Nonviolent Protesting

[apache_blanca]

Originally Posted by Aquaplant

I apologize for letting my anger get the better of me. I've been having some serious emotional stress lately, so I'm not exactly on my best side these days.

Your apologies are accepted. Truth be told, I got pretty **** up about this latest "exchange" to call it politely but decided to let time run its course, & come back & look at the things impartially

Let me clarify a bit what I'm talking about:
Attitude doesn't make one bulletproof, protect from rape and so on. The physical world is cruel, and those who master and command it, always have the final say, regardless of how you might think about all of it.

This is true! If someone shoots you - you die! But, if you survive, attitude can help how to deal with the emotional scars later on. Like the woman on the wheelchair - she's been thru very dark depths of depressions, it's not fun to loose legs when one is 30, but then she said "Screw this" & tried to play the cards in her hand the best way she could. Altho she still has depressions sometimes (who could blame her?) but she already knows some "psychological survival methods". Sense of humour is paramount, for one.

As for those who master the world... I am thinking about The Wall of Berlin. It stood in its place for several decades, & one good day it went down (20 years ago actually). How did it happen? Who brought it down? I guess lots of people with individial changes of consciousness that, eventually, made up a massive change of consciousness. The historical moment had to be right for that: 5 years earlier they would have faced bullets & tanks. Changes like this happen - but the time must be right. Is ex-Eastern Germany (or any country of ex-Eastern block) a paradise now? Far from it! Is it better than it used to be? I am sure it is. But, still, imho, several generations have to pass before we can talk about really radical changes. I was born in the ex-USSR, & every time I go to see my family I think: "Surely things have changed by now & it's much better!" - but then I see that only things on the surface have changed, the mentality needs so much longer. But I have hope in the younger generations, who travel, chat on forums like ToS, & see inspiration in movies like Avatar: slowly but steadily the progress will be made. It takes time though.

They are both necessary for a complete whole, but neither can make up for the lack of another no matter how strong one is mentally or physically. Personally I don't have either, even though I have at times tried to improve my resolve and attitude,

Oh don't be so modest! you insist on this with such force that I find it hard to believe you

but I find that my emotional scars run too deep for me to ever be free of them. I also know people who suffer the same kind of self-esteem issues and have spent their entire lives trying to make up for it with mechanical prowess or other means of accomplishments, but the sad truth is that damaged individuals will never truly heal.

I am sorry to hear that. "Entire life..." how long is yours if you don't mind answering? Yes, scars run deep - but (only imho) I draw inspiration from books Viktor Frankl's "Man's Search For Meaning (A Psychologer in a Nazi Camp)" & I know from my own experience that some traumas - at least some - can be healed. Then one can even help the others to heal their scars.

To end with a fitting quote that describes both sides of our discussion:

"Beneath this mask there is more than flesh. Beneath this mask there is an idea, Mr. Creedy, and ideas are bulletproof."

*applause*