Patriotism, Civic Disobedience, the flag and “the Knee”

One thing I have learned about protest is that the only people that act like they don’t “get it” is the people that the protest group are protesting against, and after they act like they don’t get what your protest is all about, they further try to humiliate you, by always questioning your protest tactics. Like “taking a knee” or another when a husband, who is clueless about why is wife is mad, when she catches him with another women, and the caught husband, puts up a “smoke screen” making it about her: saying ” The problem is not me cheat, the problem is your not trusting me and following me around!!!”

Then the argument changes, from personal, (a hurtful, act of a cheating spouse.) To a ethical act, (a ” jealous” spouse going crazy over a innocent dinner between friends).

The protest I’m referring to is the protest of Colon Kapernick, How did America get here? arguing about “police shootings”, “taking a knee”, and patriotism vs. civil disobedience. Is this a “smoke screen”? To avoid actually talking about problems in America?                                                                                        Is it actually about Patriotism? Looking back just a couple of years we see, a entirely different picture. During Pre- Hurricane Katrina, we only saw American flags in schools and Government buildings. We didn’t recognize or buy a American flag, also during that time, more Confederate flags sold than American flags. Now post-Katrina, Americans are talking about Patriotism buying flag ” me included”. Another unusual thing, I can’t for the life of me understand, after the Civic War, after the most violent act of treason against our government, and a shameful act of Violent Disobedience, we get monuments and statues, of the subversives, and year’s later, and it takes a citing of racial violent clash to get them removed.

Crazy huh.

We are and always have been a group of people that fight against teariney and oppression, look at our history: We fought against the oppression Britain to gain our freedom, We fought against the oppression of slavery, we also fought against the oppression of women in the suffrage movement, We learned many lessons from these clashes, one of them is that, all of those fights were needed and the price was ” bloodshed”, pain and tears, and we have had enough of that.

However we are also the nation that has

this song as our national anthem:                                                                                           

Lyrics

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!
O beautiful for heroes proved,
In liberating strife,
Who more than self, their country loved
And more than life
America! America!
God mend thine every flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self-control,
Thy liberty in law!
If you’d like to join me, please do!
O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!
To shining sea!

So Please let’s not allow the smoke screens of word like: Patriotism, Civic Disobedience, flags and kneel, divide us and take away from the words in this great Anthem that unites us!!!!

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In What Voice Are You Speaking?

Today I heard a colleague say, “Maybe you’re not fit for the job” and I thought to myself, Wow that sounds like something a Daddy would say. How many of us have heard these Daddy or Father based statements or euphemisms in our lifetime, and we have many of these type of phrases that are still embedded in our minds and as a part of our vernacular. I also realize how vital they are when we are verbally “inspiring a group or individuals to accomplishing a challenging goal.” With the father statements, there are also mother statements and in this blog I will explain how we learn them and the difference between them, there different: inflection, tonality, of the idea I call, mommy and daddy speak.

The average person spend their lives using two completely different styles of speaking in any conversational setting and or reactive situation.

These styles or methods are Mommy speak: which is a nonconfrontational posture which gives the child opinions, or the Daddy speak, which is a confrontational posture with one goal and no options. Here’s a brief background:

This is my theory: not to be confused with Scientific Methodology. 

History

Early in the development of a child, the fetus learn the mother’s sounds, the mother’s voice, and all her vocal varieties. While learning to talk the child learns it’s “Mother-tongue: language, native language or mother tongue is a language that a person has been exposed to from birth or within the critical period.” With the mother’s tongue they also learn, The Primary languages and they develop Mothers voice or mommy speak: within that voice we hear the most common sounds and statements they say to guide our daily life.

Later, while interacting with Mom, they learn social interactions they learn, “mommy-speak” the style and way mom talks and acts in a conversational situations, which includes but not limited to, sayings like “make sure you brush your teeth and clean behind your ears.”

Her statements are: nice, sweet, funny, educational, and sometimes annoying, but gentle reminders to do what she says, and are laced with a precaution, that any missed steps comes with mom’s wrath.

At the same time the child interact with Dad, and is confronted with his social interactions, and conversational styles. His style is called Daddy-speak: It’s a confrontational style, with a point, and no “wiggle” room, and no deviations. Example: “Hey go in the bathroom, clean up, and brush your teeth, and don’t mess around in there!!                                                         

Overtime we have come to learn and to understand our parents and their particular styles, and every once an a while we hear their words coming out of mouths.

So when that happens, let’s remember to manage these styles in the most meaningful and appropriate ways, because mismanagement of anyone of them can be disasterous.

Also remember with the Mom and Dad voices in our head, you have the option, to choose between, the Mom voice, Dad voice, or use both voices. So “Choose Wishly” because the relationship you save, might be your own!!!

GREETING PEOPLE LIKE THEY ACTUALLY Exist!!!

Walking in most places in America during morning we encounter so many lifeless, ” Good Mornings”,”Hello’s” and “How are you’s.” That we may come to the conclusion that most people don’t actually care about us or don’t care period.

In our day to day, meet or beat the clock society, we are too, busy, too stressed or too tired to actually slow down and give someone a proper “Hello.”

Most of us are getting greetings, with people actually thinking, ” I better say hello or good morning, so that they will preceive me to be nice, and get them out of my face, because I have work to do.” And ” hi” now let me get back to what I’m thinking or what I’m doing. Me, me, me, I, I, I.

Did you know greetings are not about you? They are for the people you are greeting.

Greetings are defined as: a polite word or sign of welcome or recognition.

Looking back in social history, Greetings have a very long and glorious story, and they have found their way in most languages and kiniticly, they are given in many form. Also greetings can be perceived as the original icebreaker, because they have helped a many nervous person to find, friends, family’s, wives, husband, lovers, and even spritual deities.

If we look through out our lives Greetings matters a lot, to everyone of us. Think about all the good and bad greetings or none greetings, and how your days turned out, you realize that greetings can be the beginning of a great things such as: great days, dates, conversations, relationship… Or on the other hand, a bad greetings can be terrible start, to a day of doom!!!As Zig Ziglar says:

“Send out a cheerful, positive greeting, and most of the time you will get back a cheerful, positive greeting. It’s also true that if you send out a negative greeting, you will, in most cases, get back a negative greeting.”

So because Greetings have so much potential power and responsible, it’s up to us to learn to wheeled this power, responsibily.

So here are two methods of how to properly: informally and formally greet someone.

Method 1

Informally, to Somebody You Don’t Know

1. Approach the person. (It is important to walk confidently and wear a smile.)

2. Make eye contact before greeting.

3. Wait until they acknowledge you.

4. Start a conversation.

5. Follow their lead.

Method 2

Professional Greetings:

Formal, Meeting Professional For The First Time:

1. Stand when someone new comes into the room (whether you are a man or woman).

2. Do make eye contact and smile!

3. Offer your right hand out-stretched with palm facing left to shake hands.

4. Your grip should be firm not crushing.

In conclusion:

If you notice, I didn’t include a bad way of greeting, because most of us, either know a bad greeter, or are a bad greeter!!! ☺                       

However, We don’t have to stay that way, we can change that today. How? By making it our business to “make someone’s day” by giving someone or everyone we meet a wonderful greetings experiences!!!