If you’re not from the United States or currently living in the United States, or if you are one of the astronauts that just left the United States for space, good choice.

Things are crazy and there is no way to tell if they will improve, worsen or go into a holding pattern. Even if things do get better, there will still be bad cops and opportunists that abuse community pain.  We can’t control every outside circumstance. But we can control ourselves. We can change our minds, our hearts, our immediate worlds. In an effort to take back some power and energy, here are three things I want to keep at the forefront of my mind this week!

#1: I can still do good to the person right in front of me.

If what is happening makes me treat the people right in front of me worse, or makes me ignore the people I’ve been given, I am no longer a world-changer. I have lost my free will and become a part of someone’s agenda. You are an agent of change to the space immediately around you. That’s where your greatest power is!

#2: Moral superiority always leads to moral bankruptcy.

When people think they have the moral high ground, they do terrible things. They kneel on people’s necks. They stand by while someone dies. They loot stores and destroy their own community. They set cities on fire. They lie in wait for an innocent runner, to settle some score which he likely never knew existed. Thinking that I am better or wiser or above everyone else will lead to moral failure.

Anyone can be the bad guy. That includes us. Remember that.

#3: More than ever we need a vision for the future.

The powers-that-be are comfortable with anger, with frustration, with violence. Anger can be managed. Frustration and violence can be managed and even directed, for political gain. But true vision is unstoppable. It’s the most dangerous thing in the world, true vision. It has won wars, led people to do the seemingly impossible, and it cannot be controlled. And we each have the ability to imagine it.

Einstein said it: “Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. But imagination encircles the world.”

So what is your vision? We need it. We need you.

Be safe,

a.i.a.l.