Παρασκευή, Οκτωβρίου 16, 2015

The Love Speech

This week I had the chance to attend an interesting and almost "strange" two-days, international conference. The major discussion was about the hate speech and the liberty of expression. I enjoyed the sessions even though this is neither my field of studies nor my professional background. But since social media have intervened so much into our lifestyle, i suppose that this is nowadays everyone's field and background. You see, there is no one around us without a single social media account. I have almost 30 and I am using them depending on my mood. If i assume that everyone else is doing the same, i expect to detect some hate speech and too much liberty of expression. 
Considering that our world has become more advanced and globalized hate of speech seems to be more of a left over. But no. This is not the case. Hate speech is everywhere around us. In our everyday life, shopping or hopping on a bus, watching a tv show or reading a newspaper, talking to a stranger or talking to a loved one. But i started wondering...Where has the love speech gone?
Are we really so busy of finding some minutes to express ourselves or we have just forgotten how to talk to each other? Are we incapable of talking with kindness to other human beings or it is just a phase where symbols and emoticons do the job? Why did we became so vulgar?What changes so significantly within us that we cannot talk freely to the people we used to share our deepest thoughts with? Is it the perception we have about them or the perception they have about us that shifts our speech from the one side to the other? And if it is none of the above, will we ever be able to speak to each other freely again? 
Mind the gaps: liberty of expression does not mean absolute truth or honesty. Love speech is not always based on feelings of love too.   
A.

Σάββατο, Οκτωβρίου 10, 2015

A place in the sun...

Who doesn't know and who doesn't like Morrissey? Haven't met yet a person that didn't whispered a few lyrics once in a while. So do I. 
A place in the sun is all one should ask for. And this is not because I was born Greek and was used to have an endless sun on my face. It is mostly because of the sun that will warm our souls. The sun that will come into our life and there will be no more darkness, no more shadows. A sun that will make everything brighter, even if it is not supposed to be. Happiness again, it always comes down to this particular pursue. The pointless need to identify the things around us as good or bad, happy or miserable, needs and musts. A list that can fill pages with its contrasts and its different elements. 
But once again c'est la vie.
The sun. The warmth that cures it all. A little sentiment that brings along memories of summers in love, lunches with friends next to the sea, walking at the pier watching couples sharing hugs or fights of jealousy, opening the curtains and having a home full of its light, drinking a coffee and thinking nothing at all, or walking to the office for a stressful day and thinking what if you skipped that meeting...
Or simply a sun that we carry within us. One little star full of warmth and light that can brighten someone's life. The happiness we look for maybe is the one we carry inside our heart and it just waits for the right persons to find it. And then we can become their place in the sun. 
But once again that's life, sun will come and go. 
So do people.

A.


Τετάρτη, Οκτωβρίου 07, 2015

People with dreams are scary.




It has been a full week for me. Full of sentiments, changes and obligations. Usually this type of week is never a good period for thinking. But still, the human brain is so multitasking that fits it all inside. And that is so annoying. Especially when all you want to do is close your eyes and dream. 
Dreams, a favorite habit. Most people do that but the ones that are seriously dreaming are the scariest people alive. It must be the easiness with which they plan everything or the ability to walk through nightmares totally safe and sound. These little scenes of imagination are a piece of personal confessions never said and never written. Silent needs that demand their realization and we try so hard to make them go away, so hard that we make ourselves wake up in the middle of the night. That's why most of the dreams never have an ending, eternally hanging on to be continued during the next sleep or remaining a faint memory that no one can list in the real life or the subconscious part of us.  
People with dreams are not worried. They can see their dreams falling apart and at the same time they can make them work again or create new ones from scratch. They can share their dreams, they can mingle them, they can change them or they can offer them to someone who needs it more. In any case they are creating their own world and they settle inside until the real one is safe for them. People with dreams are afraid to meet the truth. They dare to jump in fiction and walk through streets of the unknown but they are threatened by the darkness of the world. The darkness that fills the human brain, that multitasking brain that never stops finding ways to ruin a dream. People with dreams are afraid that they might lose their ability to dream. Too much blood comes out of the great dreams that died.
People with dreams, glorious and amazing dreams are usually the ones to be laughed at. People with dreams are the ones that still search for the perfect piece that will fill their puzzled life and make everything work out magically. People with dreams do not need to close their eyes, they do not feel sorry for missing something ordinary, they do not hesitate. People with dreams chase the things that we cannot imagine. They are the people that we are feeling jealous of and yet we do not applause them because it is too romantic, to vain, to pointless to dream in a world like ours. 
People with dreams are never alone. They have friends in their little universe, friends that are caring and are always present. They have perfect houses and huge families. They have careers and they have "eaten" the world. Many things to do in the everyday life and no hurt feelings at all. 
The people that have dreams have also happiness. Lot of happiness. Because they know that they have something to search for. They know that they have still something to hope for. They have still faith in life. People with dreams are never alone. 
But that's the scariest thing about them; Happiness is always pending.
A.