The yellow brick road

Being constructive (and not-being destructive) is an energy pulsation in itself, but to keep up that pulse we need to train our thoughts towards how things COULD be. I don’t mean ‘feeling lucky’ or wishful thinking or romanticising, nor even being idealistic. I mean just taking a wider-eyed look at the significance of today’s changes. Seeing the possibility of change in an optimistic way, as if little by little, individual by individual, we are laying down (very patiently) the bedrock for Change.
But how can you change, or why would you bother to make changes to your life, if you didn’t think it worth doing, worth more than just relieving guilt?
“Change” - we get stuck in the rut of our habits, so change is what we don’t do in spite of wanting to. Probably, we don’t change because, in our perception of our own life, we lack the energy needed to make serious change. I look at parents sometimes, their time and energy mortgaged by duty to kids and home and employer. They’ve got no time for change (whereas, for me with no family responsibilities and self-employed, it’s the opposite). For most adults, the reality is that there are not enough hours in the day, so ‘change’ is not a priority. “Things will have to remain largely as they are”. Could that be the ultimate tragedy of our age?
Most people may find they’re so rigid and fixed by habit that any major food change is out of the question. The sorts of changes vegans are suggesting (to comply with Animal Rights) seem unlikely - any omnivore would fear this sort of change, especially when it concerns family food.
This is where “change” seems like a real bogey, OUCH!, it implies action ... and ACTION NOW. “Urgency”. It might bring on a sense of panic. If we do change, it may be too half hearted to work. Or if we hurry it ... change doesn’t like to be hurried. So, perhaps our attempts to change fail. That makes us afraid of change and yet we’re still thirsty for success - failure just makes us more determined ... (“determination is everything”). We introduce a little force ... and then we up our expectations and require support. We rely on other people changing too (to confirm our own decision to ‘change’).
Wanting support from others is possibly where (traditionally) vegans have gone wrong. We’ve wanted others to agree with us. We’ve expected and demanded too much support from others. We’ve wanted support, and in the wanting shown our desperation - which is always an unattractive look.
Support - we aren’t given it. So, we begin to feel we’ve been let down. Then it’s likely we lose the plot to the extent of focussing on that disappointment ... which leads to resentment ... which brings on anger.
It’s almost as if we sometimes purposely bring it about, this sequence, as if we want to feed the anger in us. For some of us this is an all too familiar process. So, how can we break that cycle?
As defenders of animals’ rights (and let’s not forget those poor beings who have a much more horrible time in life than any of us) we have to shed a lot of that whingeing pessimism - focus on blossoming.
As tediously foretold in every New Age magazine, Humanity is about to blossom. I’d like to go along with that. It sounds good to me ... but do I believe the inevitability of it? My point is this: that there can’t be any blossoming until we, individually and then collectively, visualise it - to see how things could be. For that we need to show a gesture of solidarity ... even for a single blossoming. Here, surely, the highest priority is some form of action, change and attitudinal shifting.
To start, I think we need to be less afraid of looking at the bigger picture - the could-be becoming the will-be. We need to be a bit insistent, never pushy, but appear to be more certain than we actually feel.
I probably mean that we should try to be certain of our self and certain that change will be happening soon, but maybe not before one’s own death. But if it does happen outside one’s own present lifetime, should that matter? (A key question!!)
The changes which are already happening (especially in people’s attitudes to our non-human, animal friends) are the result of forty years of consciousness-raising, perhaps a little longer. Everyone, even kids, know the worst of it (they know what ‘battery hens’ means, for instance). Change is in the air, perhaps not fast enough for some of us but it is happening. And, in terms of Animal Rights, these are the most voluntary change there could ever be, since it’s the most private habit-change imaginable. This change doesn’t need swearing of any allegiances to it. We only need to want it and then consider the ramifications of it. On the downside it means some initial inconvenience, but on the upside it shows the possible future becoming a probable future (and of course, a future we’d all find difficulty in not approving of).
Animal Rights implies such a different way of looking at life. Within that tiny mind-shift there’s a revolution taking place. No blood or war or force or authority or danger, just a great leap forward. A rebellious act. An attitudinal shift. And what do we need to do to bring that about? Nothing but merely consider vegan principle as a possibility.
In the vegan world there’s no one watching or finger-wagging or hurrying us on ... but maybe there’s a little self-generated expedition necessary. Some response and some action.
The bigger picture is like a book which you can put aside when you’ve read enough for the day. No one’s pressuring anybody to read it. And the book itself is passive, just as the future is. It accepts us if we accept it.
If we’re ready (and if we want to, and if we’re attracted to it) then we only need to follow the bigger picture. I like the idea of us all building the yellow brick road to Oz… and following it as we build it.
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VeganWise Blog ENDs on Saturday 18th December and resumes 30th December (Off-line, on holiday).

A few articles to follow until then, from ‘The Place of Non-Violence and Altruism in Animal Rights’ (2007), on the Blog.