Our Country,
Going, Going, Gone?
Are We Sliding Down Hill to a Point of No Return?
by F. Anton Stahl
Did you know that if you continue to do what you’ve been doing, you’ll continue to get what you’ve been getting? Are you satisfied? If you are, great! If not, what are you doing about it? These questions can also be applied to family, community, society and nation.
There are serious problems in our societies today. Our whole world is in distress. Contributing to this is the GMP Factor: Greed, Money and Power. And this has arisen because of the CDD affliction: Character Deficit Disorder. What we really need to resolve the GMP Factor and CDD is a serious Character Counts Campaign.
Our nation, our whole world is in distress. Can you hear the SOS call: Seek Our Success * Secure Our Selves * Save Our Societies? There is an all important need for change…Positive Change for the greater good of all and it starts with each one of us. This is our only true hope for the world.
I believe in We the People helping one another. We strive, survive and thrive best when we work and cooperate with each; caring and sharing wherever we can. I also believe what Napoleon Hill (author of Think and Grow Rich) wrote in his 1500+ page book; Law of Success: “All anyone really requires as capital on which to start a successful career is a sound mind, a healthy body and a genuine desire to be of as much service as possible to as many people as possible.”
I would add too, the following quote from Mahatma Gandhi: “In order to find yourself, you must lose yourself in the service of others.” Also, from Ralph Waldo Emerson: “It is one of the most beautiful compensations in life that no man can sincerely try to help another without helping himself.” He also said: Character is higher than intellect.”
The Human Socio-cultural Evolution involves the process of competition: survival of the fittest or most competent. In this process the concept of beating your own best is often forgotten, not realizing that this is the key to surviving, thriving and coming out on top.
Unfortunately “beating the other guy” has become the byword for many, regardless of any ethical values or spiritual principles. Where does ethical behavior fit in today? How to you feel about the value you place on your own values?
Do our biases cloud our vision as to what are the best actions to take in order for positive change to take place? Like Nature which is in constant change, we must remember; when growth stops, decay sets in. How are we doing in the areas of spiritual and personal growth, individually, as a nation and worldwide? Our chaotic world tells us that very many people are caught up in the GMP Trap and the CDD Affliction.
It is not sufficiently understood that Character Counts; that Character Carries Credit. The Value of Values has been down graded by entirely too many. Character traits such as integrity; unselfishness; self-responsibility; courage; sincerity; honesty and many others have been diminishing over the years within many segments of our society.
In America too many in society have come a long way down the road towards moral bankruptcy. Does this really need pointing out? If so, the reader has been asleep. Wake up. Yes, WAKE UP AMERICA; It’s Later Than You Think! Much Later! Let not the Amer I CAN spirit of honest achievement ever die or be taken from you!
What are the reasons for this decadence? Haven’t parents and the adults who run our religious institutions, public schools, colleges and universities done a good job? After all, weren’t they exposed to these same systems? Bill Gates has said that “Our high schools are obsolete.” What do you think? Warren Buffett feels that “Ethics should be learned in the home.” How do feel about that?
It seems that there is an observable cycle here: children are brought up by parents who went to institutions of worship and public schools operated and controlled by adults who were once children who did the same thing. As time went on the Bible, God and the value of values, along with certain historical events, were phased out of schools while simultaneously grades plummeted, graduation rates diminished and ethical standards faded away. Apparently this observable cycle hasn’t worked all that well.
I’ve been watching these trends closely for over 30 years. I remember reading an article in 1980 on how cheating on tests was increasing among high school students. Today, the internet seems to be a method of choice used for cheating. Have our schools been dumbing down the children? If so, has it been unintentional? What about when you went to school? How did the schools then, compare with the today’s?
Note: A poorly educated and misinformed people, lacking vital information and being untrained in critical thinking, develops analysis paralysis. They are more easily misled and misguided into serfdom. Has this been happening in America?
F. Anton Stahl:
Previous achievements include: Author: Uncommon Wisdom1, Lifetime Strategies for Successful Living; Founder and former director of Amdo Institute for Human Development, Research, Education and Training in Wayne, New Jersey; Human Relations Counselor; Head instructor of 8 Martial Arts schools; Weight lifting Champion; Shopping Mall owner.
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