Quotations Sunday: The Idea of Society

Random, nameless girl?
This quote was a realisation for me, not a group of words with which I connected with but a sentence that made me think about what I mean when I use the term "society" flippantly when I talk, what we all mean. Because its very easy isn't it? When we have a problem with the workings of the world we explain it by saying "society tells us...", "a product of society", "you're not ugly, society is" etc. I've said it many times in my blog posts and I'll mention the word in many more but when you come to think about it, what is society?

Society is us. Yes you. No matter who you are reading this you are making up the collective term given to the world's population, the different groups of people filling the earth. So when we call society ugly, pressurising and messed up we often refer to it as a seperate entity to which we have no control over. This is totally false. You are as equal a member as any other in this immense and diverse club and so you have the power to change its rules and traditions as much as anyone can. It kind of ties in with this amazing quote:
"Be the change you want to see in the world"
Its easier said than done though, isn't it? We all know what we hate about the world and we all know the type of person we'd love to meet but we don't connect that we can play a role in changing this. If you don't like negativity or bitching then you can shorten its lease in the world by ceasing to partake in it. The media and society are often interlinked so if you feel "society" is ugly because beauty in its eyes is a size zero then the only contribution you can make is to never mock someone for being overweight, or never whine about not being the smallest size, stop liking pictures on tumblr which read "I need to get skinny for summer". Do you see what I mean? There are a billion other examples of course. The change you want to see is peanut butter eradicated? Stop eating it.

Addressing the second quote, (Holy Moly another quote within a quote post, this is like inception!) I feel the change you might want to see in the world applies with people too. You want to meet someone who's a great listener? Become one. You want to meet someone who is patient with you and kind? Be that person to someone else. Its important that we realise that we can't wait for other people to change the world for the better in our eyes. We have to take the first step. You don't have to arrive in as prince charming or God and fix everything that has ever been broken on the globe. You just have to try and follow your honest convictions everyday, if you fail one day just try again the next. Remember to fail better though (I'm integrating so many quotes into this post :P)

However instead of using this quote to beat yourself up or panic because you suddenly think you are the reason for wars, depression and bullying, think of it as an empowering post. Society is not one person or creature, it is you, it is me, it is all of us!  Hopefully you now know that you do not have to watch from the sidelines while a parade of society's products cruise by destroying the path. You can change the world today. You don't need a gun, a mind blowing speech or a license. Just do what is right no matter what.

What's your view on Society?
Love,Rachel!=)

Idealism VS Realism: My thoughts....

The stereotypical view of an idealist and a realist.

I always called myself an idealist. I thought that Realism was essentially another word for boring and my general hobbies and interests pretty much fit the bill for my chosen title. I'm very spiritual, philosophically minded and I hold beliefs that are pretty out there. My future career plans are very unstable and I am a huge supporter of positive thinking- to an extreme point. However, as I delved further into this fascinating topic of Idealism VS Realism I discovered that its not as clear cut as I thought. Just like any thing else in life, I don't think its possible to categorize yourself one hundred percent.

To attempt to define both terms in a basic manner, I think most of us would agree that Idealism is behavior or thoughts based on how things should be or how the person wants them to be with a tendency to be imaginary or visionary.

Realism on the other hand is behavior or thought based on how things are, regardless of how the person wants them to be. Realists are often practical and pragmatic.

I personally agree with both definitions but I think the incorrect belief that I used to hold was that Idealists were very happy and positive people. That life was splendid for them. I also thought that Realists must be depressed because they focused on reading the news(which is rarely uplifting) and were against dreams, etc. How could they ever find pleasure in their lives?

I have now realized that that belief is false in my opinion. Severe idealists in my life are some of the most depressed people I know. And I have recently come to discover that I, myself am a realist in many ways. In many, many others I'm a dreamer, an idealistic dreamer, but now I like to call myself an optimistic realist.

The reason that I feel severe idealistic thinking can lead to depression is because it simply causes disappointment. If you're constantly living in a head full of crazy dreams then you're not going to live in the present and focus on making those dreams into goals. You become disappointed when these dreams didn't fruition and thus feel depressed. I know a proud realist who believes in pushing their problems away, filling their head with good thoughts instead of the niggling obstacles. I don't. This is an idealistic belief which I highly disapprove of. One of my favourite quotes is "The best way out is through". I think that if a problem enters your life it is better to find the positives in it and work through it until you find a solution. That is where my self- denoted title "optimistic realist" comes from. I believe in observing the many opportunities in and using this world to achieve the many, many dreams I have. I think it is achievable for impossible things to come true in this world. I am also well aware that there are terrible things happening in the world. However, these  self- proclaimed "Realists" are very good at talking about how awful and cruel poverty, sex-trafficking and murder is yet I find that there are a lot of angsty talkers out there who simply have a negative attitude but don't bother to do anything about changing things. I don't think a negative attitude is going to help anyone. I adore volunteer work and plan on including it as a big part of my life. However I will never become a cynic because what will that do?? Positively moving towards change is what I plan to accomplish. 

Another idealistic approach to life which I disagree with is the craze of filtering photographs on Instagram or Tumblr and of course photo shop in magazines and such. There is beauty in the world already. I think there are many sights in the world you could take a breath taking picture of without altering it at all. When pictures of people are changed to look 'perfect' I just don't get it? Do you want the whole world to feel inadequate or something? 

All in all, I think it is important to have a balance of the two in your life because if you're either extreme, you're missing out on a lot. My favourite idealistic thought is that nothing is impossible. What isn't normal/ possible now could well be in the future if we make it. And that's within us too. Just because realistically we should have insecurities and hate people doesn't mean that you can't change that for yourself. Its idealistic but totally possible. We all need to be genuine when we go through life though. Like the infamous Kanye West said, we need to "suffer from realness" and my interpretation of that is eliminating fakeness, because there's nothing worse than faking a positive attitude.  So in my view its a draw, I'm going to keep on dreaming but I'm never going to lose the world around me either.

Now its over to you guys, in your opinion

Which side wins?

Love,

Rachel!=)