TIDE'S UP; BUT CAN YOU RIDE IT?

Sorry, Tweeters, but a recent study by Sysomos [a social-media analytics company] found that 71% of the 1.2 billion tweets posted in the last two months generated "no reaction whatsoever!" While we may have a lot to say, frankly my dears the world may not give a damn.

Ah, but now turn this around. Instead, try listening to the world. Say, to the eternal tides of the oceans. Here it's virtually inevitable we will experience -- body and soul -- the rhythms of our planet. In and out...higher and lower... forever leaving and then returning. If science is right that we first evolved from out of the ocean, it's easy to understand why we respond to the rhythms of its tides.

Find a beach. Stand toes to the tides. Now give yourself over to what they're telling you. Life is change...! Change is growth...! Growth depends on how you ride the changes...!

There's a man who, at his 100th birthday, admitted: "I've seen a lot of changes in my time; and I've been against every one of them!" He said it with a smile, which seems to say he learned the law of the tides the hard way. Then there are those eternal optimists who have never met a change they didn't like. Somewhere in between these two tide-riders ride the rest of us.

When you watch the surfers riding the great waves in Hawaii, there's a wedding that takes place between the rhythms of the water and of the rider. An instinct, a skill, a determination to catch the cadence, thereby becoming one with it. The same is said about great leaders. They don't so much choose the direction, as they find the direction things are going and then get out in front of it.

Time Magazine will be coming out with its annual New Years edition featuring the greater tide-riders of the year. In politics, industry, education, religion and entertainment. OK, that's good copy. However, what's far better copy are what we can do with our own tides.

But remember one thing. While no one can control the tides, we can watch out for the cross-current that can sweep us off course. Where are these found? Most times while we're passively sitting in front of screens, little and large, seeking to inundate us with everything from slanted news to suffocating nonsense.

Ready now...? Tide's up....!