Hope

Talking about Gumption raises one interesting question: What do you do when your gumption loss has nothing to do with your self? What if it has to with the state of the world? How do you prevent the feeling of debilitation when you read something like this? Or this? Or even this? How do you feel motivated to do anything when you would rather prefer to feel ashamed of being part of the human race and just off yourself?

The stock answer, after distilling all the pearly wisdom expounded, is: Nothing. If you really feel so strongly about the state-of-the-world, get out there and do something. Anything. Join an NGO or something.

Fine. Am willing to turn the wheel, ready to put my shoulder to the mill. Willing to work to reduce the gap. But don't it feel more like you are finger plugging an ever leaking dike? That as soon as you get consensus to do good in one place a thousand other erupt on the radar crying for attention?

Just seeing all those blips will send what is a fairly normal gumption loss right deep down into the dark pits of hell. And given enough time down there you end up screaming: Well I've been down so god damn long, That it looks like up to me.

To counter this kind of loss there is only one effective response. Steely eyed determination powered by indefatigable hope - you go on finger plugging the dike refusing to accept defeat even with the overwhelming odds stacked against you. You are a Rainbow Warrior. A Warrior of the Light. You trust in mankind's inherent will to good even though all evidence seems otherwise. You tell yourself that you are a worker in the field. At some future time all these blips on the radar will be gone for good and you can take satisfaction in the fact that you have played your part. Or you could be a believer in the Second Coming when Jesus will come and off these problems with the flick of a psychic switch. Or you could have your faith fixed on the end time avatar of Krishna when he will come and destroy evil doers. Or you could believe that Earth's present problems are due to a disconnect with the SWOF (Substance of We Feeling) and very soon that is going to be re-established. In the meanwhile, what is called for is finger plugging.

Whatever is your persuasion - the end result is still the same: you are powered by hope; you get down to work and do your thing. You aren’t able to give a formal rational answer why finger plugging is valuable but that doesn't bother you. A soldier has no time to question why a war is being fought. It's fight, fight, fight. Some R&R. And then back to the front. Even when at rest the guns are never totally forgotten. Your soul works a rhythm into the fabric of your consciousness. Comfort in Tension.

As gumption fillers go this works pretty well. You feel some sort of cosmic connection. That your sweating in the trenches is not just make-busy hypocrisy. Sure, you’ll have your down days – like when the Taliban blasted the statutes of Buddha, like when the people were manipulated into a frenzy to tear down the Babri Masjid, like when Union Carbide (now folded into Dow Jones’ skirts) denies what happened at Bhopal was corporate genocide, like when the Rwandan countryside ran with rivers of blood.

Sure your eyes will go teary, your heart will seethe, but when the mist clears, you’re still standing. The sun is still shining. You look at your hope and you renew yourself.