EVEN A SMALL STAR SHINES IN THE DARKNESS


 

 

“When the spirit shines,

even the foggy skies make pleasant light.”

Abraham Isaac Kook

 

Both, joy and despair, are contagious… They spread very fast. But, in my experience, the despair spreads faster than joy. That seems to be the reason why we have so much negativity – the dark sensationalism – on our television news. Even on social media, what mostly gets viral is the negative content…

This human psychology is manipulated to the hilt by the brains behind the social media algorithm… Just watch one video or post, that’s enough to open the floodgates of similar posts and videos. The mind is simply manipulated by this dangerous engineering… One happy video will be followed by a hundred more, and one gloomy story will be followed by not hundred, but a thousand more!




Two nights ago, our son explained to my wife and me the meaning of these two terms (apparently popular in psychology): the ‘triggers’ and the ‘glimmers’. On finding us, that evening, repeatedly watching many old episodes of The Ellen Show featuring happy, little kids and how it had made both of us feel so joyful, so light, our son asked us: “Do you know what’s making you watch these shows repeatedly? They are called ‘glimmers’… They are the opposite of ‘triggers’. While ‘triggers’ open the floodgates of despair and darkness, the ‘glimmers’ open the floodgates of joy and lightness.”

How true, this simple human psychology is!

We need to get in touch with the triggers of our despair and darkness and consciously stay away from them. What we watch, or listen to, continuously – if they are dark stories of hate, fear and conspiracy – we have to remember, that they have been fed to us relentlessly by the manipulative brains behind the social media algorithm.

To get into a happy, optimistic state of mind, we need to choose our ‘glimmers’ consciously – something small, something like these kids on The Ellen Show. That’s from where the common English phrase – ‘Glimmer of Hope’ - has come…

Yes, ‘glimmers’ are the opposite of ‘triggers’. Both are like the tiny stars in the sky… While triggers can take the daylight out of our souls, the ‘glimmers’ can turn our darkest nights into the brightest…




Let’s take this cue… the next time we choose to watch a story on social media…

 

GERALD D’CUNHA

 

Pic’s:  Pixabay

 

Video: TheEllenShow

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