Living in spin.The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

"Mum! There's nothing in this house to eat!" "You never wash my clothes!" "You never buy anything good to eat!" "You're/we're always late!" As a parent of a teenager, words like these are really good at pushing my buttons. Reflecting on why it gets to me me so much, I realise it is partly because it is usually blatantly untrue (therefore unjust!), but also, I think it is because this way of speaking seems to have become the norm for so much of our society. Not specifically, of course, but the style of exaggerating so much of what we say way past much semblance of the truth.

Actually, one of my pet hates at the moment is the excessive and inflated use of certain adjectives, particularly those such as "awesome", "fantastic" and "amazing". While I agree that it is good to be positive about and grateful for the various aspects of our lives, we can amplify this completely out of proportion to reality, or we use these words so often that they become ordinary; they lose their impact and sense of the special. For those listening (or reading) it can end up having the effect of making them feel as though their lives really could never match up (even though they are not too different). Alternatively when something truly out of the ordinary happens, we have no language left to use.

While, certainly, much of this hype has its source in advertising, where more and more outrageous claims seem to need to be made to be heard above the clamour of "consume, consume, consume", over-the-top adjectives and spinning the truth out to get a good emotive story appear to have become the norm in many facets of life. Media thrives on this (we are ever amused to hear an advertisement about a story on one or other of the current affairs programs which seems to bear little similarity to the actual story that appears, or has no substance underneath), as do our politicians. I have to say that I find it quite disturbing how little of the messages we get from politicians seem to be based on actual fact rather than innuendo and truth stretching.

And we are probably all familiar with the idea of the use of spin in public relations, but it is alarming how accepting we have become of this. In a discussion about the idea of a 'just war', John Howard Yoder says that the control of information or "spin" has become a "science and an art". However, he also states that "disinformation and spin control invalidate...administrators’ claim to legitimacy." The problem is, when we start to rely on "spin" to control the people around us, whether it be our parents, our children, or in wider organisations, we sacrifice our integrity and our credibility. People around us either start to tune out to anything we say, or simply become very sceptical and cynical about us and whatever we represent. 

Personally, for quite some time I have endeavoured to remove the words "always" and "never" from my vocabulary (except, of course, in relation to mathematical constructs!). Of course, to my analytical mind  these words are rarely true, and we can't prove it anyway, quite apart from the knowledge that this type of language tends to be unhelpfully inflammatory in personal discussions. I am reminded of Jesus' words in Matthew 5:37, where He says, "Let your 'Yes' be 'Yes' and your 'No' be 'No'". Although this was in regards to making promises, I think we can safely extrapolate it to mean 'be honest'. Tell it how it really is and don't dress it up to make other people happy or to manipulate them in any other way. Keep your integrity and credibility intact. Genuine honesty is such a rare commodity today and I think people really appreciate knowing that what you say is the truth, nothing more, nothing less. 

Winter...a poem

So it has happened.
Winter has come.
And its coldness and barrenness
Have shocked you, saddened you.
Even though you saw the signs,
Heard the warning,
The emptiness stretching ahead 
Without sign of abating
Seems to have the power to shrink your soul
Even just thinking about it.


How will you survive?


Just asking the question seems to open up a glimmer of a vista,
An iota of hope.
How have you survived winter in the past?
What did others do?


So instead of simply enduring, hibernating
It is time to be overt, proactive.
Seek out those places, people of warmth
Where conversations are filled with life
That will sustain and carry you.
Contemplate anew past promises for the future.
And above all, remember: 
The dying that is Winter 
Is essential
Before the New Life 
That is Spring
Can usher in

A new season.