This is a reprise of a posting from July 27, 2011
I regret using the word 'I' so much, but that is hard to avoid when you are trying to introduce who you are and why you are doing something.
I had completely forgotten about this, and came across it when I was looking for something else.
That's one of the benefits of old age. You are like a traveler in time, but slowly. And you can look back and see what has gone before.
You can remember places and people vividly, that to the young are just pages in books.
And you can look back and see what you were like at a different place and time. Cringe-worthy experience, but it helps to ground you, and remind you why you are standing on the ground that you are.
And to help you remain standing.
A Brief Apologia of Sorts
Why do I put forward these thoughts? Why don't I charge for it, or take ads? Why don't I do interviews and speak at rallies, and direct a group of followers to promote messages in comments and 'pile on' to those who do not agree with us?
As I recently answered to a fellow blogger, because I do not need the money. So why bind myself to some agenda, even if a little, by taking it? I give out of the excess and abundance given to me. Yes, there are definite sacrifices and self-limitations, and they extend to family. And that is sometimes a cause for unease. But the necessities are covered.
Why do I witness to my beliefs, and alienate some worldly and influential people, and even believers with different viewpoints and prejudices, and incur the consequences of diminished opportunity? It limits the acceptability of my message in many sites and areas. You might be surprised, but it does. And it hurts. And the ability to see the ugliness for which people can be capable is discouraging. But then there are the consolations that seem to come, as they are most needed, from the most unexpected sources, the kind word, the occasional graciousness of the spirit.
This is not some incidental thing, it is what I am, it defines me. I am not my own, to do as I will. I owe a triple allegiance to the truth and what is most human, the very pinnacle of existence, by creation, by redemption, and by continuation. If I do not do good when there is a price to be paid that is in reality very slight as these things go, how could I expect to pay the price when the stakes are high?
What is it that I want? I don't want anything. This is why I shun the spotlight. I want neither money nor followers, nor recognition or fame. I want to be a simple, honorable man. Husband and father. And that is work enough for anyone.
What makes me think I can know the Truth? Why do I sound so much like a leftist lately? By the way, I find that particularly ironic, since I am a life long pragmatic conservative in the tradition of Edmund Burke, with a tinge of the libertarian. It just shows how far things have shifted from center.
I have a scientific mind, so I do not proceed from the assumption that I know the truth in this world, as truth is a never ending journey, a way of life that one never reaches until the very end of this world. So I start at the bottom and slowly, carefully, work up from there, taking things where they lead me, constantly reviewing the landscape, continuously learning, pursuing an ever-retreating horizon, with the occasional view from the peaks.
If I have any fear, if there is any recurrent theme in my energy and my prayer, it is not to mislead people and myself, even unintentionally. I not only do not seek to promote a point of view with the misuse of facts, I beat my own conclusions bloody, almost every day, looking for any weakness and misapprehension, constantly absorbing new data and ideas. I expose myself to a wide variety of thoughts and opinions, almost to exhaustion.
Forecasting the future here is exceptionally difficult because there are so many exogenous, and yet outcome critical, variables. There are powerful forces promoting certain ends for their own benefit, but there are other forces working against them. It is a conflict, and the fronts are not always easily seen through the fog of war.
And so even at best, I know I am not and cannot always be right, so it is never an easy place to be thinking, wrestling with the uncertain and taking its measure, much less acting upon it. But this is where I am, and must be. Going forward, one step at a time, in fear and trembling at my own weakness and insufficiency.
When my site was improbably recognized as among the ten most influential [international financial blogs] by some very kind people, links to pieces on my site dropped off a cliff. Those in the blogosphere probably figured that since I was already 'successful' that there was no need to encourage it, since I was no longer a colleague, but the competition. There is only one competition that counts in these times, and that is to stand for goodness and justice in a terrible class and currency war.
And I also continued to strike out on a line of thinking that people in the financial world and the fortunate may not favor. And so it is not popular. If you want to be popular, tell people what they wish to hear, not what they may need to hear. And the greater a person becomes in the favor of the world, the less tolerant they are of contradiction.
Good fortune and wealth can be a terrible trap, the most ponderous of burdens, because we are so unwilling to let go of them, even a little, as they drag us down into the abyss.
And so the temptation to change my approach, to post hysterical (and not just hysterically funny) headlines and pieces that are misleading, to fan the flames of passion and prejudice become high. I can understand that. Isolation is no picnic, and the crowd has its allure. Everyone desires to be liked. I am human.
And it is because I seek to be truly human that I cannot be otherwise. People seem to have lost their sense, their voice, of humanity. How can I remain silent, when good and innocent people become prey? Who am I to do this, why me?
I do not seek this. At times I wish to run away, to hide in my library or the kitchen, rather than be taken where I do not wish to go. I came to the study of money for a blessing, but I have found a work. And I cannot leave it, because this is where I am meant to be. And so I am here.
