42 Ways to Change the World
Our world is a mess.
There are over 40 active conflicts occurring around the world right now, climate change is wreaking unimaginable havoc on our planet, nearly every country is in the middle of a political crisis of some sort, the world economy is heading for a recession, the fight against inequality has stagnated and despite the many appeals I’ve made to the responsible personnel, 77 + 33 is still not equal to 100.
This is not going to be like one of those unrealistic sci-fi books in which a random power from who knows where approaches a group of unassuming ordinary Joes, and their dog (there must be a dog) and tells them that another random power from who knows where ordained them to save the world (and perhaps the universe) from yet another random power. Nobody knows where these random powers from nor why our ordinary Joes trust them but no one every asks these very pertinent questions so maybe I’m the problem.
But we have no time to waste.
There are 3 key reasons why this is nothing like our unrealistic sci-fi books:
Reason Number 1 is that I’m not a random power. You know me, and if you don’t, my name is Muku. Reason Number 2 is that you’re no ordinary Joe – You’re you. Just about the greatest person I’ve never met. Reason Number 3 is that the random power I need you to save the world from isn’t actually a random power.
It’s you.
You’re the problem.
But good news, you’re also the solution!
I have therefore, by invoking my sacred powers, called upon you, to embark on the perilous journey to the repairing of our world. And all you have to do is follow these 42 easy steps:
1. Become intimately aware of your psychological disposition and the manner in which it affects your relations with other people.
2. Interrogate everything you have come to hold as true. Ask why. Why it is true, why it is good for it to be true and what that means for you. Piece it apart and piece its pieces apart. Find its underlying principle and then interrogate that too.
3. Refuse to allow yourself to become a part of echo chambers. Reject the idea that being around people who only echo and idealize views similar to yours is good. It’s not.
4. Be repulsed at the idea that because the world is tough, you ought to be tough too. The world is not tough. It is merely deeply injured and scab is always tougher than the skin that was there before it.
5. Yesterday is fact, today is conjecture, tomorrow is fiction. Read that again.
6. Speaking of fact and fiction, read. Read everything – Harry Potter, the Sapiens’ series, research papers, legislation, the Bill of Rights of your country and the news. Read for yourself, read to a child, read to the ill, read, read, read. Our world is where it is now because of stories and narratives. You need to re-educate yourself on new ones.
7. Be gracious and honest.
8. Smile – You’re scaring people walking around with a frown etched onto your face.
9. Think. Open your mind up to the limitlessness of possibility and allow it to bask in its glorious rays. Possibility is beautiful. Refuse to starve yourself of that treat.
10. Smile. This time, into the camera – Your brain can only hold so much information, memories included. Keep mementos of your greatest memories.
11. Sing, dance, paint and write badly. And if your neighbour come complaining about the noise, then sing the “Beauty and the Beast” duet with them. If they call the police, consider forming a choir (Not recommended). Allow yourself to enjoy the beauty of incompetence. You don’t have to be good at everything. Goodness is exhausting.
12. Smile – This time at the baby in front of you. Be the first person to teach it that the world is a beautiful place and that it only matters how you decorate it.
13. Smile – This time at the mirror. You look amazing when you smile.
14. Apologize and forgive.
15. Say “Yes please” and “No thank you”.
16. Ask “How are you feeling” and “How am I feeling”.
17. Refuse to be stressed by the absence of labels that adequately describe you. You are your own label – Louis Vuitton could never.
18. Recognize that unless you have the power of changing people (I regret to inform you, as your guide, that you do not get superpowers in this story), you don’t really have a choice but to accept and celebrate them for who or what they are.
19. Also recognize that even if you did have the power of changing people (I do not regret to inform you, as your guide, that you do not get superpowers in this story), you don’t really have a choice but to accept and celebrate them for who or what they are.
20. Learn how to adequately express yourself. Your thoughts, your emotions and your feelings must be easily expressed at a moment’s noticed.
21. Say it. Say the words. You know the words I’m talking about. Say them. No, I don’t care if they’re scary and frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn about whether they’ll say it back. Say. The. Words.
22. You are privileged. Fight for the person from whom you stole this privilege. You owe it to them and you owe it to yourself.
23. Live life as though you had one life. Because you’re not a cat – You actually only have one life. There are no do-overs, there is no rewind button and there is certainly not enough time on your disk. Live it. Love it.
24. The future you were worried about yesterday is the one you’re missing out on today while stressing out about tomorrow.
25. Have that extra cookie if it’ll make you happy. You owe yourself happiness.
26. Write to your local representative. Bombard them with letters and phone calls. Request meetings with them and if they seek out a restraining order, develop an alter-ego (not recommended) and demand accountability from them even more. Ask them how they plan on voting on Draft Bill 4509/B12@97#. Request that they explain the rationale behind that vote to you. Suggest issues for them to lobby in their houses of assembly. You are their boss: Act like it.
27. Monitor what is happening in your country’s legislative bodies. A lot goes on without your knowledge in there. Read Hansard or your respective countries parliamentary minutes. Track the proceedings on TV, on your laptop, on your phone, on your radio and on your carrier pigeon.
28. Sign petitions. Real petitions with real tangible effects (Disclaimer: I regret to inform you that your signature will not end the war in Yemen).
29. Visit homes. Visit prisons. Visit the terminally ill. Visit the forgotten community. Say hi to them. Write them cards. Flowers are nice too (I suggest lilies). Ask your local representative what they are doing about those in each of these spaces.
30. No, you twat, don’t drop that plastic bottle on the side of the road. Don’t drop anything on the side of the road. Don’t drop anything anywhere – Find a bin. Or, I don’t know, recycle.
31. You’re emitting too many carbon compounds. Fix yourself. It’s getting hot in here.
32. You can’t be empowering companies that harm animals, the environment or people. Just don’t. Spend your money elsewhere. Buy from an environmentally friendlier firm. Donate to research foundations. Give it to me instead, I’m craving chocolate.
33. Smile – You’re doing well.
34. Adopt a pet. Or a plant. Or even a human. If you feel like it, adopt all three.
35. Normalize yourself. You’ve been told for their entire duration of your human life that there’s something wrong with you and that every aspect of you is in the extremes. Too much this, not enough this, too little that, way too much there. Normalcy doesn’t exist. The absence of normalcy is normal.
36. Be able to give compliments. While you’re at it, learn how to take a compliment.
37. An apple a day does not keep the doctor away. But a good deed a day does.
38. Hold people to account, for everything. Their words, their actions, their promises, their disclaimers. People should be answerable to you.
39. Hold the door open for the person behind you, stop slowing down the flow of traffic on the escalator and road rage is highly unsightly.
40. Share this article with several of your closest friends as you prepare to assemble your army that will help you change the world.
41. Understand the degree to which the power you have extends: You have the power to permanently shape how someone will perceive themselves in the future. You have the power to take away power from systems that benefit from injustices. You have the power to determine how many pieces of plastic will end up in the stream near your house where they’ll choke fish and kill plants. With great power comes not only great responsibility but a great sense of duty.
42. Refuse to believe them when they tell you that world changing is too big a job for you. It’s not, and when it feels like it is, enlarge the size of your army.
The journey you are about to embark on is a long and perilous one and I wish you great success in it, most noble and valiant Chosen One. But I have faith in you and the army you are going to assemble.
Get to work.
Sincerely,
Muku
great work
ReplyDeleteThank you,this really helped me to be honest
ReplyDeleteNice piece, worth reading..
ReplyDelete