What does it mean to honor someone? What must one do to truly demonstrate that they honor a great figure, or a movement? These are questions generally glossed by, generally ignored for some reason, and thus the case is made that many times when people think that they are living a life of honor towards a person or cause they are actually not. It is not their fault though, in a sense they are responsible on some primary level but when one is never taught how one should honor another he/she should not be held responsible for not knowing how to go about doing so. We've broken down what it means to honor, and hope that this might be helpful to some and encourage others to live a life of honor.
Reflection
We celebrated Dr. King this past Monday, within this celebration we remember all that he did, his struggles, his speeches, his fights, and his death. We pause from all that we do and reflect on who the man was, thinking about his flaws, his strengthens, and learning from them. Reflecting on something while honoring it means that you not only gloss over information about a figure, no, you truly meditate on a person, on his/her life, on their accomplishments, and learn from them. In doing so you honor their life, you honor their memory and hard-work. Reflection becomes a tool of honor only when you reflect on the past in order to improve yourself, only when you sit down and think "what would this person want me to learn from them?", this is what it means to meditate and honor a past life.
Reflection can take place many different ways, one could simply buy a biography of the person you wish to honor and learn about that person's life, one could watch a video, read a magazine, study a history book and so on as well. The mediums that we have available to us now-a-days are many, thus there is little to no excuse as to why we should not know who these revolutionary men and women were. To truly honor someone is to know who they are and were, meaning, knowing who they were as a person and knowing what they are to the people today, knowing both who the 'man' or 'woman' was, in order to better understand what the 'movement' or 'cause' of today means.
Action
The first part of honor is simple, reflection, most people accomplish this task easily, though true honor does not end there, true honor has action accompanying it. Action is a simple term that carries a heavy meaning with it, to honor someone through action one must understand what actions would be considered honorable toward that person or cause, meaning, one must meditate on it first prior to acting on it. The previous paragraph might seem like a repetition of the previous few but the repetition is warranted, it is due to that fact that we have many who seek to honor another without understanding what that person thought or believed, this usually only brings trouble and unavoidably becomes a clink in the armor of the movement. Thus we implore you, prior to seeking to honor someone, please take the time to understand who that person was first.
Action does not mean drop everything and fight for the cause, action does mean living for the cause, meaning, devoting your life to the cause. Some of us cannot drop everything and join a protest movement right now, in fact if we all did so society would not be able to function, this is not the only meaning of action. Action can also mean just upholding a cause, standing up against racism, fighting against inequality, with your words, with actions, with reprimanding people, with just taking a stand. The world is not changed by the big things, though they help, it is the application of those big things in the small ways a society functions that brings change. In short, by taking a stand and being the difference you become part of what is truly going to change the world, thus truly living a life of honor.
We challenge you to not only celebrate and reflect on Dr. King's life, but to also take action and raise awareness to racism and prejudice, the small things are the things that impact the world the most sometimes, so never think that a small action by you will go unnoticed, no action ever goes unnoticed, this is a simple rule, all actions bring about change, be it good or bad, thus we urge you to live a life of honor, seeking to bring about a better tomorrow for the generations to come. Reflect on what was, in order to bring about a new and better now, this is what it means to honor.
Also if you have not heard of the "SOPA Act" please follow this LINK and get acquainted with it. This is a cause that is happening now that we must all fight to prevent. Google has done a great job summarizing everything and providing you with good links, sign the petition at least, every little bit helps. For those that are unaware SOPA is a bill attempting to censor the internet, so please follow the LINK and sign the petition against it.
We hope you all have a good rest of the week, remember to smile more and be kind to those around you.
Love from your humble blogger,
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