Gratitude over Privilege

 

In this ever-changing political climate we are faced with how we view the world around us and how we choose to consciously or most of the time unconsciously act in it. To think that all of us have equal experiences is not true. There are near infinite amount of stories of how we have gotten to where we are today. Most of the time for the better. Sometimes for the worst. 

There is lots of talk of privilege in this heated era. Some people flaunt it and other people like to point it out like its some type of disease or something to feel guilty about. Most people don't even factor in that maybe their so called privilege is why the way they and where they are today. When told to check your privilege, you are thrown into a manipulated world view where you should feel responsible for having more just because of your past, color of your skin, gender or some phenotype like trait that may distinguish your from a certain group. All in all, the concept of privilege relies heavily on comparison and a loose and amorphous hierarchical structure that relies on an oppressor/oppressed paradigm mingled in with imbalances and struggles of power. 

If you take the concept of privilege to its logical conclusion, you will find out that you there are infinite ways to make yourself seemed more or less privileged based on people with more secure and stable backgrounds and genetic histories. It's designed to limit. It derives worth from most things that you cannot control. If you had more control of how you looked, where you grew up or what your family unit looked like then you could theoretically make more of a case for the Descending Myth of Privilege. You can acknowledge privilege all you want, but does it really change or add to your self worth? If anything it can give you a perspective even if its uncomfortable, but at the end of the day there are only so many things that you can control and some people will always view you as a fixed identity with little to no mystified nuance. 

If you look for privilege somewhere, you will see it everywhere. 

Taking privilege into consideration, we can learn to challenge its conflicting paradigm with the concept of gratitude. It's the small things in life that we take for granted and not acknowledge that add up to where we are today. If we are grateful and we express gratitude even if it is within our heads, we can fundamentally change how we see ourselves and other people around us. Gratitude doesn't thrive on comparison. Gratitude takes into account the ones around you, but is not dependent on them. You can be grateful for the mere act of breathing and it doesn't rely on some oppressive power structure or group of people waiting to vilify or validate you. No man is an island, but self awareness and gratitude is highly contagious and definitely something that can set us on a good path away from negativity and division. 

The idea of privilege thrives on measurement and the ability to look at things through a lens of conflicting experiences. It creates a false sense of value for an individual and most of the time puts a group before the individual. A person of "considerable privilege" can be lumped in with other people of the same status, but will have so much variation between personality, temperament, intelligence and physical ability. There tends to be more variety within one group than compared with other competing groups.  At the end of the day, it's much easier to label someone and judge them than trying to understand the workings of their actions and level of awareness. 

Privilege most of the time relies on an analysis of material conditions tied to the past. Gratitude deals more in the realm of the conceptual and transcends the need for discernment or labels. Gratitude is close to being eternal and ever expanding. 

It's really not constructive to compare privilege and gratitude because that would just create more conflict. Gratitude has no guilt mechanisms and no costs to the person that practices it. You can take any self perceived bad event and be grateful for it because you have grown from it. The act of gratitude acknowledgement allows for more growth. To peer within the unconscious and learn from our actions, mistakes and misgivings. There are infinite things to be grateful for even if its something that we think would be silly to be grateful for like jealousy, anger or spite. We can acknowledge these emotions and feelings as teachers for own personal self discovery and growth. Since gratitude is non-judgmental (unlike privilege), you can full feel and accept emotions even if they hurt or aren't exactly kittens and gumdrops. 

Remember, to define is to limit. 

There are no bells, whistles or methods for gratitude. You can practice it however you like. It just takes a few moments of gratitude to get the ball rolling. 

One of the first steps forward in switching from a privilege lens to a gratitude filter relies on the act of observation. We may catch ourselves at times judging people on what they they think and act and then holding them to some type of world view or standard. How necessary is this in expanding our own sense of self awareness? If we observe and be grateful for these visiting thoughts and bursts of energy, then we can transform our own perception. We can turn a self perceived critical and negative thought process into something new. Something refreshing that allows us to un-clench our jaws and see with unclouded eyes. We get so caught up in the "I" that we tend to forget how we can learn from each waking moment. 

Gratitude is based around unity while Privilege tends to be more of a Great Divider. Gratitude does not need nor function very well when there is a hierarchy. Privilege depends on a top to bottom analysis of measurement, comparison and power. Yet here I am comparing the two when I could just be grateful for what I am experiencing at this moment. When we get caught in the web of analysis we tend to lose that playfulness and spontaneous curiosity. The dance turns into a list of moves to make with our body. How can we live and experience if we are never truly in the present to begin with? 

DG