The ‘Why’ Of ‘A New Future’

Start Point #1

Anyone who knows me knows I’ll sometimes get annoyed or frustrated or something similar. And what prompts those feelings in me are complaints, moans, beefs and the like – especially when they’re to do with politics. Fine – a good moan means you’re letting off steam to some extent. But beyond that … complaining is easy and talk is cheap. What are you actually doing to change whatever it is you’re moaning about?

Start Point #2

I had a choice. I could have studied any two out of three degree topics: history, politics, law. Say it myself, I was good at history; I had no experience of the other two. So I picked the other two.

With ‘Getting Directions’ I’m trying to understand what’s made me who I am. That choice of what to study is typical me, illustrates me. I’ve always been like that. A challenge motivates me.

I’m only human. To get me to attempt it, a challenge has to be something that I find interesting. That begs questions about why something does or doesn’t fire me up. The answer is elusive.

Somehow or another, you learn your strengths and your interests and what stimulates. At root, perhaps it’s a nature/nurture issue. I don’t know. A topic to return to, in its own right.

Start Point #3

I think I gain some confidence from my own consistency. Things I find interesting and stimulating have remained remarkably consistent over time. They’ve evolved – and you’d hope they would – but within a stable overall context. I take confidence from the fact that I’m not flitty.

(An exception is food other than the necessary. That’s a wholly different topic which I promise I’ll expand upon one day.)

(Of course, a downside to being consistent over time is that I think others must find me boring … and that I find myself boring too. Hey ho.)

Start Point #4

So, talk is cheap. So it’s money and mouth time. If I’m thinking things need to change in the politics of Britain (or more widely), then what am I going to do about it? Or am I just another moaner?

And if I am going to ‘do something’, then what? Whoever you are and whatever you’re doing in life, it makes sense to both understand and then play to your strengths.

Start Point #5

I used to smoke, cigarettes, a lot. And I mean A Lot. I loved it. I’d always say I’d give up if I ever started coughing. After almost-to-the-month 30 years of smoking, quite happily 60 a day in adult life, I started coughing. So I gave up. Overnight. I called my own bluff. (And in case you’re wondering, no, giving up wasn’t easy. But it was worthwhile.)

And that’s how I am feeling about politics. If I think political life in Britain (at least) is no longer appropriate, then I should do something about it – that or shut up about it. Merely moaning is, at best, a tad tedious.

Quite what I should do I don’t know. I might have a long-standing interest in politics, and one way or another politics might have been a major factor in what’s made me who and how I am today, but I’m not an academic, nor a researcher, nor a politician. I’ll have to experiment and investigate as I go.

So, Let’s Start

That’s the bundle of strands wrapping themselves up into ‘A New Future’.

And as politics (in the broadest sense) has and continues to loom so large, unbidden, in my day-to-day life, it feels that thinking about it sits appropriately within the overall context of ‘Getting Directions’. Politics has been formative.

And as with all other aspects of ‘Getting Directions’, I’m willing to make my workings-out public, as I go.

Think of this explanation as giving the back-story, the ‘why’ of it. ‘A New Future’ will crop up in its own right from now on, as ‘Getting Direction’ progresses. Welcome to A New Future.