Define 'A Nation' Please!

Co-creating a sustainable future: it is serious business.

During the past few weeks I’ve attempted to tease readers by trying to hone in on one question: “what calls for thinking?” I tried to set the stage for that question by sharing a few thoughts on how anyone might approach the creation, or drafting, of a roadmap, or a project plan, by which they could then go from here-to-there.  In order to create such a roadmap, however, the group, or individual, must accurately and completely define their “Current State” (or, perhaps using a more inviting metaphor) “Point of Departure.”  In perusing comments here and on other discussion boards, I don’t think many of us are ready to do the very hard work of defining without bias, completely and fully: the ME-CE (“me see!) Way, (a.k.a., “the McKinsey Way”). I still believe we ought.

And, so I feel compelled to try to find a new way, because I believe that it is critical that we are on the way, always on the way… or else we die, we become the living dead. What I would like to do is share something I came across in my studies; and, then to ask a question or two:

“Some day it will be permissible to ask, and possibly to answer the question, ‘Who were the Americans?’ At present what concern us more are the twin questions, - ‘Who are the Americans?’ and ‘What are they in the process of coming to be?’”

The quotation comes from a history book that I highly recommended: Who Were the Greeks, written by J. L. Myres, and published in 1930. In précis, doesn’t his remark near-fully capture, almost entirely subsume, those questions that so pointedly challenge us, each and every one of us, about what our nation is; was intended to be<come>; and, where it is now stuck, paralyzed? The challenge, which once it comes into the clearing and is examined under brilliant sunlight, from which moment’s pellucid clarity, we then begin almost immediately to retreat, that which we did not willingly want to face.

Myres refers to Herodotus’s four (4) criteria of nationality (readers with the “traditional, classical educational background will re-remember this), viz:

“Community of descent, community of language, community of religious belief and ritual, and a common mode of thought and behavior in everyday life; these are the signs by which a nation is known, and the bonds which make it one and indissoluble.”

Does, or will, knowing the answers to the implied question help our conversation. (Keeping in mind that a conversation is a dance with words, a dance with partner(s) using language to build world) Will it help us more clearly define our present-Here, so that we might better, more caringly define our desired-There?With that as your touchstone, can you help me define our nation as it is; as it should be: as to its currept, intended, and desired characteristics? Our national characteristics: are they in accord with those put forth by Herodotus? If not, what’s different, what’s changed?

Last night I watched “Harry’s Law”. [I like Kathy Bates (despite “the hammer scene”: I walked out - sorry)]. The thread that ran through one plotline emphasized our national need to be “inclusive”. What does and would/might “inclusiveness” mean for us as we plan for the next 50 years (or, even the next decade), as we try to dislodge our nation and ourselves from this politically-(un)inspired, partisan paralysis.

It is my hope that by posting this piece that you, dear reader, will help me better understand. [Again, a “conversation” is a dance with words]. This isn’t me as a Republican asking or as a Dem: just “a guy” concerned and curious.

For my part moving forward, I’m going to start using “tapestry," and weaving, as the primary, living metaphor for solving and healing our everyday maladies. {So, please: if there are any who can teach me how to build a miniature high-warp loom, and (more important) to not butcher the precise, verbal description of creating “a tapestry of the sustainable, inclusive world”, I will be eternally grateful}. Regardless, I hope you will help me move this dialogue, this conversation along, and help me make the metaphor come to life and “touch ground” – which isn’t always the easiest thing to accomplish.