A Whole New Reality

Today, after yesterday's election and Barack Obama's resounding victory, the world is in a whole new reality. Now people know, deep in their awareness, that anything is possible. That conviction, now embedded in the consciousness of humanity, has already changed us; ultimately, it will fundamentally change the world.

On election night a young, African-American boy on the south side of Chicago told a reporter what Obama's election means to him: "Now I can go to college" -- something he had not believed possible for himself before. A commenter responding to a Huffington Post election night blog, wrote, "If someone like Barack Obama can become President of the United States of America then anything is possible. I personally don't have any excuses anymore. If he can become President then I can at least become the IT Project Manager I always wanted to be. Everything is now possible." (emphasis mine)

The "everything is possible" mantra is no longer viewable as just a naïve belief, open to scoffing by cynics and pessimists. It's no longer just an idea, a possibility. It happened. It's real. And all of us saw it. Indeed, all of us, as Obama continually reminds, are what made it happen.

That's the great significance of Obama's victory. The consciousness of the American people shifted and that shift was made visible last night. Obama's triumph reflects back to us our own new, self-chosen, collective belief, and reinforces it in the process.

Because one person did the "impossible" -- with the help of many others -- then all of us can do our own personal "impossible," too. Moreover, we now know, as a collective -- at a level beyond intellect or imagination -- that together we can accomplish what humanity has believed to be beyond our reach.

Yes, we can. And yes, we will. Because after last night, we "don't have any excuses anymore."

Pamela Gerloff is co-author, with Robert W. Fuller, of Dignity for All: How to Create a World without Rankism (Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2008).

Read more reaction from HuffPost bloggers to Barack Obama's victory in the 2008 presidential election

Comments

[dke-1stfigroup]

I dare say that the euphoria of ideology is laying the foundation of expectations that President Elect Obama will transform the United States into the world"s teddy bear. Just click your heals together and you too can be transformed to the land if loopy pops and sweetness. The fact is we needed to change our role in the global sense as well as our foreign policies; we need to stop being everyone big brother and participate rather than take the lead on every issue.

The American view point of the world and how countries govern themselves is not where our focus needs to be. The United States needs to address our own failed infrastructure from financial institutions to highways, reduce our dependence on foreign energy, consumer products and financial support.

I am sure Obama will change the world"s perception of the United States from the negative position we have gotten into and I am relying heavily on the Senate and House to ensure we don"t give away the farm doing so.

The real defining issues of the Obama presidency will be the domestic issues; unemployment and the cost of health care are real issues. Too many people are willing to risk being without health insurance or worst they are terminated or lose their jobs for whatever reason just to be slapped with COBRA payments that are just not affordable. Comments at www.cobra.1stfigroup.com will be answered to help those that want alternatives to the high cost of COBRA.

[KillTheMessenger]

That "everything is possible" is still a rather naive belief and nothing that is generally helpful in life. What you have just witnessed IS NOT a simple application of the "hope principle" (that would be what the McCain campaign did when they hoped that their base was large enough to carry them trough one more time despite numerical reality being cruelly clear about that not being the case) but the result of an extremely well planned intellectual effort by enormously gifted people and millions of hours of hard work by highly motivated volunteers. It is the prime example of how motivated, smart people deal with problems in the real world. To reduce it to an empty phrase like "everything is possible" does not only do disservice to those who made this happen but it also sets us all up for the next defeat. THIS was possible because WE MADE it happen. And if we don't keep making things happen, next time we will lose again.

[Pamela Gerloff - Huffpost Blogger]

Reply Part A, from the blog author:
I think KillTheMessenger misunderstood the point. The shift to the belief that "anything [or everything] is possible" is a quantum shift in the mind of an individual, a nation, and a world. When a child or adult who used to always experience a glass ceiling around him/her, sees something they thought was impossible happen, that forces a change in perception. That perception then allows for hope; it makes it seem possible to actually reap the rewards of hard work and gifted intellectual effort, whereas before, there was no reason to even bother, because even with such brilliant effort, "the impossible" would not have been able to occur (in their perceived reality).

Obama's presidency was possible because his own consciousness was not limited by the "it's not possible" mantra that limited many others. His conviction that he could be elected, and his ability to inspire a similar belief in many others, allowed millions to believe that their efforts in the the movement for change might not be just hopeless, wasted effort. If they hadn't thought it was at least possible, they wouldn't have put in all that massive effort. (continued below)

[Pamela Gerloff - Huffpost Blogger]

Reply Part B, from the blog author
(continued from Part A)

I totally agree that Obama's victory resulted from "an extremely well-planned intellectual effort by enormously gifted people and millions of hours of hard work by highly motivated volunteers." But the idea that "anything [or everything] is possible" somehow diminishes that effort or is "a naive belief and nothing that is generally helpful in life," as you claim, is simply incorrect. That's the point. The belief in possibility was an essential element in this campaign. And it will now be an essential element in the changes the world is yearning for--which masses of people will now begin to work toward with hope, enthusiasm, and diligence, precisely because now they not only believe but know that such things are actually possible.

To believe or know that something is possible does not imply that it is guaranteed. It simply opens the door that will allow whatever it will take to make it happen seem worth undertaking. It makes it possible to say "Yes, we can, and so yes, we will aim higher, knowing that things we used to believe were impossible no longer are."

[wendy82551]

When Obama ran through the list of "everyone" -- black and white, male and female, etc. etc.-- when he got to "gay and straight," my gay son began to cry. He said, "I think that's the first time we've ever been included in that 'everyone' by a politician."

That's the promise of Obama: we're all in it together.

[MsDebate]

Absolutely!!!