Hardware and Software
A coach corrects your stride, and works with your psychology, emotions, and strategy. In essence, software. But if your leg is actually BROKEN, you need a doctor. A lot of people really are broken, and asking them to walk or run on a broken leg is just cruelty. Let alone if their leg has been amputated. Hardware.
There are people who have crappy software, due to abuse, poverty, neglect, or oppression. But if they can CHANGE that software, they can perform at much higher levels. Even if it requires a reboot of the entire ego system, it is POSSIBLE. But others actually have damaged hard drives, monitors, or processors.
I think it critical to know which kind of damage you have. This will help you understand the people around you. There is complication because some with broken hardware are too proud to admit it, or afraid society will isolate and destroy them. So they simultaneously say “There’s nothing wrong with me!” and “Help! Make special considerations.”
This is all so complicated, and as a society we should be as kind as possible, whether the problem is hardware or software. People who are not functioning at the survival level, let alone the joy level, didn’t WANT to be dysfunctional. They care. They try. All creatures try to move away from pain toward pleasure. When you see people trapped in pain, or violating the Three Gates, they are dealing with the illusion that they cannot, or a genuine dysfunction. It is reasonable to say that EVERYONE wants to be happy, and that ANYTHING that stands in the way is some sort of genuine problem. People who are violent and cruel are deluded into thinking this will help them be happy. EVERYTHING EVERYONE DOES IS TO TRY TO MAKE A POSITIVE MOVE.
Our society needs to be kinder, but of course the FIRST kindness is to protect the children who will grow to be the adults who will one day guide that kind society. If they are not protected in youth, they will have a difficult time loving and expanding their sense of self to love others.
How do we build such a kind society? Well, it needs to be a place where people feel safe, or they will devolve to survival drives. A place where people feel loved enough to love themselves, accept the full spectrum of their emotions, make peace with their fear. This allows them to love others, and expand their sense of self. When you meet someone who cannot do this, they are trapped in fear and perceived lack.
And that society needs to be a place of plenty, one that can afford to be kind to those troubled outliers without risking their children.
How do you do this? The people who will be able to guide that society will be people who have solved these problems in their own lives. They feel safe in their lives, and have a sense of agency. They are healthy animals, who have the energetic level that attracts them. They feel safe enough to have open loving hearts. And they are DAMNED good at something they love doing, something that they can exchange with their neighbors to produce wealth and abundance.
It is from this abundance that we can give SAFELY to those with software or hardware issues, still able to protect our families, and empathizing enough to know that we are ALL “temporarily abled” so that there is no shame in accepting the assistance.
In other words…if you want to change the world, START BY BEING KIND TO YOURSELF. Protect yourself, connect with your survival drive and THEN open your heart. And THEN build your enterprise. And THEN seek higher spiritual being, solidly rooted in the messiness of the consensus, Newtonian world.
Be a leader, a warrior, a lover…first in your own life, and then for the benefit of all. There are other paths, of course, but this one is available to anyone willing and able to take small daily actions that multiply into big changes over time.
If you are not…I hope that the society around you is kind enough to help. Let’s be that society. Let’s be kind.
But first…be safe.
Namaste
Steve