Beverley Anderson-Manley

The ending of a year and the beginning of another can be a reminder that there are really no endings and beginnings - just the onward process of life and that, to a large extent, human beings can intervene in that process either as victims or as empowered human beings. The nature of the interventions, in turn, is based on such factors as early socialisation and the capacity to think.

People who live from an empower-ment perspective are conscious that they have choices no matter the circumstances. Victims, on the other hand, feel that they have no power over circumstances and that things happen to them and it is always someone else's fault. This type of projection has only one result - a perpetual. downward vicious cycle into nowhere but darkness.

CLEARING CLUTTER

For example - perhaps in choosing our behaviours this year, we could begin, by taking responsibility right where we are for our 'corner' of this extraordinary country. In whatever way we can, let us begin to clear up the clutter that we help to create on a daily basis. This applies to clutter and mess wherever it exists in our lives - mentally or physically. The clutter could be in our homes - our closets, our desks or our gardens. It could be in our communities and the ways in which we dispose of our garbage. It could be among policy makers who need to be thinking of new ways of keeping our country clean, or public sector workers at any level who get paid to keep our surroundings healthy and clean.

Most importantly, we could begin by clearing up the clutter in our minds - in our thinking. Clearing up mess and clutter allows for space that helps us to have creative thoughts so that we build rather than destroy; take responsibility rather than projecting unto others. Most importantly, when clutter is cleared, there is the possibility of space for us to create other ways to behave that are more beneficial to ourselves, our relationships and therefore the entire Jamaica.

LIVING IN A CREATIVE SPACE

This approach to life can lead to the type of virtuous circles that we need if Jamaica is to be wealthy and prosperous. We have to begin to think on an ongoing basis that it is possible to have a country where women and men can create wealth that ensures a decent living and opportunities for everyone. We have to begin to so change our mindset that we create an environment that is safe for our children so that they are not burnt in fires because of neglect or physically or sexually abused. We have to begin to think differently so that our young men who are both the perpetuators and victims of crime have a reason to live and not to die. We have to create a system within which our women and men are not reduced to seeing begging as their only hope of survival.

We can begin to think differently no matter the circumstances that engulf us. We have to get to the stage where we can refuse to live in the same old way, and are willing to do whatever is necessary to see ourselves differently and therefore see Jamaica and our world differently.

As human beings we do have the capacity to use our creative imagina-tion to look beyond our current reality and create a Jamaica that works for everyone - when enough of us are tired of projecting onto others; when enough of us are tired of living in a country with such high rates of disorder and murder; when enough of us are tired of corruption and participating in it; when enough of us are ashamed of mediocrity. It is then and only then that things will begin to change fundamentally. The good news and simultaneously the bad news is that the process begins with us as individuals and our willingness to transform ourselves and take responsibility for our lives.

Endings are beginnings and beginnings are endings.