The one person you never really get over

There will always be that one person you’ll never really get over. Sure, you can go days, weeks, months, years without thinking of them but the second you see their face or their name gets mentioned in passing, your stomach drops and you feel like you could puke.

You’ve lost control and all of these feelings suddenly rise to the surface. You’ll hate yourself for this, for all of it. You won’t be able to recognize why this one person can still garner this type of reaction.

You’re not over this person because you still want them. If they wanted you at this moment, you would leave everything and come to them. It almost feels good knowing that you want someone so bad. You spend so much of your time feeling indecisive about things but this is the one thing that remains the same. It drives you insane but it also brings a certain level of comfort.

You’re not over this person because they still have the ability to piss you off. A simple insensitive comment made in passing can affect you worse than an insult from your best friend. Why? Why? WHY? That’s all you ask yourself as you sit, licking your wounds. It’s important to not question this too much. It’s fruitless. It just is. Maybe one day they won’t piss you off. Maybe one day you’ll feel nothing. Hope for nothing, accepts everything.

You’re not over this person because you can still remember the little details, like the way they smelled (make that memory go away), their favorite song, or a day you held hands. These memories still reduce you to mush all of these years later. Can you believe it? How can some lovers evaporate the day they leave you and others stay way past their welcome? Who gets to choose who gets left behind and who gets to stick? Not you.

You’re not over this person probably because they could never love you back the way you wanted them to, the way you needed them to. They were a defective toy that could not be fixed at the shop. This made you so angry and so sad and you tried just so damn hard and everyone knew it but it did not work. Not one bit. Because of this, your business with them will always seem unfinished. You could notn’t conquer them and seal the deal, which made getting any kind of closure difficult. Your closure needs to be done on your own. You have to accept that this person will never give you the answers you want them to.

It sucks to have this one person in your life that can derail you at a moment’s notice. But in a way, it feels good knowing that you could ever love someone so much. Or that’s what you tell yourself anyway. It doesn’t matter if something is true or not. The things we tell ourselves can become our truth.

A word for the heart-wrenching pain of wanting someone you can't have

A word for the heart-wrenching pain of wanting someone you can't have

There is a phrase in French that means this: “la douleur exquise”

It literally means “the exquisite pain” and expresses the wanting the affection of someone unattainable.

What is the attraction of someone that is unattainable, we know in our hearts that they will never love us?

When we had that person in our lives, why do we always realise what we have lost only after we have lost it?

Why don’t we appreciate what we have, while we have it?

Why does it suddenly become more attractive when it now belongs to someone else? Do we really want that person, when we never wanted them while we were with them? The annoying things they did, how they used to push our buttons that made us extremely angry?

We go as far as possible to make their lives unendurable, we are unfaithful them to them, and flaunt it in their faces.

Deny them the one thing that truly wanted, our love. Telling them we will never love them.

When they are gone, after a time we only begin to see the good things, but when we were with them, we only saw the bad things………

We drove them away, and now they are with someone else, they doing things with the other person, that they used to do with us. Now we need them, now we love them, and the pain of not having them is unbearable.

When we had them in our lives, did we stay with them because of the familiarity?

What would happen if they leave the person they are with now and come back? Will we treasure them, like we never did before? Now we have them back, like a spoilt child, we just carry on as before. Is it that we just don’t like seeing them with someone else, being happy and carefree? We don’t really want them but we don’t want anybody else to have them either. They will always be the same person they were before, if we could not appreciate and love them as they were then, why would we do it now?

Why must we always have this fixation, we had, and now we have lost them.

Is it because they left a void in our lives, when they left us, and how ever we seek, we can’t seem to find another person like them to fill the emptiness?

Is it because that person is no longer obtainable, and we are acting like children, when we were told we could not have something, an tantrum was inevitable, though we really don’t want it, but because we can’t have it, we want it even more?

Apparently this can be explained, there is a logical reason for this, and the urge to go after the unattainable is in our DNA.

George Loewenstein, came up with this theory, “Information-Gap Theory”. This will explain why we behave as we do. Apparently when we feel a gap between what we do know and what we want to know, curiosity hatches. We feel the need to take actions, and bridge this gap.

Wanting what you can’t have, whether it’s a lifestyle or a relationship with the person that has left you, or even a new person, will you ever likely to be satisfied with this.

What happens if you win the jackpot? Will this be enough? What happens when this person becomes attainable, you got what you want, what is the fun in this, will you lose interest and move on to the next unattainable.

It’s an endless cycle of any agony, no fulfilment, no payoff and certainly no romantic ending.

Let me try and explain further…

There's a difference between wanting somebody/something and needing something/someone.

Here's an analogy: You want a Prada bag, but you don't exactly need one. Of course, your desire for that particular thing you want can be weak or strong, depending on several things.

You may want something really badly, with every ounce of strength that you possess, or you may only want it half-heartedly. On the other hand, you need oxygen; there is no real desire for it, but you have to have it, nonetheless, for survival.

Of course, there are circumstances in which a need may become a want. For instance, when you're drowning, the need for oxygen gets so strong that the need becomes want.

In those few seconds, you want oxygen like you want your life — literally. Often, we only truly appreciate the value and necessity of some things only when we lose them, don't we?

Want and need can be really different, but at times, pretty similar. So, what is love? Here's the answer to the million-dollar question: Love is when you want what you need and need what you want.

Most love relationships start out with a state of wanting. When you fall in love, you want the other person very, very much.

And then slowly, over time, as you love, you also become more and more accustomed to that person, so much so that you might even feel as though you can't live without him or her. This is when want becomes need. When you want and need something simultaneously, you can call it love.

When you truly love someone, you know that you want him or her. You can feel that craving in the depth of your soul and in every nerve and every fibre of your physical being. It may feel almost like an addiction or an unyielding obsession.

You know that there is lust, but there is also something more. It’s something that truly satisfies, yet leaves you wanting more. Indeed, love can leave you in a vulnerable state. Perhaps this is where “want” transcends into “need.”

It’s when you have become so dependent on the other person for your emotional and physical demands that you can't live properly if he or she disappeared from your life completely.

With this person, you can feel a sense of familiarity and assurance that comes with his or her acceptance of you. You feel safe with him or her.

In a way, love can become a comfort zone, a refuge you can run to. Though, in another way, it can also be a dangerous place where you might get yourself or the other party really hurt.

After a breakup, it's unavoidable that you will feel slightly needy because now that you're out of your comfort zone, you just want to feel safe again.

Forgiveness is not giving up...............

In many protracted and deep-rooted conflicts, apology and forgiveness are essential for reconciliation and conflict resolution. As long as one side continues to blame the other (or both sides blame each other) for their problems, healing cannot occur, and normal relationships based on mutual acceptance and trust cannot be formed.

Apology is often a difficult step, as it requires acknowledging guilt. However, the lack of apology suggests to the other side that its opponent thinks that its behaviour was appropriate. This creates the fear that the opponent’s unjust or violent behaviour will continue. An apology is a signal, more than anything, that the opponent regrets its actions and wants to rebuild a new relationship on a stronger foundation.

Forgiveness is also critical for reconciliation. Many people refuse to forgive, feeling that forgiveness is essentially "giving up" or "letting the enemy get away with" their actions. Revenge or punishment, they feel, is the only way to achieve "justice." Yet the need for revenge or punishment can delay or even prohibit the resolution of a conflict, as fear of retaliation can keep an opponent from accepting guilt and apologizing. For this reason, it is often superior to forgive an opponent’s deeds--even if they were atrocities, to stop further atrocities from happening.

Forgiveness is not giving up, but is rather an acknowledgment of the past and a willingness to move on in a new way for the benefit of both sides. This is superior to revenge, because revenge only continues the conflict and the pain. "The more common misperception is that by performing acts of revenge, one’s hurt will go away. This notion blocks people from coming out of their pain and moving on

Forgiveness becomes institutionalized when amnesty is granted for war crimes or political crimes against a particular ethnic group (as occurred in South Africa in the apartheid era, for instance). Some people, both within and outside the victim groups, feel strongly that such crimes should be prosecuted and the perpetrators punished. This is the only way to obtain justice, it is argued, which many believe is required before a lasting peace can be obtained.
Others, however, saying that prosecution and punishment will just prolong the pain, not end it. A better solution, many argue, is recognition of the past, and amnesty for the perpetrators of violence.



The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission is one example of this approach. There perpetrators of violence on both sides of the conflict (white and black) are encouraged to testify about their deeds, after which they are granted amnesty for their actions. While some South Africans object to the Reconciliation Commission, it seems evident that the successful transition to black majority rule could not have occurred as it did without such an amnesty process. South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) was a court-like body assembled in South Africa after the end of Apartheid. Anybody who felt they had been a victim of violence could come forward and be heard at the TRC. Perpetrators of violence could also give testimony and request amnesty from prosecution.

The formal hearings began on 15 April 1996. The hearings made international news and many sessions were broadcast on national television. The TRC was a crucial component of the transition to full and free democracy in South Africa and, despite some flaws, is generally regarded as very successful.

Creation and Mandate the TRC was set up in terms of the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act, No 34 of 1995, and was based in Cape Town. The mandate of the commission was to bear witness to, record and in some cases grant amnesty to the perpetrators of crimes relating to human rights violations, reparation and rehabilitation.

The TRC has a number of high profile members: Archbishop Desmond Tutu (chairperson), Dr Alex Boraine (Deputy Chairperson), Mary Burton, Advocate Chris de Jager, Bongani Finca, Sisi Khampepe, Richard Lyster, Wynand Malan, Reverend Khoza Mgojo, Hlengiwe Mkhize, Dumisa Ntsebeza (head of the Investigative Unit), Wendy Orr, Advocate Denzil Potgieter, Mapule Ramashala, Dr Faizel Randera, Yasmin Sooka and Glenda Wildschut.

Committees

The work of the TRC was accomplished through three committees: Human Rights Violations (HRV) Committee investigated human rights abuses that took place between 1960 and 1994.

Reparation and Rehabilitation (R&R) Committee was charged with restoring victims' dignity and formulating proposals to assist with rehabilitation.

Amnesty Committee (AC) considered applications for amnesty that were requested in accordance with the provisions of the Act. I .In theory the commission was empowered to grant amnesty to those charged with atrocities during Apartheid as long as two conditions were met: The crimes were politically motivated and the entire and whole truth was told by the person seeking amnesty.

No one was exempt from being charged. As well as ordinary citizens, members of the police could be charged and, most notably, members of the African National Congress, the ruling party at the time of the trial, could also be charged. 5392 people were refused amnesty and 849 were granted amnesty, out of 7112 petitioners (there were a number of additional categories, such as withdrawn).

Findings the commission brought forth many witnesses giving testimony about the secret and immoral acts committed by the Apartheid Government, the liberation forces including the ANC, and other forces for violence that many say would not have come out into the open otherwise.

On October 28, 1998 the Commission presented its report, which condemned both sides for committing atrocities.

Is South Africa going down the same path?

Is South Africa going down the same path?
South Africa is increasingly displaying evidence of radicalism, radicalised, rhetoric and general disenchantment. There are similarities between what’s happening today and the mood in South Africa in the 1940s – the results of which altered the country’s course, for the worse.

The Good Old Days?  

South Africa has changed a lot since the end of apartheid 22 years ago. 

Many blacks will tell you things are better for them today, and in some ways they are. Blacks and people of mixed races are free to travel wherever they want and no longer need to get passes to enter certain parts of the country.

They can vote, and they now dominate the government. They run the military and police forces. There are quota laws mandating that businesses hire non-whites first. The government has a land reform process in which it uses tax revenue to purchase land owned by white people to give to blacks. The government also builds free housing to give to blacks. And of course, there are no more “Whites Only” signs at train stations.

But most things are not better. Black-on-black crime is through the roof. In the slums, where the police fear to tread, “necklacing” is frequent. Vigilantes beat accused criminals to exhaustion before forcing vehicle tires over their shoulders, dousing them with gasoline and lighting them on fire. What is left is hardly recognizable.

So it really isn’t that astounding that growing numbers of non-white South Africans—especially the older generation that lived during apartheid—admits to a certain longing for the old days. The reasons are obvious and transcend race. South Africa’s crime rate is among the highest in the world. Its official unemployment rate is around 26 per cent, but it is probably a lot higher. Its public institutions are corrupt, and law and order is failing.

Beyond the police force, Transparency International found that 74 per cent of people think all public officials and civil servants are corrupt or extremely corrupt, while 70 per cent believe the whole political system is corrupt. 

Then there is the obviously decaying infrastructure. Regular and unplanned power blackouts are now just part of South African life. Generation and transmission systems are all failing. What isn’t buried underground is stolen.

Sometimes the underground wires are stolen too. Tens of thousands of people inhabit suburbs that are plunged into darkness at random times. Hundreds are regularly left stranded on trains. South Africa’s well-maintained freeway system hides the dangerous, pothole-strewn secondary road grid, for which there is no money to keep up. 

Even South Africa’s world-class mining industry is collapsing. Once the world’s biggest gold producer by far, 22 years later, it is now fifth on the list and falling. International investors don’t want to build mines in a country that constantly talks about taking them away from “rich whites” to give to blacks.  

Meanwhile, as the population has skyrocketed, agricultural production has stagnated, and is now slightly beneath 1980s levels.  

For growing numbers of South Africans, the sentiment appears to be: At least back then I had a job, it was safe, and I had food in my belly. But for others, the failure of Nelson Mandela’s “peaceful” transition to improve the life of blacks is just proof that South Africa hasn’t gone far enough. They say it is time for blacks to turn up the heat and take full control of the country.  

Popular political hatemongers like former ANC youth leader Julius Malema are attracting large numbers of followers on his party platform of seizing the land and driving all whites out of South Africa. 

What happened in the 1940’s and later
Apartheid was a system of radical segregation in South Africa enforced through legislation by the National Party (NP) from 1948 to 1994. Under apartheid, the rights, associations, and movements of the majority black inhabitants and other ethnic groups were curtailed, and white minority rule was maintained.

The word apartheid is an Afrikaans word meaning separateness or “the state of being apart”

The Population Registration Act of 1950, which formalised racial classification and introduced an identity card for all persons over the age of 18, specifying their racial group.

Racial segregation began in colonial times under the Dutch Empire and continued when the British took over the Cape of Good Hope.

The second pillar of grand apartheid was the Group Areas Act of 1950. Until then, most settlements had people of different races living side by side. This Act put an end to diverse areas and determined where one lived according to race. Each race was allotted its own area, which was used in later years as a basis of forced removal.

This strategy was in part adopted from "left-over" British rule that separated different racial groups after they took control of the Boer republics in the Anglo-Boer war.

Legislation classified inhabitants into four racial groups, “Black”, “White”, “Coloured” and “Indian”. Coloured and Indian were divided into several sub-classifications.

Official teams or Boards were established to come to a conclusion on those people whose race was unclear. This caused difficulty, especially for coloured people, separating their families when members were allocated different races.

This created the black-only "townships" or "locations", where blacks were relocated to their own towns.

From 1960 to 1983, 3.5 million non-white South Africans were removed from their homes, and forced into segregated neighbourhoods.

The Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act of 1949 prohibited marriage between persons of different races.

The Suppression of Communism Act of 1950 banned any party subscribing to Communism. The act defined Communism and its aims so sweepingly that anyone who opposed government policy risked being labelled as a Communist. Since the law specifically stated that Communism aimed to disrupt racial harmony, it was frequently used to gag opposition to apartheid. Disorderly gatherings were banned, as were certain organisations that were deemed threatening to the government.

Immorality Act of 1950 made sexual relations with a person of a different race a criminal offence.

In 1950s, a series of uprising and protests was met with the banning of opposition and imprisoning of anti-apartheid leaders. As unrest spread the military were called to suppress the uprising.

The Prevention of Illegal Squatting Act of 1951 allowed the government to demolish black shanty town slums and forced white employers to pay for the construction of housing for those black workers who were permitted to reside in cities otherwise reserved for whites.

The Bantu Authorities Act of 1951 created separate government structures for blacks and whites and was the first piece of legislation to support the government's plan of separate development in the Bantustans.

Under the Reservation of Separate Amenities Act of 1953, municipal grounds could be reserved for a particular race, creating, among other things, separate beaches, buses, hospitals, schools and universities. Signboards such as "whites only" applied to public areas, even including park benches. Blacks were provided with services greatly inferior to those of whites, and, to a lesser extent, to those of Indian and coloured people.

Education was segregated by the 1953 Bantu Education Act, which crafted a separate system of education for black South African students and was designed to prepare black people for lives as a labouring class.

The Bantu Authorities Act of 1951 created separate government structures for blacks and whites and was the first piece of legislation to support the government's plan of separate development in the Bantustans.

The government tightened pass laws compelling blacks to carry identity documents, to prevent the immigration of blacks from other countries. To reside in a city, blacks had to be in employment there. Until 1956 women were for the most part excluded from these pass requirements, as attempts to introduce pass laws for women were met with fierce resistance.

The Promotion of Black Self-Government Act of 1959 entrenched the NP policy of nominally independent "homelands" for blacks. So-called "self–governing Bantu units" were proposed, which would have devolved administrative powers, with the promise later of autonomy and self-government. It also abolished the seats of white representatives of black South Africans and removed from the rolls the few blacks still qualified to vote.

The Bantu Investment Corporation Act of 1959 set up a mechanism to transfer capital to the homelands to create employment there.

In 1959 separate universities were created for black, coloured and Indian people. Existing universities were not permitted to enroll new black students.

In November 1962, the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 1761, a non-binding resolution establishing the United Nations Special Committee against Apartheid and called for imposing economic and other sanctions on South Africa. This made it increasingly difficult for the government to maintain the regime.

Legislation of 1967 allowed the government to stop industrial development in "white" cities and redirect such development to the "homelands".

The Black Homeland Citizenship Act of 1970 marked a new phase in the Bantustan strategy. It changed the status of blacks to citizens of one of the ten autonomous territories. The aim was to ensure a demographic majority of white people within South Africa by having all ten Bantustans achieve full independence.

Interracial contact in sport was frowned upon, but there were no segregator sports laws.

Afrikaans Medium Decree of 1974 required the use of Afrikaans and English on an equal basis in high schools outside the homelands.


The end of Apartheid
2nd February 1990 State President F.W. de Klerk announces the begging of negotiated transition to end apartheid. The speech announces the unbanning of the African National Congress, Pan Africanist Congress and the Communist Party, the release of Nelson Mandela and other political prisoners, and the end of the state of emergency.11th February 1990 Nelson Mandela is released from prison after serving 27 years.

In January 1991 the minister of education, Piet Claase announced that segregation of whites and blacks in state-run schools will end.

9th January 1991 – Black children are admitted to schools previously reserved for whites only.

1st February 1991 - At the signing of a national peace accord F. W. de Klerk, State President of South Africa, promises to end all apartheid legislation and to create a new multi-racial constitution.

12th March 1991- The government tables a white paper to end racial discrimination in landownership and occupation.

14th March 1991 - Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, dubbed the "Mugger of the Nation", is found guilty and sentenced to 6 years imprisonment for her involvement in the death of 14-year-old Stompie Moeketsi. The sentence will never be carried out.

28th June 1991 – The Population Registration Act, in terms of which South Africans were classified into racial groups, is repealed.

30th June 1991 - The laws enforcing geographical segregation, including the Group Areas Act, the Native Land Act, the Native Trust and Land Act and the Asiatic Land Tenure Act, are repealed.

9th July 1991 – The suspension of South Africa from the International Olympic Committee is lifted.

4th September 1991 - F. W. de Klerk, State President of South Africa, announces a new constitution that will provide suffrage for black people.

3rd February 1992 – President F.W. de Klerk and Nelson Mandela, the African National Congress leader, are jointly awarded the Felix Houphouet-Boigny Peace Prize at the Unesco headquarters in Paris.

17th March 1992 - The government holds a referendum about changing the constitution, paving the way to end apartheid. With the result being an overwhelming "yes" vote to continue negotiations to end apartheid.

23rd September 1993 - The United States Senate approves legislation lifting economic sanctions against South Africa.

10th December 1993 - President F.W. de Klerk and Nelson Mandela are jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

27th April 1994 The multi-racial democratic elections was won by the African National Congress under Nelson Mandela.




Jacob Zuma - HIV and AIDS
8th May 2006 the former South African deputy president Jacob Zuma was today cleared of raping an HIV-positive female friend in a case that has alarmed Aids campaigners and jeopardised his political future.

The 31-year-old woman had accused him of rape after they had unprotected sex at his home in November last year, but a judge ruled today that the encounter was consensual.

The case has threatened Mr Zuma's hopes of becoming president, and health campaigners say his evidence during the trial has undermined years of promoting safe sex in a country where six million people have Aids.

As a former head of the South African national Aids council, Mr Zuma shocked many people by arguing, against scientific evidence, that there was little danger of him contracting HIV from unprotected sex.

He said taking a shower after having intercourse with the woman had reduced the risk of transmission.





2015 in South Africa
There was a number of social and political protests and movements form. At President Jacob Zuma's 2015 State of the Nation Address, the president was interrupted by an opposition party, the Economic Freedom Fighters, who demanded that he pay back the money used on his Nkandla homestead.

South Africa also saw new xenophobic uprisings taking place, mainly targeted towards Africans from other countries. Foreigners were beaten, robbed and murdered during the attacks.

26 Jan 2015 ... In an open letter to President Zuma, Minister of Home Afrairs, Malusi ... the government has denied that there is xenophobia in South Africa, ...

28 Apr 2015 ... Xenophobia murder: Emmanuel Sithole - "Emmanual Josias' stabbed to death:
Zuma denied he was killed in xenophobia ...

29 May 2015 ... President Mugabe has called on (black) South Africans to direct their xenophobia towards whites – instead of blacks.

The social protest Rhodes Must Fall started in 2015 at the University of Cape Town to protest for the removal of statues erected in South Africa during the colonial era depicting some of the well known colonists who settled in South Africa.

In education, South Africa recorded a drop in its matric pass rate from 2013 to 2014. The protest #FeesMustFall was started towards the end of the year and achieved its primary goal of stopping an increase in university fees for 2016.

South Africa also saw the discovery of Homo naledi in 2015.

The South African national rugby union team came third in the 2015 Rugby World Cup

There are many instances providing hard, compelling and even irrefutable evidence of a party in serious decline: the arms deal shenanigans, the Guptagate scandal, the Schabir Shaik corruption case (in which Zuma was implicated), the fraud and corruption charges against Zuma himself, the role of ANC politicians in the Fifa scandal over South Africa’s winning the bid to host the 2010 World Cup, the grotesque and absurd Nkandla scandals, the unpardonable Marikana massacre of black miners, the killing of township protester Andries Tatane, the mismanaged Gauteng e-tolls debacle, the perpetual crisis at the SABC, the electricity crisis, and so on.



What is happen now?
In spite of such a promising start, South Africa’s current democracy is characterised by ambivalence. There is an increasing fervour for racial nationalism in the ANC’s policies.

And protests are increasingly characterised by radicalism and violence to express discontent. There is also the rise of populist militancy in the form of the Economic Freedom Fighters.

The high levels of unemployment and inequality also provide a source of genuine grievance.

Much of what is happening now harks back to a dark time in South Africa’s history. The National Party’s radicalism and exclusivist ethnic nationalism left a morally and economically bereft state. Today we stand at a similar crossroads.

South Africans face a choice. They could obstruct the country’s future prospects by being re-radicalised and polarised and by closing their ears to genuine grievances and injustices. They could also resort to methods not of compromise, accommodation and mutual respect, but of intolerance, radicalism and incivility.

Faced with these choices, South Africans would do well to heed the mistakes of the past.


South Africa’s financial looming financial crisis
Source: http://www.rdm.co.za/politics/2015/12/02/why-2016-will-be-south-africa-s-year-of-reckoning

“The ‘rocky road’ is our worst-case scenario for a future South Africa, featuring a powerful and interventionist development state that believes it can head off future political defeat by destroying democratic institutions in a desperate bid to cling to power,” said Cronjé.

We are on that road. We haven’t reached crisis point yet, but we are hurtling towards it at an alarming rate. The trouble is that neither President Jacob Zuma nor the ANC seem aware of what is happening.

Zuma can’t see it because he is out of his depth in economic matters. And the ANC can’t see it because it is too preoccupied with the looming succession issue. Zuma has established a patronage administration of loyalists to protect himself from the implications of his involvement in the arms deal and Nkandla scandals. Now those loyalists are worrying about what will happen to them when Zuma’s term ends.

The choice of successor seems to have boiled down to either Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa or Zuma’s former wife, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma. For anyone concerned about who can dig us out of the economic hole we are in, I would have thought the choice was obvious. Ramaphosa is the one with economic savvy. Dlamini-Zuma has none that I know of.

But the scared loyalists are pushing for Dlamini-Zuma. Never mind that as health minister, she was involved with former president Thabo Mbeki’s Aids denials, with endorsing an industrial solvent called Virodene as a quack remedy against HIV infection, and with the controversial Aids play Sarafina II that cost the country an outrageous R22-million. The loyalists want her because they hope that, despite the divorce, she will establish something of a Zuma dynasty that will continue to protect them as well as her former husband.

As for Zuma himself, his lack of perception is not confined to economics: it is equally lacking in his inability to project a clear political course for the country.

"We operate under capitalism," Zuma told the trade unionists. The national democratic democracies are not the system — are some system within a system. That’s why, if that is the situation, the crisis after crisis of the system will affect you whether you like it or not because if there is economic crisis it affects everyone within the system — the global system that is operating. In other words, it’s a class divided society."

Interpreting that gobbledegook is a challenge, but what I think Zuma was trying to say was: "We socialists (democratic democracies) are having to operate within a global capitalist system, and are subject to its uncertainties." And there lies the rub.

Under Zuma, the ANC has become an ideological hybrid, with a capitalist finance minister and Marxist-Leninist ministers of economic development and trade and industry. The result is gridlock. The administration cannot function as a unit with clear direction. So nothing is achieved. The country wallows in a trough of inertia while the problems mount.

The other problem with Zuma’s tortuous diagnosis is that it is self-exculpatory. None of SA’s problems are internally created: they all come from outside. They are the global system’s fault, not Zuma’s or the ANC’s. So presumably there is nothing we can do to about it until the great international revolution removes "the system".

Because of Zuma’s — and other ANC members’ — years of immersion in Marxist-Leninist doctrine, they have failed to see that the logical incorporation of socialist needs into a capitalist system is through social democracy. As the Nordic countries show, you need a strong private sector to generate the tax revenue to fund a healthy social security system. The ANC has labelled itself a social democratic party, but seems to have lost track of what that means.

The trouble with Zuma and his administration is that their inbred anti-capitalism makes them hostile to business. Instead of encouraging capital investment, both domestic and foreign, to create the jobs and tax revenue we so badly need, they disregard it almost to the point of antagonism. They regard foreign investors as exploiters who are extorting our workers and taking the profits gleaned from our resources out of the country. And they regard domestic capitalists as apartheid collaborators and economic exploiters from the past.

These are attitudes from the past that have stalled our progress and are now leading us towards economic crisis. And I believe we are not going to avoid that crisis as long as Zuma remains president. We cannot afford to have him at the top for another three years. He must go.

Hopefully the shock the ANC is in this year’s local government elections will jolt it into realising this. The longer Zuma remains number one, the greater the chances of the country landing in a full-blown economic crisis and of the ANC being blown away at the 2019 national election.

The sticking point is Zuma’s fear of those multiple charges of corruption coming back to ensnare him the moment he leaves office. The way to overcome that is to devise a soft exit strategy for him.

All that is required is for the ANC and the DA to reach an agreement to amend the Constitution to empower the new president to grant Zuma amnesty for those issues, as former US president Gerald Ford did for Richard Nixon after the Watergate scandal. Jointly, the two parties have the votes to do that. Zuma can then retire quietly to Nkandla while a new regime gets down to fixing the country.

The DA may object to this idea. But just as governing parties must sometimes place the national interest ahead of party interests, so too must the opposition.

An apology that you never receive

An apology that you never receive

I have written about forgiveness.  In many instances a person says they have forgiven but in reality have not.  In normally goes in an order, someone apologises and the other person forgives and if you a bigger person, you will say you sorry also, cause nobody is guilt free.

If you have not received an apology and have forgiven that person, in essence you don’t need their apology.

If someone does not apologise to you, you will get a different perspective about that person.  It’s not a reflection on you.  Especially, if you have done nothing wrong.  

There might be a lot of reasons why that person has not apologised to you.  The first reason would be that the person does not see anything wrong with their actions.  Secondly they might think you are the responsible one for their actions.  That you have done something that might have caused them hurt and they lashed out at you for your actions.  In this case, there is a saying, “it takes two to make a fight”.  So in this instance, it’s essential for both parties to apologise and forgive in order to move on.

This would lead to accountability, not just one party but both, where both parties don’t take responsibilities, and blame it on the other.  Another saying, “there is no smoke without a fire”

Some people just don’t have the courage to face you, too apologise.

We don’t have control in these instances.  So to hold ourselves in this place of waiting for an apology makes absolutely no sense and prohibits us from living our best life.

I am the person that is not apologising for my actions.  I have been forgiven by this person but I don’t feel like I was forgiven.  Plus most importantly, I have not forgiven myself.

In the past I have apologised many times and have tried to learn from it by changing my behaviour. Generally I am the first person to say sorry. Usually the other person does not feel the need to reciprocate and they come up with reasons to justify their behaviour. They never take responsibility for their part.

They just showed me who they really are.

I will be friendly with them when the need arises, but at the back of my mind I will always remember and because I have forgiven them, with time and a lot of work, trust might be re-established. 

They say that forgiveness does not go hand in hand with trust, but there are many things that do go hand with forgiveness; one is showing compassion and understanding for the other person.  How can you truly forgive someone if you ended up doing the same thing that they did?  When you never let it go and always use it in one way or another, use it to justify your behaviour?

Only true forgiveness means that you also can forgive yourself, this enables you to leave the pain and resentment behind.

I have never wished that another person should apologise to me.  This is not my call to make.  This is the other person’s responsibility.  Yes I am hurt by their lack of apology, but I can still forgive them.

Someone not apologising to you ultimately is that person’s problem. Maybe they don’t know how, maybe they can’t see their wrong doing, or maybe they’re just scarred. None of the above is something that you can change aside from being a good example.

The final component to forgiveness is being able to carry on without ever having the other person say that they are sorry for what they have done to you.

Once we stop worrying about these people in ability to express remorse, for whatever reason, other people whom we can trust and love with all of our heart come forth out of the shadows that we were trying to bring light to.

You don’t need a person’s apology to move forward in life, there are too many variables involved to wait around for it before you proceed into the life of your dreams. Maybe one day they will make it all up to you.  Maybe one day they will apologise after they have enough life experiences under their belt. 

My question is, why wait for that? Release yourself and remember to apologise when you need to.  Let those that can’t accept personal responsibility help to remind you of what it feels like so you don’t do it to others. 

Someone not apologising for their actions and us responding by holding our own life hostage is the greater atrocity.

Shame

I look in the mirror, feel so much shame. 

It was my fault, I deserve all the blame. 

Just don't know what I was thinking, 

With all this shame, I feel like I'm sinking.

All the consequences, I completely deserve, 

Can't imagine, where I found the nerve, 

I just feel like the biggest fool, 

What I did, was simply not cool.

Your forgiveness, I earnestly plead, 

Without it, my heart won't be freed. 

Please forgive me, I miss you so much, 

Beautiful voice and your tender touch.

by AnitaPoems.com

The Box

© Peter Tamburrino

Published on April 2009

He ascended those stairs that day, why he did, he could not say.

But reached for that old dusty knob of his attic door insight.

A turn to the knob so gently,

Cautiously he made his entry, entry into the attic that night.

Among cobwebs, dust and in much wonder, a flash of lightning, a crack of thunder,

He lit a small candle to see a bag within his sight.

Inside a dark brown leather sack

Did he find a box so black, as black as it is at midnight.

His soul jumped, and it was frightening, while he gazed in awe during the lightning.

For in his hands was a black box containing his soul that night.

It was black as the midnight sea,

At his feet he found a key, a key to the box of fright.

In a cold sweat, and with a shudder, he turned the box during the thunder.

He pushed in the key and tried to turn, but the lock was too tight.

But as determined as he would,

He turned as hard as he could, he could with all his might.

He knows he is the key that unlocks his soul that resides in the black box.

Amid the lightning he saw his soul was full of sin that night.

The box full of sins he did,

It was filled up to the lid, the lid of the box that night.

So he took paper and found a pen, and recorded the sins he did often.

Tears in his eyes and sorrow in heart he began to write.

I'm sorry for what I have done,

I never meant to hurt anyone, anyone I have hurt any night.

So among the lightning and what wrote, he opened the box and slipped in the note.

For remission of his sins is what he clearly had insight.

And then he laid his head to rest,

For he knew forgiveness was best, best on this thunderous night.

And in the morning they found a dead man, with a note and a pen by his hand.

And on the note was written a poem that previous night.

"My heart is the key which unlocks

The deep dark secrets of my box, a box no longer black, but white."

Broken Telephone

Communication

Do you find that communicating with people causes more problems than it solves? If so, your relationship may be suffering from a lack of communication. Healthy communication patterns include both specific skills and a connection with other people. This includes staying positive, limiting anger and engaging in active listening. An adequate communication style is important for the longevity and quality of any relationship.

“The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.”
George Bernard Shaw

Broken Telephone

Broken telephone was a game that I remember from my childhood.  Players can either stand in a line or form a circle.  The players must not be to close so they can hear what the other person needs to whisper.  The facilitator gives a phrase and it is whispered to one person to the next till the last person.  The last person would then repeat what he or she thought was whispered.  What the last person says is never the same as the original phrase. 

The main purpose of this game is for the amusement of the players.  It is also fun for the players and helps a group relax.  The game has other benefits and it shows how problems occur because we don’t listen properly.  The game can help people develop their listening skills, and it helps us understand the importance of active listening.  It also teaches us to understand the impact of gossip and rumours. One should never listen or spread gossip or rumours.

Communication is the biggest problems in any kind of relationship, well lack of communication.  Under-communication, lack of communication, miscommunication, whatever you want to call it, is a widespread and a detrimental problem.

Problems with communication

Almost all conflicts involve communication problems, as both a cause and an effect. Misunderstandings, resulting from poor communication, can easily cause a conflict or make it worse. Further, once a conflict has started, communication problems often develop because people in conflict do not communicate with each other as frequently, as openly, and as accurately as they do when relationships are not strained. Thus communication is central to most conflict situations.

Communication involves at least two parties--the speaker and the listener. Sometimes there are third parties: in-between people who carry messages, from one person to another. Problems can develop at all three of these sources.

Speakers often are not clear themselves about what they mean, which almost assures that what they say will be unclear as well. Even when people know what they mean, they often do not say it as clearly as they should. They may hide their true feelings or ideas intentionally or unintentionally. Either way, people often get confused about other people's messages.

This is especially common when people from different cultures try to communicate. Even if their languages are the same, culture acts like a lens through which we see and interpret the world. If their cultures are different, it is easy for the same statement to mean one thing to one person and something different to someone else. Thus intercultural communication is especially prone to errors.

Listeners also are sources of communication problems. People often fail to listen carefully. They may assume they know what the other person is saying or will say (because they have heard it before, or they assume that one person is "just like" another person from the same group). Also, when people are in conflict, they often concentrate more on what they are going to say in response to their opponent's statement, rather than listening to their opponents' words with full attention. The result, again, is misunderstandings, and often unnecessary escalation of a conflict.

Third parties can make communication better, or they can make it worse. Skilled third parties can help speakers clarify what they are saying, and they can help listeners hear what is really meant. They can act as go-betweens, carrying messages between people who cannot or will not meet face-to-face.

Unskilled third parties or third parties with a different agenda can make matters worse. The media's goal, for example, is often not helping people understand each other better, but rather, presenting the story to meet the media's own goals which may be to inflame the readers' anger in order to sell more newspapers, or to support the publisher's or government's own interests and views.

Different types of communication problems

Misinterpretation of Communication

Even in ordinary circumstances, people often say things that are not interpreted in the way the statement was intended. When people are angry with each other, the likelihood of misinterpreting communication is greatly increased--to the point where it is almost inevitable.

Failure to Understand an Opponent's Perspective

People often view conflicts from very different perspectives depending upon such things as cultural background, economic position, and religious beliefs. In order for the parties to communicate effectively, they need to understand (though not necessarily agree with) the perspectives of other parties to a conflict.

Cultural Barriers to Effective Communication

Culture affects both the substance and style of communication. Culture influences how people express themselves, to whom they talk, and how. For example, while some people may feel comfortable talking openly about their feelings with anyone, others will only talk openly and honestly with very close friends, while others may not talk that way at all. Such differences can cause people from different cultures to misinterpret both what is said and what is left unsaid, leading to misunderstandings.

Language Differences

When conflicts involve people who speak different languages (or even different dialects), it is very easy for misunderstandings to arise. Even when skilled translators are used, it is difficult for translators to transmit complex feelings and emotions as clearly as they are originally spoken.

Misinterpreted Motives

Motives can be misinterpreted as easily as statements can be misunderstood. When parties are in conflict, there is a tendency to assume the opponent's motives are malign, even when they are not.

Inaccurate and Overly Hostile Stereotypes

Often, communication difficulties arise because people think they know all they need to know about their opponents and that further communication is unnecessary. Yet images of opponents tend to be overly hostile and exaggerated. Opponents are seen to be more extreme and outrageous than they really are.

Lack of Communication Channels/Avoided Communication

Often disputants do not have reliable methods for communicating with opposing parties. This may be because they do not want to communicate, or it may be because they are afraid to contact their opponents or have no way to do so.  Sometimes the parties will break-off communication as a form of protest after a particularly disagreeable incident. However, the lack of communication can significantly increase the risk of future incidents.

Poor Listening Skills

Successful communication requires that the parties listen actively and carefully--asking questions and confirming interpretations to make sure they understand what the other person is meaning. People seldom work this hard at listening, however. Often in conflict situations, they hardly listen at all. Rather, while their opponent is talking, they are busy planning their own response. This frequently leads to misunderstandings.

Secrecy and Deception

Sometimes information which is critical to the accurate understanding of a situation is not available to all parties. This frequently occurs in business conflicts, when companies try to keep details about products and processes secret.  It also occurs in international conflicts when governments keep secrets for "security" reasons. This can happen in interpersonal conflicts as well when people simply choose to keep particular facts to themselves.

Poor communication also can arise when a party attempts to strengthen its position by deliberately providing opponents and other parties with misleading or inaccurate information.

Inflammatory Statements

Sometimes communication can make matters worse rather than better.  When communication is threatening, hostile, or inflammatory it can do more to escalate a conflict than it can to defuse it? 

Inflammatory Media

Negative and inflammatory publicity is a problem in conflicts--before, during, and after negotiations. Before negotiations, the media can intensify a controversy, making it harder to get people to work together, or even talk. In the early stages of negotiation, parties often advance tentative ideas which could easily backfire if publicized. The resulting outcry and complaints could easily undermine an otherwise promising negotiation effort. Even after negotiated solutions have been developed, negative publicity can rekindle conflicts, making implementation of agreements more difficult.

Inadequate Information Gathering/Time Constraints

Gathering the information needed to sensibly deal with conflict situations is time-consuming and expensive. In some cases, misunderstandings will arise because of the failure of the parties to invest the time and resources required to obtain important information.  Sometimes adequate time is simply not available. When direct communication is cut off, it is easy to rely on unreliable third party sources--rumour and media stories especially. These are notoriously error-prone, and can lead to serious misunderstandings.

Crisis Communication

In crisis situations, normal communication channels are likely to be much less effective. They often operate too slowly to keep up with the rapid pace of events, or they may have been cut off entirely.  They may also be unable to resist the increased hostility and distrust which crises are likely to create.

New, Poorly Informed Participants

In protracted conflicts, the people involved continually change. Often those playing leadership roles give up their positions and other individuals take their place. These new leaders frequently have a very limited understanding of the conflict's history and the current situation. This lack of information can cause these people to take actions which they would not have taken, had they been better informed.

Constituent Communication Problems

When dialogue or negotiation occurs among a small group of people, they may develop communication skills and a level of interpersonal understanding that is not shared by others outside the immediate circle. If these small group processes are intended to have a wider effect, it is necessary to transfer the learning that takes place in the small group to the larger constituencies which the group represents. Often, however, communication between the small group members and their constituents is not adequate to expand the learning beyond the immediate circle of participants.

Bad Communication by  SweetTea1000

Flaws: they fill up our insides - they consume us all, 

but we decide if they make us or let us fall.

My past relationships, they all seemed to have failed,

but I put the blame on me; Bad communication... he bailed.

The difficulty level of expressing my feelings - it's an all-time high,

I ruin things for myself and  when it ends, I wonder why I cry.

To properly communicate with him, I think I need a bottle of luck,

maybe if I told him how I really felt, he would have gave a fuck.

I understand now that bad communication doesn't help me grow,

it makes simple things complicated and conflicts with what I truly know.

What I know is that you meant an extremely great deal to me,

I'm sorry I never let you know, I'm sorry you're still everything I see.

If I could change one thing about myself, I would be able to speak my mind,

I would have told you everything I felt for you, even if they were out of line.

If I didn't have such bad communication skills, maybe we would still be together,

I could still call you and express myself - I guess it's truly now or never. 

Sticks and stones........

Sticks and stones will break my bones but words will never hurt me.....

"Sticks and Stones" is an English language children's rhyme. It persuades the child victim of name-calling to ignore the taunt, to refrain from physical retaliation, and to remain calm and good-natured.

I never could understand this, sticks and stones will break my bones but words will never hurt me, for words hurt so much, plus the hurt does not seem to heal, nor does the verbal abuse stop.  Once a verbal abuser realizes that he or she can hurt one, there seems to be no stopping them.  Broken bones at least heal.

Be Careful What You Say
Words are the most powerful tools in the universe. Whether you are aware of it or not, the words you use out loud and in your head have extraordinary power. When you use words repeatedly in your affirmations and when setting your intentions, it is important to stop and consider how you define those words.

What is verbal abuse?
Verbal is when some abusers yell, threatens, ridicule or humiliate.  There are ways that are less obvious and they are correcting your mistakes, disparaging your motive and even suggesting what people should do that would be for their own good.


Verbal abuse can come from the people we love the most or even strangers.

Bullies

It’s usually the bullies that use verbal abuse.  The bullies don’t get much attention at home, so bullies abuse others in order to feel better. Bullies usually target people who are different in some way.  People that are short, tall, over or under-weight, the list is endless.

These forms of bullying range from the following:

• Physical Bullying: this includes hitting, punching, kicking, or any other physical act which is intended to cause harm to another individual
• Verbal Bullying: using any type of degrading, demeaning, or even racial remarks that negatively impacts another individual
• Hidden bullying: this includes gossip, the spreading of rumors & lies, mimicking, and any other act which seeks to cause another individual to be humiliated
• Cyber Bullying: this includes any bullying directed at an individual through social media, text, or the internet

Trying to stop a verbal abuser can make matters a lot worse.  Often people cope with verbal abuse with silence, numbing their feelings against the pain and not get in the way of the abuser.

It’s much better if you don’t keep quiet about the abuse, let someone know, a friend, a relative or a counselor. For me it got so bad, that I refused to go to school, and then questions were asked by my parents.  Their idea for me to handle this was to make a rag doll and every time the abuser would hurt me, I was supposed to put a pin into this doll.  I never did that, at least others were aware what I was going through.

For my daughter’s, my advice was not to retaliate but to have compassion, and for them to remember that they must never bring themselves down to the same level of their abusers.  Tall order, I know, for my eldest daughter she will always remember the cruel words.  I was lucky that both my daughters could speak to me about the verbal abuse.

Signs of Bullying

• Mood swings
• A withdrawn or distant demeanor
• Lashing out at siblings and other family members
• Refusal to discuss what is bothering them
• A sudden increase in aggressive and irrational behavior
• Unexplained bruises or marks on body
• Seems to misplace or lose items frequently
• Being hungry, or complaining of not having enough to eat
• Not wanting to go to school
• Drastic shift in academic grades
• Wants to be alone more often than not

If you have or are experiencing verbal abuse, you need to take control and not let them hurt you. Find ways to solve it, the better for you. I was told never let the abuser know how much they hurt me, easier said than done. They said, don’t react, and let them carry on with their abuse and act like nothing was said or done. They cannot know or control what you think and feel. Only you can do that.  Always inform another person what is going on.........

It's also important to remember that you're not alone. We need only turn on a TV, watch a movie, or listen to conversations around us to know that verbal abuse permeates both teen and adult culture.