophy of life, human nature, and social conditioning.

Why do some of us live our lives wanting to be liked by everyone? Is it insecurity (from lack of affection, or from just biological need to be liked)?  Is it a Karmik outlook of life (treat others with warmth and it will come back to you)? Is it our genes? Or our family history or ethnic culture (living in the shadow of the Holocaust)?  Or our upbringing and parental models? Religious teaching? Is it guided by altruism, self-interest, or just being oneself?

And is it a "good" way to live our lives? Can we make this a better world by making others smile? (and doing unexpected acts of kindness for them – or KINDINGS – as KIND is encouraging with KINDED?).  And what drives some people to care so much about others and about making this world better, while others are less so motivated?

Do we yield better people if guided by social awareness and concern or by internal values?

One of my best friends never cares what anyone else thinks about him – and it doesn’t make him any less ethical or upstanding, quite the opposite in his case. He has a solid core of values, does what he feels is right, and doesn’t wonder how society will receive it.  He also doesn’t lose sleep.  But maybe he is a rare case? Certainly there are many examples of people who also do not care about what others may think and who are not role models for society.

Others like me are always wondering how their behavior and actions will be judged by others, very self-aware, introspective, and insecure.  In some ways this insecurity and self-consciousness can be a positive trait that makes us strive to be better and improve.  But it can also increase occasions of grief and worry, and more dangerously for people in positions of power or responsibility (say a politician leading a nation), it can cause them to bend to political/social pressure and potentially reach a wrong but ephemerally popular decision.  And just like in the other strand, there are also examples of self-aware people who may obsess about how others will see them but just put up fake mirrors and end up harming the world no less (think Bernard Madoff).

What is interesting about Poppy, the lead character in Happy-Go-Lucky, is that she is eternally positive and deeply committed to making those around her happier, WITHOUT judging herself or taking herself too seriously.  She is forgiving – of others and of herself.  That is quite interesting. And not as easy to emulate. She seems genuinely interested in healing the world – and in her own way, she quite succeeds at times.

Beyond values and outside impact, as far as our individual journeys in life, it certainly must be the case that having a positive outlook must yield greater happiness and joy in life than seeing life through gray. 

In very deep ways, attitude is destiny.

Alina Tugend wrote a piece last week in the New York Times that I think contains some valuable insights about how to give and receive criticism.

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Here is a project that seems quite powerful:

…a mesmerizing dialogue between teh children of the perpetrators of the Holocaust and the children of the surivors.  Both live out the Holocaust daily, unable to move forward.  Both finally face the past and are empowered to move on.

The trailer video contained here is worth watching.

I’ve always felt the weight on my shoulders from my Dad’s survival of the Dachau concentration camp.  I cannot escape those shadows. It had never crossed my mind that the children of the perpetrators must have similarly been marked and shaped by that experience.  Very poignant, and the trailer seems to confront the issue with depth and introspection.  It includes the story of a marriage between the son of a survivor and the descendant of a major Nazi criminal.

One of entrepreneurs’ and CEOs’ greater challenges is learning the art of contraction.

CEOs and entrepreneurs may feel they can do a task better than their team members because they have more experience.

But then they will never will build the professional potential of their staff, and their organizations will not reach their full potential, limited as they are by the hours of one human being.

Similarly with children, if overbearing parents control the lives of their kids, these are more apt to become meek children living in the shadow of their parents.

Same with Professors and Coaches and Doctors and Lawyers who have apprentices.

Philosophers of religion, when trying to explain why G’d, though all-powerful and omni-present, does not dominate our lives or otherwise prevent all forms of evil, talk about the supreme power of contraction from G’d, to allow free will to reign.  Were G’d not to contract its power, humans would never be able to have self-determination or otherwise do anything.

The power and the talent of contraction is thus vital to all pursuits where you want to build the strength of your team or eco-system.

In reply to my post, Mapping Your Life’s Journey, I got a really interesting email from my friend Jonathan Harris, the cool artist whose work is as fascinating as this note:

There is a centuries-old idea coming from the Hindu tradition, of "The Akashic Record", which is said to be metaphysical plane where all information is stored — every thought, action, interaction, and idea that has ever occurred.  A kind of cosmic filing system. 

There is debate over whether The Akashic Record is already completely written (and we simply follow it, like actors following a script), or whether it gets updated every instant with new information (and free will exists).

It is believed that when we dream, we access the Akashic Record, and that this is why dreams often contain either future prophecies, or seemingly random events from long ago that haven’t been thought of for years (because in the Akashic Record, all things are equally simple to access, like searching on Google, or, perhaps more appropriately to dreams, clicking "random page").

It is also believed that tapping into the Akashic Record is our source of energy, and that this is why our bodies need REM sleep to function (REM sleep being the time we access this record).

Whether you believe in this stuff or not, I agree with Daniel that we are fast approaching a time when our technology will essentially create the Akashic Record for us.  You could say that this will happen in "another dimension", as the meta-layer of aggregate online information could be considered as such.

I am very interested in seeing this happen, and believe that it will (if the world doesn’t end first, that is).

Jonathan

P.S. Apologies to any purely deductive rationalists on this list