I often feel like a character out of a Jane Austen novel - rarely the heroine these days.
I know my character flaws and over the years I have tried very hard to be the "good", do the "right". If I were a character in a Charles Dickens' novel I would be the one who never got away with anything and was always required to "be good".
My belief is that life is not about actual "right". It's not about actual "good" because these are relative - you can be right all the time if you hang out with people who think like you do. You can all be wrong together. Just think of the climate change debate. Just look at the political reporting about the Labor leadership and Prime Ministership of Julia Gillard.
All the fuss over who said and who did what to whom boils down to nothing but hot air. I guess if you want to be remembered do something worthwhile, say something worthwhile.
Do you think that Alexander The Great should be considered "great" just because he conquered the "known" world? Maybe. But it didn't last long - well, he died so he didn't have time to do anything, so I guess he's great. Does anyone know what benefits flowed from this "great" acheivement? So he used elephants! But he did add to the sum total of knowledge at the time and probably opened up new trade routes. You probably can find Greek pottery in India thanks to Alexander. Many a mere ordinary mouse appears to think themselves an Alexander these days.
I fear that today we don't examine this idea of "worthwhile" too much unless it applies to us personally. I won't be around when the Torres Strait Islands sink beneath the waves and the stars go black so I don't care. How many times have I heard a similar refrain?
For some people, worthwhile is bringing up a family, for others it is cooking food for others, or teaching. It's all cool and awesome in my book. It's "great"!
Maybe worthwhile is as simple as peace of mind, the ability to turn the other cheek and show compassion. That's not easy. The ABC recently screened a series by Jimmy McGovern called The Accused - you should catch it if you can. It is crazy amazing and awesome!
There's a norm and you've got to find it and conform otherwise ... I think this is the part in the Bible which refers to "the meek". The meek shall inherit the Earth, not the powerful, because it takes immense (great) strength to be meek.
Try not exploding over dinner with someone you have known forever who obviously has an axe to grind but does not say a word in order to apply the pressure - there's Dickensian bile.
If you manage to show compassion, or do something worthwhile, six out of 10 times (that is a passing mark) people still tend to only count the four times you didn't turn the other cheek. Fat people must walk the plank along with old people, poor people, people of different races ... the list could go on depending on who you meet.
Legislate all you like to stamp out discrimination but the Dickensian Truth of Humanity and the Darwinian Theories will prevail.
Sydney University's Professor Paul Griffiths spoke at last year's Happiness Conference in Brisbane about Darwin's theory of Group Selection - he tried to explain how altruism flourishes in society.
Google this topic and all you get are academic/scientific abstracts - no wonder this kind of thinking does not pass into general knowledge. I can't think that a busy teacher would have time to read this stuff in a world saturated with information.
Prof Griffiths told the 2011 conference that Darwin's theory of Group Selection had been discredited but was again gaining credibility. A successful society co-operates. FACT.
So even though it appears that selfishness prevails in our society there are enough altruistic individuals in our midst to dissipate the selfishness. As altruism flourishes in one group, individuals break away to move to another group to seed the process again. Eventually, selfish groups should become extinct because they fail. See Libya, Syria... despotic regimes.
The more I blog, the more I write, the more I am in awe of great writers like Charles Dickens who build the truth of the world in words. If I could have dinner with anyone alive or dead it would be Charles Dickens and Charles Darwin.
If only Charles Dickens were alive to provide the commentary on our rapidly transforming world today! Recognizing a Dickensian moment is possible but putting it down on paper with panache - that's something else.
Define "good", "worthwhile", "great", "awesome". Define "right". Then take your self-interest out of the equation and redefine it. Who says there is nothing left to explore?