Passion Power

Progressivism claims to be a movement that aims to represent the interests of ordinary people.  I’m not so sure about that. We are living in an era with more fences and security, more protests, and clashes.  The media separates us into different camps.  The working class versus elites, left versus right, black versus white. It’s a profitable strategy to have us pitted against each other where we hate and blame each other for things the ‘ordinary’ person has not participated in like systemic racism, indigenous residential schools, or islamophobia. If you disagree with the mainstream narrative, you’re a bigot. If you call it out, you’re a racist.  They shut down voices of reason that are contrary to what they subscribe to. Where is the open-mindedness and tolerance in that?  These virtue signallers have a hidden agenda. To prop up “group think” and clusters of mobs like Black Lives Matter and the LBGTQ communities to sell discourse and create division. They like t...

I used to tell my kids that watching too much TV will make their brain turn to mush.   I wonder what parents are telling their kids these days when it comes to their devices.   Keeping kids off technology is next to impossible.   I applaud every parent who is trying to do so, especially during Covd where, a year later we are still stuck in our homes — and increasingly stuck behind our screens.   We must be flexible enough to evolve with the technology but choose how to use it right. Apple is hands down, my favourite company in the world.   It has made our lives better, easier, and more efficient and we cannot overstate how useful these devices are.   Yet for every plus there is a minus. When we spend too much time on our phone, we miss what’s happening in front of us and lose connection with our surroundings.   The average screen time in 2020 was 7 hours a day.   Technology overload is detrimental to a person’s mind. Establish some “house rules”...

What choice do companies have but to use Amazon?  Afterall, it's where the world is going. Everybody’s doing it.  Amazon takes large cuts up to 30% to sell on their platform. We haven’t seen those margins in tech since the nineties. The stock has increased by 80%.  Sales have gone up 40% and Jeff Bezos personal wealth has clocked staggering growth of $58 Billion last year and so far, the money ‘ain’t trickling down.’   Did you know that Amazon avoids paying their share of property and payroll tax? Through aggressive bargaining tactics, they erode the local tax base in communities where extra resources are necessary to support a large warehouse fulfillment centre such as wear and tear on the roads, emergency assistance, police, fire, ems and schools. Before you click you may want to think about what life is going to be look like for the working class in years to come if the vast majority are forced into Amazon warehouses in non-union environments. These are physically...

A good friend is like a four-leaf clover, hard to find and lucky to have. There is mutual trust that builds up in lifelong friends. William Shakespeare wrote, “a friend is one that knows you as you are, understands where you have been, accepts what you have become and still, gently allows you to grow.”   I also believe that friendship is the secret sauce to a lasting marriage. There are many obligations in life and friendship should not be one of them. Friends aren’t there to live up to our expectations. If you put too much pressure on a friendship it will fizzle away. Friendships evolve as people do.   If we don’t see each other in a while we can pick up where we left off.   Sometimes we must forgive our friends because the friendship is more important than the grudge. I have friendship requirements, but it doesn’t matter what your status is.   You have to be a fairly positive person and a decent human being.   No haters and no victims. You must accept me...

I have no idea how to have a caring conversation with someone who always plays the victim card.   Am I the only one? Victims feel sorry for themselves and blame other people. Yes of course there are genuine victims that we must help.   Then there are fake victims who have this underlying envy and an inventory of excuses for why they can’t have what they want.   People who can’t see the forest through the trees have a thick layer of denial.   That’s a hole I won’t be climbing into anytime soon. I recognize that every situation requires a response from me and although my first impulse may be to blame someone else or feel sorry for myself, I remind myself that it will not give me what I want. At some point you have to jump into the driver’s seat and create the life you want rather than make excuses for why your life is unsatisfying.   A victim mentality lets you take the moral high ground.   All it really is if you look at it is the refusal to take respons...

  I have always treated new years as a fresh start.   Like God hit the reset button and gave us all a new beginning.   So why is it already mid-January and I haven’t made a single goal for 2021.   There is no plan. I don’t really like it very much.   It seems perfectly reasonable to make new year’s resolutions and if you are all about positive change as I am, you plan out the year.   Without goals we are tossed around like a flag in a windstorm, right?   It seems unfathomable to just see what happens. What kind of crap is that? My husband’s resolution every year is just to be better than he was the year before. I ask him to be more specific, but he says no to me every time.   Last year a global pandemic, completely out of our control thrusted us into this abyss that we are still trying to climb out of.   It taught me that life is unpredictable.   We’ve had to learn how to adapt to new conditions, overcome challenges and improvise...

 How is a person with disabilities, mental health issues and addictions supposed to improve their lot in life when the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP) benefits get clawed back whenever they go out and work for extra income.  We discriminate because we don’t understand the struggle is real for so many Canadians trying to live on $1100 per month or less. Under this benefit, they can earn an extra $200 per month before the government starts clawing back the benefits. With no incentives, no encouragement, job coaching or family support such as transportation or childcare for example, how is it possible that someone can lift that boot off their neck?   It takes a toll on someone’s health trying to get basic needs met, trying to reach out to people who do not listen, trying to do the right thing and make good decisions.  Throw in some addiction, depression and violence and you have yourself a taste of what it is like living hand to mouth year after year afte...