My wife and I were driving our 9 year old granddaughter, Cami, home last Friday night and hit a blizzard along the lake. As we drove what started out as some heavy snow flakes turned out to be blinding. At times, we couldn't see a thing. Cami asked, "Kug, couldn't we drive off into the ditch?" Of course I told her we could.
It hit me, that's exactly what America has done. As citizens of our once great country, we've allowed people to drive us off into the ditch. The snow was blinding me the other night, selfishness, the disease of me, has produced a near fatal crash. Let me explain.
I first heard of the 'disease of me' years ago right after the Los Angeles Lakers had finally beat the Boston Celtics for their first crown in years. Their coach was Pat Riley. He wrote a book called, The Winner Within. You see the Lakers didn't repeat that next year. In his book Riley explained that the reason they didn't repeat was the 'disease of me'. Meaning each of the players, including at that time Magic Johnson, were sure it was 'them' that was responsible for the victory. He went on to explain that until a 'team' realizes none of them are responsible but all of them are, they cannot continue to win.
Go back to World War I and those incredibly challenging times. America and the free world won because they were a team fighting for freedom. Then America had to face and survive the Great Depression. We did as a group, a team, and survived only to face World War II. Once again together we rose to the occasion, banded together and stood tall as a beacon for freedom in the world. America did not have the 'disease of me'.
Then came the 60's, which introduced the Sexual Revolution, the assassination of President Kennedy and the Vietnam War. That brought us President Johnson, Mr. Disease of Me. He was so focused on his Great Society, which we are still paying for, and gave the war over to Robert McNamara, born with the disease of me. He was certain he knew a new way to wage war. Between these two the result was a large portion of the 58,000 plus killed happened on their watch as a result of their selfishness. Then America got Richard Nixon and Watergate. Everyone knew that Nixon had that election won, hands down. Yet his need to be number one in his own mind drove him to hire Liddy and a few others and the rest is a sad history of American politics.
Since that time the 'disease of me' has permeated every part of American life. Our selfishness has paved the way for us to be taken over from the inside. Blinded by the success of this country American's everywhere have become focused only what's best for them. We no longer look at what is good for our country; we look at what is good for our little part of it.
How have things played out since the days of the 60's? Let’s take a quick look at ten areas where selfishness has emerged in a destructive way.
1. Marriage: Young people have little desire to be married. Too many possibilities out there. And when they do? Well, if it doesn't work out let’s just divorce rather than work through a problem.
2. Divorce: There are many reasons for divorce and all of them are acts of selfishness, the disease of me. What is an affair? The ultimate selfish act. What is abuse? Selfishness in action. My way or the highway taken to violence. Children learn what they live. They hear your words, they learn by your actions.
3. Daycare: There is no doubt women have no choice today but to use daycare to survive. Many have done nothing to deserve it. Others had unprotected sex. A selfish act on both parts. Maybe they had a loser for a husband who had an affair. That is an act of selfishness.
4. Crime: Murder? Selfishness. Robbery? Selfishness. Rape? Selfishness. Need I go on? The commission of a crime against another says I can have my way over you.
5. Politicians: Need I say more? Over the past forty years we have deteriorated in our leadership to the point that a politician today 'must' tell us what we want to hear or we will not elect them. We also live in a time when we a Senator or Representative retire from Washington after a few decades they are praised for their service. Is it service when you come in a middle class American and retire a millionaire? The disease of me.
6. Corporate Leadership: Today our highly paid perfumed princes and princesses think nothing of derailing a once great company and walking away with hundreds of millions of dollars. The disease of me at its finest.
7. Entertainment: If there was ever a no-brainer this is it. Actors and Actresses are sure the world revolves around them. They are above the law and sure we have anointed each of them God. They make insane amounts of money and we idolize them for it. Selfishness at its finest.
8. Sports: We are a country in love with sports. We've taken sports to levels never imagined. We used to watch the crowd celebrate a touchdown by their favorite team. Then it became the one making the touchdown began celebrating. That wasn't enough then it morphed into individual celebrations. Now we have to watch the tackler celebrate and the kicker and the cheerleader. Sports are no longer teams they are just groups of selfish individuals all the way to the high school level with few exceptions.
9. Parents: Parents today are either so focused on their kids at the expense of others. Or they could careless because they are so focused on themselves. Either way the kids suffer. Parents kill each other over their kids’ sports or their kids go hungry because of their parent’s careers, drug habits or other vices. The disease of me is killing our kids.
10. Special Interest Groups: These groups started out for the right reasons. Usually to right a wrong. Today? There is a group for everything under the sun. Our society is so splintered agreement can be reached on nothing. Groups like this are simply selfishness organized.
We in America have been blinded by our success. Our freedom has allowed us to indulge ourselves to the point of selfishness. Our enemies are and have been taking advantage of our luxuries for decades. American's have to realize the luxuries our society created. It is a luxury to worry about your special interest group. It’s a luxury to worry about whether your little Billy is the best A student at your middle school. It’s a luxury to be able to worship your favorite sports star or actor. We need to wake up to how good we have it in America. Because it is all being taken away from us, as we speak. Selfishness, the disease of me, is blinding us to both our history of what made this country the world’s only beacon of freedom; and our future, what is happening to our country right now.
We cannot change what we do not acknowledge. We cannot turn the tide that is sweeping our freedom out to sea unless we begin to live the Three Musketeers way. All for one and one for all. It made us great and can again ... only if we live for something bigger than ourselves.
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