The more I get to know people, the more I get to love my dog

I’m so tired of CEO’s claiming they have an open door policy, when they are in fact under lock and key on the 50th floor, behind soundproof glass and with 3 gatekeepers at the door.

I’m so tired of politicians who talk about the welfare of people, when the only welfare they are really interested in, is their own.

I’m so tired of people who preach about neighbourly love, only to raise their boundary walls an extra 2 feet in order to block out the misery next door.

All I hear is blah, blah, blah..

While on a walk to her school, I asked my sixteen year old daughter what she values most in her friends. Should they be nice or should they be honest. Should they lie to make her feel better, or should they always be honest and risk hurting her in the process. Without hesitation she called for honesty.

I find it a shame that those two concepts are no longer related. Nice has become patronizing and infested with hidden agendas, and honesty.. well honesty is now a pipedream engulfed with blatant lies. I really want to believe in the basic good of all people, and in honesty still being a virtue.

However, we live in a world where our flaws are constantly overinflated by the fake, fabricated perfection of those we meet. It has become almost impossible to differentiate between honesty and self-serving agendas. Our failures have become a yardstick by which others measure their own success.

In order for our CV’s to float to the top of the applications pile, we have to lie about how skilled and successful we are. ‘We hire for character rather than skill’, has become an overused cliché, completely detached from the reality of the job market.

To stir the interest of potential clients, we have to lie about how successful we are. We hire BBB-EE consultants to panel beat our procurement credentials in order to qualify for tenders, and in the process we miss the whole objective of empowerment.

We have to lie about our physical appearance, or run the risk of ending up in the swipe-left-basket of relationships. Terminology such as “catfish” and “Tinder Swindler” have become so blasé on the online dating scene, where deceit is the norm rather than the exception. How can one be expected to differentiate between what is real and what is not, in a world where people’s only interest in you is either based on the popularity of your own online persona, or your ability to advance theirs?

You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.

The words of Lincoln? Even that is no longer certain. It does, however, not change its truth. In “The Twitter” world of today, where even a 280 characters tweet is pushing the boundaries of our attention spans, it simply translates into: ?

Let’s cut the bullshit!

Our existence has become one big fat lie. We live in a world where we paint rainbows and tell stories about the pot of gold at the end of it. Clichés like ‘your personality is more important than your looks’, or ‘if you can dream it you can be it’, or ‘there are more important things in life than money’, are all idealistic and overused by people who have never experienced the sharp end of life.

Words come easy, but actions speak louder. How can we claim that beauty lies within, yet we continue enhancing our physical appearance on social media? How can we tell our children that they can become whatever they put their mind to, and then condemn them when they still drift around aimlessly a decade later? How can we talk about things that are more important than money, when we are not part of the more than 700 million people who have to get by on less than $1.90 a day?

Our idealistic views go a long way to numb our conscience and hide our own insecurities, but it does very little to change the reality of an extremely harsh world where few really care about anyone else before themselves. In order to address the cruelties and injustices that still exist in our world, we have to face up to reality and call out the bullshit for what it really is.

If this article left you uncomfortable my job is half done. Change seldom comes from a place of comfort. Also, the road to hell is paved with good intentions, but until we all start doing what we say rather than saying what we do, the queue at that gate is not getting any shorter.

In the mean time I will attempt to retain my own sanity, by seeking out the uncomplicated, selfless company of man’s best friend.?