My advice: Don't try to 'fit in'

I reckon you set yourself up for a whole world of angst when you try to please everyone and a blog is a perfect example of this. Professionally I apply the same logic and tend toward doing my own thing despite the expectations to the contrary of the many. Whilst this could be argued as being arrogant I prefer to suggest it is simply my take on things-you either like it or you don’t? There’s this strange assumption out there that all content must conform, or at least universally appeal  Whatever happened to ‘changing the channels’ or better yet, ‘don’t turn the set on’ in the first place?

I have written before on the culture of complaint that has slithered into our collective social intercourse. I think it takes courage to stand up to inequity and unfairness but those that ‘sweat the small things’, as they say, make me question whether doing so is worth all that effort?

I mean if you don’t like something, vote with your feet or your wallet. Whinging about it online seems counterproductive to me and smacks of narcissism. Who cares what you think really? There are billions of people on the planet and do you really believe anyone gives a ‘rats’ that your latte wasn’t hot enough?

Don’t worry. I count myself in this category too. My pipsqueak blog is but a miniscule opinion measured in millionths of micrometers in an unimaginably broad band of content on the web, but hey, it’s mine and it’s not meant to please everybody.

I write this blog mainly to exorcise the numerous thoughts that cascade through my overly stimulated brain. If I’m being honest I also indulge myself by putting into words situations, events and circumstances that make me laugh, inspire me or piss me off. Sometimes this puts me at odds with some of my cherished readers. Some of my posts might cause offence? Some might make you laugh out loud whilst others you might read between the slits in your fingers as you cover your eyes in disbelief.

I suppose I am a bit contradictory at times. I’m also a bit of a contrarian and this trait seems to be gaining more purchase on my personality as my middle age speeds up.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not apologising but I am saying ‘this is what I reckon’.

I find myself gravitating toward the voices that stand out in what is becoming a homogeny of our public vernacular mainly because I like to hear the opinion of the recalcitrant, the agitator and the iconoclast as they are nearly always an antidote to the rapidly expanding middle ground. Of course there are shrill views from the fringes but give me a break, I like to believe that people are smart enough to discern fanaticism from enthusiasm.

This last year has been one of significance for me.  I never thought that I would find myself in a position of middle-aged retrospection. Mine is not the first generation that has grappled with the effects of an impending use by date but like all generations we all think we are equipped to deal with it and mine prides itself that it is educated enough to negotiate this passage without losing any of the bolshie leit-motifs that define our age group. What makes this delusion sadder, is the belief that our peers were the coolest and that this would endure and be obvious to every succeeding wave born since. But this. Is. So. Wrong.

Paradoxically I find it hard to go quietly into the night. Whilst in my youth I enthusiastically “Kicked against the Pricks”, somewhere inside me always held a seat reserved for my elders on the long ‘bus ride of life’.

Before one might interpret this post as a grumbly lament on the younger generation let me state that tomorrow is someone else world, I get that, but today is now and now is er..now., so today’s values are valid today.

How can one be ‘In the moment’ which is such a common sound-bite these days, without recognising the lay of the land in this regard.

Boomers are relinquishing control as each finger is prized from the trigger of global spoilage but the lineage threatens to skip a generation in favour of one that has not known hardship, going without or having to wait for …anything actually. For-warned of this impending disconnect, I think the responsibility of my Gen is to remind our kids that not everyone is a winner, sometimes people don’t measure up and you’re only entitled to harvest what you’ve put in. This is not to deprive them of the successes of scholarship but to help them to put things into perspective and negotiate a world that advocates who one is rather than what one does.

If I could make a royal analogy, Prince Charles who has for an age spruiked the benefits of a small scale agrarian society much to the derision of the popular UK press could be held up as a great example of thinking to his sons who will probably skip over his custodianship of the throne.

I hope your 2013 is a rewarding and happy one, bringing you and your family good health, prosperity and good fortune in the new year.