The Costumed (Superficial/Shallow/Artificial/ Posturing) Society

People confuse appearances with deeper reality.  Perhaps it comes from misconstruing popular memes and sayings such as “If you believe it you achieve it,” “You can have anything you want if you dress for it,” or “If you want to be noticed, dress the part.”  Perhaps we are simply trained to focus on the superficial and to believe that if we get the superficial right, then we have succeeded in getting that which lies below the superficial right as well.  Nothing could be farther from the truth.

First example:

When someone has denied sexual allegations, does his resigning, being fired, or even committing suicide as a result of those unproven allegations make the women who made them feel empowered?  Perhaps it makes them feel momentarily powerful, but they are anything but empowered.  Instead, they have revealed a lack of empowerment in their absence from coming forward  or taking appropriate action at the time of the offense and more importantly in their inability to use the legal system or other procedural means that provide them the ability to prove their allegations definitively and receive true justice.  Instead of their own empowerment, they simply rely on the current nurturing of such claims by media and others, sometimes for their shock value alone and sometimes as a way of removing or destroying those whom are disliked.  That has nothing to do with true empowerment of women.

Second example:

People are encouraged if not often required by school, job, etc., to do some sort of good work and then broadcast their good works to others as if this is some sort of proof of their inner goodness.  It is not.  Yes, some people who do good deeds in the form of some sort of public or community service are good people within their souls, but that is not necessarily so.  Others may do good works because they are required to do so or because they believe that their good works are a way to advance their own agendas or simply their own popularity and acceptance.  That has nothing to do with true inner goodness.

You may ask “Really what difference does it make?  The “me too” allegations (even if some are less than accurate or taken out of context) are making people aware of the problem of sexual harassment and even good works done with less than good motives still serve the people to whom they are directed.” 

While that may be true, it is also an acceptance that ends justify means.  But in this case the perceived ends are only that – a perceived reality that sees only a superficial and whimsical truth.  There is a huge difference between outer dressing and truly meaningful actions.  Just as fashions change, so too do societal trends; what is meaningful today may be insignificant tomorrow.  Women who are feeling powerful as they see their allegations have major impacts on the lives of the men accused may not feel so powerful when society takes a different view of such allegations.  But, if the focus of “me too” was instead to truly empower women with an inner strength that is not dependent on the whims of society or the strength of others, then that empowerment would remain regardless of the current posturing of society. 

Similarly, while any good works are helpful at the time they are done, if they are only done because that is the current fashion of society, then they can end when the designs of society change.  If we encourage good works only for superficial or selfish reasons we are doing nothing to create good persons within themselves who would choose to do good works regardless of the current trends and whims of society.  Hence those good works and their benefit to those served could easily end, whereas if we were more concerned with creating truly good people then those works would be far more likely to remain permanently ongoing. 

Posturing is not Being.  I can put on costumes that make me most anything, but who I am is the person with all the costumes removed.  It is who I am in my soul.  That inner being is what gives me strength, not the clothes I put on; it is what gives me whatever goodness I may have, not the clothes that I put on.  Yet, society seems to be dazzled only by the clothes, the costumes.  We think that they are the definition of whom we are.  We think that our costumes alone will define and sustain our world.  Yet, at some point those costumes fall away and we are all left with a deeper reality that we must face.

It seems that today so many fear facing that inner reality, and so they simply don more and more costumes, costumes that make themselves and others feel good, but which can be discarded anytime at their own or society’s caprice.  The souls of so many in society seem empty, yet they do not understand that superficial costumes and actions will not fill them up.  And so, society itself begins to lose its soul.

We all need to step back from the daily hysteria, posturing, and shallow if not artificial interests and behaviors of our society.  We need to take some time to focus on what lies beneath the surface, in ourselves, our children, and our society.  We need to forget our costumes and nurture our souls.  For it is only that inner and deeper truth that empowers us and our society, giving us all a better and more meaningful reality.