Blessings

As I get older, there is an ever-increasing number of things that truly piss me off. Things that are intolerable include clam shell fruit packaging, potholes, frayed spots on blue jeans and knives that have inexplicably dulled. I persisted in the state of mind that finds what is wrong until last week when something happened that truly made me crazy.

I found myself chatting with an acquaintance and the conversation has – hopefully – changed me forever.

The man was a newly retired, middle class, white man that did noting but complain of life’s inequity and unfairness. His sense of his personal victimization and his list of grievances was endless…nothing in his life had ever been fair and his opportunities had been consistently undermined by forces that were sinister and targeted directly at him. People of unknown origin wanted to steal his wife, his job and his self respect.

As the conversation progressed some facts about the guy became clear. He was raised in suburbia, went to college, had a career and now lived on a pension and a monthly social security check. He was completely unaware of his privileged status and completely oblivious to the cornucopia of opportunity that spilled out in front of him because he was a white, middle class, American man. His rant shocked me out of my own tendency to carp. I realized that I was a man who drove a newer car and complained about traffic; a man who was never really hungry but complained about the size of the grocery bill and a man who was educated but complained about the cost of education. What I had become was entitled.

Social scientist, Brene Brown once said, “what separates privilege from entitlement is gratitude.’ I started to see just how privileged I was and how grateful I was not. Looking beyond myself, I clearly see a society that has a significant group of entitled persons fighting every day to keep their privilege. MLK was right when he observed that, “privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily.” All around us, we see certain folks who will fight to retain their privileged status. Their is no Geneva Convention that governs their war making… anything goes.

This is a war I refuse to fight anymore.

I will count my blessings every day and do what I can to share the rich opportunities that were given to me. This, I believe, will transform my life. I hope so.

I am grateful for the opportunity.