Inner Michael

Have you ever noticed the irony of words and symbols, of an oxymoron or acronym? Have you ever noticed how words “feel?” How words conjure pictures in your mind?

Words are powerful; words have punch. They can be soft or stark, soothing or startling. And sometimes they hold irony. “Iron curtain” has iron-y.  The phrase “behind the iron curtain” meant somewhere deep inside the Soviet Union and tucked away in the dark secrecy of Russia and communism. Is iron curtain an oxymoron?

Mad means “angry or indignant” but at one time MAD was an acronym for Mutually Assured Destruction.”

MAD. The irony is hard as iron, no—steel. “Mutually Assured Destruction.” It referred to the cold war and nuclear threat of the Kennedy through Reagan years when the U. S. and Russian missiles were pointed at each other from strategic locations to strategic locations. (Some still are.) It was a “policy” adopted by both countries. MUTUALLY ASSURED DESTRUCTION. A policy was adopted that would ensure that the world would be completely destroyed. Because had any of those weapons been unleashed, the end of Earth was inevitable. A policy? Is that ironic? A policy is adopted by people for people to insure that when it’s over there will be no people. One does not survive a nuclear cloud or global radiation fallout. No ONE. Mutually assured destruction.

MAD? It is mad. Mad in the sense of “crazy” and “crazymaking.” Are we busy crazymaking? Is that ironic? Is the irony lost on you? The world is not filled with enough trauma, drama and suffering; now we want to make crazy too. That’s crazymaking.

“That’s so gay” has irony- gay used to be a derivative of gaiety which means “a state of merriment or joyful exuberance” but there is no delight now or anything to celebrate in the word “gay.” 

The other day I said to someone “Well, let’s take a stab at it.” Take a stab at it? What image does that conjure?  And when I talked about taking a stand on something, someone said to me “choose your battles; it depends what hill you want to die on.” Words and violence. And words making violent images. Do we watch how we speak? These days I am trying to remember to think a little more before I speak. And at the end of the day, before I go to sleep, I am reviewing my day for how I used words. Did I use them as weaponry?

What has become very important to me is to be my authentic self and to speak with an authentic voice. When I am not coming from my authentic self there is a dissonance in my energy and it doesn’t feel right. When I am busy and scheduled beyond sanity, I tend to get right to the point and I can be very direct. I don’t usually have hidden agenda in what I say and there is rarely an intention to harm so I don’t always stop to think what the other person is going to hear. When I am in that mode, it is just give me the facts and there is no sugar coating. I forget that some people need sugar coating.

I love poetry and I love lyrics. I have written both and I love the artsy way words and music can fit together to convey something in two languages at the same time. My favorite musical genre is the Blues. And James Brown was among my favorite musical artists. He did a lot for black music and to bring forward black culture. His iconic “I’m Black and I’m Proud” introduced the idea that being African American was not something to be ashamed of. That there was no reason to hide your brilliance because of your skin color (‘I’ve seen the bright get duller; I’m not going to spend my life being a color.’) James Brown with one song and a few chosen words gave a whole disenfranchised population reason to cherish their heritage. Talk about a few words changing the world. Lyrics are words. Talk about cultural memes!

And now black artists and black women and men are calling each other the N-word and “ho.” And even more dismaying is the fact that school aged children are using the term as an epithet to their peers. Can you imagine how horrified James Brown would be? It’s an insult to his memory, to race and to the progress we supposedly have made toward embracing diversity. Do you see irony there?

“Ebony and Ivory- “ Stevie Wonder; “Black or White-” Michael Jackson; “I Am Woman-“ Helen Reddy; “Imagine-“ John Lennon; “Times they Are a Changing-“ Bob Dylan; “All You Need is Love-“ The Beatles; “Tears In Heaven-“ Eric Clapton. And that is just a sample of words as musical memes that changed the world.

Do we use words as weapons? Do we hurt with words? Can words heal? How do we use words to heal? Can words harm? Can they kill? This is the “Age of Technology,” the “Age of Communication.” There is an explosion of words! Is there fallout? Do we use words for mutually assured destruction? How are we using words? How do words impact? Now there is a worldwide web. And we are all interconnected. What implications does that have for how we speak? What we say? How we say it? What kind of narrative are we establishing in this new world? Is it human? Is it humane? Do we use this new tool to celebrate humanity? Should we be thinking about that?

It’s now a global village out there. It’s a world of discovery and diversity. How are we approaching that new realization? How are we handling it? How are we describing our experience? What history are we creating? What legacy are we leaving? And it is all being recorded with words! Are we even thinking about that? Are we thinking about language and nuance and lasting impressions and what the collective narrative is for the twenty-first century? And what kind of world and narrative do we want to create? More MAD- mutually assured destruction? Are these important questions?

These are questions that are raised in a new program… coming soon to a world near you…

Stay right where you are and stay tuned. Your history, your future and your world and maybe even your life, may depend on it.