Bringing Balance to the Community

Souls’ shrinking does not feel like an adequate description. I feel like it's more of being blocked, but not dimmed. It's like a turtle in its shell. It remains hidden from view until the moment it feels the safest or the bravest. The turtle did not change size; his presence was just no longer blatantly obvious to whatever it was hiding from. It shrunk from view yes, but it did not literally shrink, which is what I feel that quote is implying.

To me a soul is similar to a turtle, with the exception of the soul having a lot more impact. It waits until the person is brave enough to bring it out to its full size, then it flares, revealing how powerful it really is. Yes a turtle is not exactly powerful, but does one person have the ability to affect millions without any help? I don't think so. There had to have been a reason for it to come out. That reason is unique to every person, and in many cases only the person themselves will ever know what that reason was.

Being in touch with the world is necessary in coaxing it out, yes, but there still needs to be a balance between internal musings and external actions. If a person only focuses on the external than everything that immediately affects them (family, friends, their health, work, etc.) could easily fall apart because of neglect. To reverse the situation, only focusing on internal affairs, and that person is basically letting everyone else control their world, much like what Loeb described.

It is because of this need for balance that I think it that it is impossible for a person to have not stayed silent on a public issue. There is so much going on in the world that for someone to choose to combat every public issue they would, at the very least, exhaust themselves, no matter how fulfilling it seemed to be. Also if someone were to try, wouldn't their views be considered hypocritical? I think that as many causes as there are in the world, in order to fight for every last one of them, some of their values would conflict, diminishing that person in the eyes of the rest of the world. Their fights would lose public interest and the views of the person would be rapidly skewed from something of greatness, to something of lunacy. People can have a wide variety of interests, but that does not necessarily mean that we are passionate about all of them. We have to choose where to focus our efforts based on what we like, and where our strengths are the most beneficial.

From experience, I have found that sometimes remaining quiet can be more helpful than constantly speaking out. Every person has a different perspective to bring to the table. If a person only speaks and never listens, than they are going to miss something important that someone else has to say. Depending on how volatile the situation is, that one thing could make or break an argument. Of course, a person always listening and never speaking, can be just as bad. Once again, I think that maintaining a balance between both is best.