Serious Happiness…

“I feel myself falling, I’m feeling happy now” ~ Take That

Or, as defined by my dictionary:

Happy (adj): feeling or expressing joy, causing joy or gladness, fortunate or lucky

 

We, that have the right to right to protest and express our views…

Happiness is:

 

Standing up for what you believe is right

Making a voice for those too weak, too dispirited, too frightened to speak

Justice

The freedom to express an opinion

The opportunity to debate

Allowing others a voice even if you disagree

Protecting those in need

And standing up to those trampling on others

Knowing and accepting that freedom and power come with responsibilites

 

Those of us that have these things should treasure them and never abuse them.

 

Thoughts, as always, on a comment box-shaped postcard

 

Princess

Passion

“We Care A Lot About The Little Things, The Bigger Things We Top
We Care A Lot About You People Yeah You Bet We Care A Lot” Faith No More

Or, as defined by my dictionary:

Passion (n): any strong felt emotion, a strong enthusiasm for something

When I was 16 I had a conversation with a good friend in which he described me as “passionate”. There was nothing of the come one about this conversation, I was upset about something (I was 16, of course I was upset about something!) & part of the technique he was using to comfort me was to dissect my personality and point out how I deal with things. I have forgotten much of what he said but the word passionate stayed with me. Mainly as I couldn’t get to grips with what he meant.

It took years for me to work out that actually being passionate about things is a good thing. It is a deep capacity to feel, to care, to be moved. Now, conversely, I can let a LOT of stuff pass me by. My ability to deal with deeply emotive things (recenlty much tested) and be ok at first seems at odds with this, until you realise that if you’re going to be passionate about some subjects then you have to let a lot go or you’d never cope!

Now this passion gets me into trouble. (No, not like that, rinse your minds out at the back!) It means I sabotage my own arguments on things that matter to me as I get so fired up I lose the thread of a debate. It recently left me unable to speak in a pub for almost an hour as some unpleasant chat, to my mind, rolled on about disability and motor scooters. It also means I’m chronically, disasterously, easy to wind up. Total sense of humour fail, which I always spot just too late and leads to other people dying of laughter at me. Not unkindly, and when I know I’ve been done I laugh as well. But you’d think I’d learn, right?

Anyway, moving onto wider issues, one of the things I love about Twitter is the diverse range of people that I interact with every day on there and how incredibly passionate so many are about many different things. I love posts and blogs about law, police work, nail polish, make up, books, food, mental health, even the ones about burritos! They all tell such a human tale of people’s likes, interests, and yes, passions. I admire the eloquence with which people can write and tweet about things so close to their hearts.

Subjects on which I am passionate about (should you be interested or just what to wind me up):

• feminism
• rape
• treatment of disabled people
• good manners
• fair play
• the debating style of the House of Commons

There are others, clearly, but they’re personal and staying that way.

So what about you? Do you have things you’re so passionate about you could burst as you try to talk about them? Do you love to argue your point eloquently? Or are you just not that fussed? And what about things that other people care about; interested or not so much? Thoughts on a comment box-shaped postcard, please.

Princess