Thursday, August 23, 2012

ONE MORNING YOU WOKE UP AND WALMART HAD JUST EATEN YOUR ONCE-UPON-A-TIME

Beginning with that first day of school when you skittishly left the safety of home, there's been a little hole in your soul. Maybe not consciously, but still a tiny tugging to recapture some of that lost sense of safety. After all, you're only one small player in a huge planetary drama where very little safety comes free.

If you take the time to figure out why that younger world seemed so safe, chances are the answer is: It was so much smaller, cozier, and personal. Sure, you wanted to spread your wings and you have. Still, even the boldest eagle returns to the nest at night.

Lately, virtually nothing in your life is small anymore. The more successful you've become, the less there can be of small and sheltered. Our modern world has made a covenant with bigness and boldness. Lets call it the Walmart Effect. In the name of convenience, efficiency, and cost benefits, the America you grew up in has morphed into something in which there can be little room for being little anymore!

We don't want to get maudlin about this. Only reflective. How many neighbors do you know by name... how many members of your church or club or community...what's the name of the local produce man... how about the cop patrolling your streets or the mail carrier or the newspaper fella? Well of course, our answer is: We're busy so we do the best we can.

In fact we do no such thing. In our daily hurry to make a buck, care for the kids, keep up with the world around us, there's simply no time to be slow anymore. Or small or cozy or personal. This is the big time. Little things like those are nice but hardly necessary. Onward...!

The funny thing, though, is that the bigger, faster, bolder we've become, the more migraines, strokes, heart attacks and depression we've recorded. What's wrong with this picture....?

 

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