A dog in the fight
“Step with Care and Step with great Tact. And Remember that Life’s a Great Balancing Act”.. Dr. Seuss
We all like to feel good about ourselves. We want to feel that our heart is in the right place and our decisions are made for all the right reasons. We have a tendency to pay closer attention to evidence and arguments from groups and causes that we know and admire and then discount contradictory information from other sources. Once we decide, we don’t like to undecide. Our feelings are important to us.
I am now going to “Step with Care and Step with Great Tact” and ask you to Think along with me. The more times we hear something the more likely we are to remember “it”. When it comes time to make a decision, subconsciously, there ”it” is in the back of our mind. I’m sure that “its” true because I remember “it”. Making the decision becomes easier because “I Know” something about the topic. We are pulled towards and believe more in ideas that sound familiar because it is easier. We shy away from ideas that are harder to understand. (Remember High School Algebra?) One approach to gathering a following uses this approach. Repeat a slogan or a jingle often enough and your listeners are hooked. Commercial jingles are designed to hijack our working memory and implant a product or service and they really work. In the Valley of the Jolly…….. I’m stuck on Bandaid cause……. I wish I was an Oscar Myer …….. and our local You Cantwell Sleep without a ……… “Fully vetted, permitted, engineered and financed” and NO AT have been repeated until some have come to decisions because they ”know” that it is true just as I “know” that the Jolly Green Giant says Ho, Ho, Ho. Don’t take the easy path. Ask questions and make informed (jingle free) decisions free from propaganda.
We are stuck in a Ground Hog Day loop here in the Wimberley Valley. Doesn’t matter how we got here but it does matter that we get “Unstuck”. I could produce all kinds of data, technical specifications and high flown ideals on both side of this issue but we would stay “Stuck”. I started this discussion about feeling good about ourselves which is important. We have reached a point here in the Wimberley Valley where feeling good is no longer enough. We need to Stop and Think about where we are as a Community. A Community that includes both the City and the Valley. We need to THINK how we can help our friends and neighbors that we elected to the City Council. They have tough decisions to make based on real bottomline Dollars and hard data driven Facts. It does not matter “what you heard” or “how you feel”. A Loan has come due (or at least a small, very small payment) and money must be paid. This Crisis of philosophy is only the first in a long series of philosophical differences. In the coming months and years, more Payments will come due (many more) and real money, not money transferred from one account to another, will have to be paid. $$$$ will be Paid by YOU, each one of YOU. Don’t be fooled by jingles or let your mind be clouded by propaganda. REAL Money will be PAID and in the end it will be PAID by All of Us. Life is a Great Balancing Act!
Deborah Koeck