A Thousand To One

No this is not about betting (as you may have observed I do bet on horses and football), but about prioritising the good in our lives and giving as little purchase as possible to the not so good. I am starting this unsure if I can make six hundred words on it , but I would like to give this the permanence of a Vocal story because I believe, although this is completely just my opinion, that this situation affected everybody and I am certainly no exception to this.

Here is the situation , we can receive a thousand compliments telling us how wonderful we are and encouraging us to do more of something because by doing that they are made happy , and are happy for us , and we will usually do the same thing.

And then there is that one thing that happens that goes against those thousand compliments , one thing that is a spoiler and that is the thing that sticks in our minds and won’t go away.

Here are a few instances to illustrate the concept:

Everyone says you are beautiful or handsome but someone says you are fat or ugly. Why do we even give that any notice? I don’t think I am even adequate looking but recently people have told me I am handsome and even devilishly good looking. The latter may have been tongue in cheek but I think not, and I will always go with the ones who compliment me.

One thing that irks all of us in the Vocal groups is when we don’t get a Top Story for a piece of work we think is particularly good, or when we see one by our friends that doesn't make it. If we step back we need to look at vocal as a cupboard where we keep our stories. They may magically turn to gold and give us a challenge win, we know that may be unlikely but a definite possibility. But my gold appears when I share my stories and poetry with the Facebook Vocal groups and sometimes on my Facebook Timeline. The Timeline seldom generates any interest and writers do not like to be ignored. But in the Facebook Vocal groups I get some incredible feedback , some great constructive criticism and the odd insulting response.

I will be honest the Vocal communities make me feel safe from harm , they have made me a poet and a writer and to be honest this was sparked off by one person who welcomed and encouraged me, and then others have done the same, and the early nasty emails I got are forgotten. My Vocal friends make me appreciate the thousand and ignore the one.

Always appreciate the positive majority. If something upsets or concerns you speak to a Vocal creator friend , speak to me , my messenger door is always open for you.

There have been times where I felt I was completely unloved and a Vocal friend came to my rescue when I asked her for help.

We are really a family of choice and I look down all the lists of stories and the comments on them and I see love and encouragement and safety.

Look at your stories , look at what people say about them , feel the love , and drink it in ,as it really is a nourishing godlike nectar. Every day I see what people are saying to me and about me, and I almost can’t believe it , but I step back and do believe it.

This piece is going to go in my Vocal cupboard. I don’t expect any alchemical process to turn it into gold but if one person benefits from this then I have succeeded.

As I have a thousand in the title I am going to include "Version of Me" by one of my favourite bands Thousand Yard Stare , because all my writing is a version of me. It comes from their wonderful album "Mappamundi".