Thoughts on changing the world

"I am a change agent. I must be the change I wish to see in the world."

This phrase haunts me. At first, the phrase was innocent, motivational, thought provoking. But somewhere in the force-fed curriculum thrust at me from all directions, it turned into something of a vile dissatisfaction with the world. First, all of these imperfections with society were exploited as "social problems" that must be fixed. Next, all the ways to fix these problems were presented with smiling faces. And so the thought process began. And over and over again, I practiced identifying "social problems", "ways to fix them, and then developed a plan to intervene and change the world. Maybe that was just my reaction. But it began to seep into my every day thoughts on everything, and now all I see in the world around me are social problems.

Here's what I've been struggling with: this thought process comes from a complex that says "the world is not good enough!". It's synonymous with arrogant dissatisfaction. And they wonder why social workers burnout?? I have a chronic dissatisfaction with everything that isn't as I want it to be. I'm finding there's a big, big difference between helping people and trying to change people.

Here's the thought process that makes more sense to me: the world simply is the way it is. people are the way they are. and i'm not on this earth to change that. i'm on this earth to be a part of that. and things do change, things do evolve, and i'm a part of that too.

"If there's one thing that's certain, it's that everything I see of the world outside is so inconceivable often I barely can speak"