What kind of world do you want for our children and future generations?
Currently:
We live in a world where wealth and status are more important than happiness and peace.
We live in a world where love is hidden and violence is practiced in light.
We live in a world where quantity is valued over quality.
We live in a world where the poor walk miles to get food and the rich take walks to digest.
We live in a world where pizza arrives faster than the police.
We live in a world where the truth offends many where lies comfort them.
We live in a world people have reached Moon but still hesitate to go to neighbors’ houses.
Take a deep breath, then ask yourself, What kind of world do I want to live in?
Revolutionary Optimism is activism and a movement that makes up its mind not to quit until it prevails, a faith in ourselves and the efficacy of collective action. It is not optimism that leaves everything to God, Deities, or fate. Praying for peace is like praying for a weedless garden. While there is no harm in speaking and sending your hopes, dreams, and wishes above, true change comes from action and initiative. Our capitalistic systems and institutions rooted in White Nationalism aim at alienation and complacency around comfort and basic necessities not being meant for everyone. Capitalism and the ‘American dream” are rooted in greed and hoarding, gaining at the expense of others.
I refuse to accept that as humanity this is our best and I know everyone is deserving of health care, higher education, affordable housing, mental health services, food security, and living wages. Moving towards a better world starts with the belief and confidence that we ALL deserve and can build a better world. We often forget as the ‘working class’ how much power we hold. The ‘ruling class’ is depended on us for the status quo to remain. Many in our world are operating out of survival mode due to having to fight to meet or attempt to meet their basic human physiological, safety, and security needs. Understand that, the ‘ruling class’ is organized: they have the newspapers, the courts, parliament, and the police. We have the strength and the ideas but it is NOW time that we are organized too.
Capitalism is inherently contradictory, unsustainable, and unstable and can no longer function as it has before. The gap between rich and poor is becoming wider and the system offers no way out of our current impasse. Again, faith without work is fantasy; we cannot simply wish away the status quo. It is time to start envisioning our political imagination and reallocate wealth, property, and power. Now, one should never romanticize revolution. My purpose in this post here is to remind all that every authentic liberation movement, in the course of its ascent, captures the genuine social aspirations of a wide segment of the people. Whatever its outcome, a revolution is an essential expression of popular consciousness. It is the ultimate manifestation of the conviction that the old regime can no longer be tolerated.
Today in our world, many of us detest and are sickened by the social misery that surrounds us. Yet too few of us truly believe that another world is possible. We must believe that Oppression is not inevitable; daily battles for equity and regenerative systems and intuitions must be fought in the street, at the job, and on the terrain of consciousness (Decolonization work). The revolution is for our grandchildren, for future generations. The best way to fight despair is to connect with a community and do something. We have the capacity to awaken, mobilize, and radically restructure society. Our most potent defense against systems and structures that are not benefiting the majority are numbers (organize), our dollar (invest and support financially what you believe in), and our optimism.
Take the time to write out, draw or create a vision board showcasing what changes you want to see and action steps you can take to begin working on building our new world that allows all to thrive rather than survive.