You’ll Attract More Bees With Honey Than With Vinegar

-or-

If you’re not a part of the solution, you’re a part of the problem.


"Addressing the verbal excrement cannoneers in the obscure fleet of equivocation:
Cavilled quibble is futile. Please adjust anticipated trajectory elsewhere."


There have always been and there will always be people out there that participate in cataclysmic disembowlment, through petty means, pointing out the flawed conceptual ground they wish to change. Some do it just for the sole reason of doing it (read: entertainment) while some don’t know how to adjust the source they wish to see improvements in to a more constructive way. It often ends up with greater annoyance from both parties; equal annoyance from the discontent initiator of change and the perceived nequient changee. Perpetual conversational disagreement will, in fact, not improve one’s karma, regardless to the topic at hand and the level of unjustness it may or may not contain. The proper way to address a problem is not by pointing fingers and looking for things to complain about. It’s not “the more flaws pointed at, the greater the chance of a change there’ll be”. In actuality, doing so most often detours the receiving end from the actual problem and one will not be accounted with any credibility. Nitpicking seldom earns the respect needed to be taken as a serious attempt to constructively change anything; only a way to start much unneeded rivalry that in practice only enlarges the rift between the factions. Isn’t that the opposite of the original intent?

So, how does one safeguard that the dialogue doesn’t turn into an abysmal monologue? What one must consider when seeking a change is if the problems one experiences is a primary or a secondary flaw, meaning if the issue you see is the root or just a by-product of something else. With accurate aim and a constructive approach, one will have a greater chance of seeing something being done rather than merely abrasively grinding the patience down with the help of a hard, grainy surface.
With this short introduction, let’s get to the point. If you wish for a change, appeal the source with proper manners and presentation to encourage it to work in a direction of change you’d appreciate. Don’t aggravate it by poking it with a mile long stick while screaming accusingly in a megaphone. That only exacerbates the problem.


- Kaffe Myers for the Feb issue of Trend, 2008