Speaking of Change

My life is very different from what it was a week ago -- and in fact, only 24 hours ago, when I completed the filing of nomination papers to run for the Representative of District 21 (Waikiki-Kapahulu) of the Hawaii House of Representatives. I pulled (obtained) the nomination papers only a previous 24 hours before filing it -- after exhausting all the other possibilities over the last two years as Republican district chair.

People in the neighborhood were just turned off to political participation, wanting very little to do with it -- which is really the greatest indictment against the present status quo. That is what I noticed about all the political forums -- and even many other kinds, that seemed to think that Robert’s Rules of Order, facilitates communications and decision-making -- rather than prevents it. Those rules are essentially about maintaining the order of the status quo -- by not being able to talk about those things we should be talking about, and questioning authority.

The field of exercise and conditioning is probably most people’s earliest recollection of the experience in their lives in which they were forced to do things because somebody else was bigger, stronger and claimed to know more than they -- as the justification for their unchallenged right to tell everybody else what to do. Those are the roots of physical education pedagogy (and less obviously, all other education) -- now called by fancy names and designating themselves with fancy titles, outrageous salaries and inviolable tenure. But everybody intimately involved with sport, athletics and performance knows, it doesn’t matter how many certifications, licenses, degrees and belts one has; all that matters is what one does, and most importantly, how one does it.

World champions don’t do more; they actually do less -- because they have perfected the economy and efficiency of motion (movement). That is why the current popular notion of exercise to burn (waste) the most time and energy, doesn’t make one the world champion, or look like one. That is what is striking about seeing a master in any field -- the absence of any wasted motion. In writing, all words that are unnecessary, are omitted. “Better” is not simply more of that which is bad and incompetent. That doesn’t make one more fit for anything worthwhile and productive.

If anything, one merely conditions themselves to do what somebody else tells them to do unquestioningly -- because the other supposedly knows better. And that should always be questioned, particularly since one has virtually the same access to information as most researchers now, and maybe even more since one as a general consumer, is free to peruse all the information rather than just the “approved” sources. Paradigms fall and are replaced by others -- because all the “experts” were wrong, because they largely went along with what the agreed upon head expert said was true, and they were conditioned not to question that authority.

Challenging authority has always been an integral part of my character make-up -- on some deeply fundamental level. As I see things done, I instinctively wonder, is that the only way it can be done? Much of bad education (conditioning) is this thinking that there is only one way to do things, one way to see things -- after the self-chosen experts have determined that “consensus.” They have effectively chosen that there should be no further questioning and challenges to the authority -- when really, the whole beauty, authority and authenticity of sport and performance, is always the challenge to the established order.

The master has to prove anew that he is still the master -- and not just riding his reputation as an entitlement until the day he dies. Hopefully before then, he has chosen to retire at the time and circumstance of their own choosing -- and even identified a worthy successor -- to take that teaching on to the next level of evolution. Wisdom is not meant to be merely worshipped, repeated and ritualized -- but improved; that is wisdom.

For the purpose of giving greater focus to the study and art of campaigning, I will be writing mainly on my campaign blog http://repmikehu.blogspot.com/ , until the elections are over in November -- and then who knows what thereafter. I’m not thinking beyond that; in fact, if the truth be known, I don’t think too far beyond the next 24 hours. That allows me to be more fully there -- in that moment. In that moment, the past, present, and future converge into reality -- and that is what makes a difference.

As intense a period as it may be, it is still only about 100 days -- with a definitive conclusion, until we can all collapse across the finish line at the same time. But that’s what conditioning and fitness is all about -- the real purposes we put all those preparations and practice to use at. I wouldn’t have foreseen this present development a year ago when I began this, my first blog, as prelude to my third as the definitive campaign blog tool, I will undoubtedly make of it. That’s just my style.

I’m not creating newspapers; newspapers are creating blogs -- and so are all the old media. Political campaigns have become very costly -- done in the traditional manner -- much of which I don’t think is very cost-effective. Everyone guffaws at my suggestion of “Mike Hu’s homemade campaign,” to which I reply, “Everybody is authorized and approved to run my campaign the way they want to -- and I’m not stopping them, because I want it to be the People’s Campaign.”

Of the 5,000 votes I need to win -- all I need to contact are 2,500, who can convince one other. If they are very influential and can convince two others, my effectiveness has to be with 1,250 (Not quite but for imagery purposes). So the quality of those contacts have to be enhanced to the extent that it motivates another besides themselves. That is the magic of high-impact communications -- rather than words like so many others one immediately recognizes to toss into the waste receptacle as having no meaning but only well-polished form.

Getting people to act on their own initiative and confidence, is the ultimate objective of every teaching.