I write this flying through the air, on a Boeing 737 aircraft, drinking a glass of white wine with the good company of strangers. 

I recently watched an interview with one of my favorite comedians, Louie CK who spoke about the incredible times that we live in.  As he says, everything’s amazing and nobody’s happy.  Watch the video here.  CK gives examples of situations like air travel and the wonders of technology where we can access a world wide web of information in a global sharing network at the tip of our fingers at all times; we can fly across the globe, seated comfortable in recline-able seats, served drinks and even access wifi internet connection.  We live in incredible times indeed.  What CK talks about in this interview though is our impatience with these marvels.  We’ve become callous to the wonders of science, our access to magical and incredible feats in human tool development.  I’ve seen myself and others go into complete rage over a delayed flight, or a phone working slowly. 

But here I am, shifting my attention from the cramped seating and squirming children next to me: I sit here on the plane with this mobile computer device (laptop) typing key by key to create my thoughts on a digital paper that I can send anywhere in the world in the blink of an eye.  I sit here looking down on the world from the sky, able to meet my friend in Baltimore just 5 hours from take-off and not 30 years of foot travel.  I am in complete amazement of the wonders that we live with today, and alarmed as to how we’ve fallen asleep to these miracles.  CK references our entitlement issues, our expectations and assumptions, which actually work against our better psychological health.  As an example, he references the upset of a fellow passenger on a plane who learned that there was wifi on the flight and then got angry learning that the wifi was slow.  I can see this mentality working across the United States and working against us.  Entitlement to me, is the opposite of gratitude.  Entitlement creates separation of the self from the world; it creates a story of exception and values of better-than/worse-than. Entitlement and questions of fairness lives in the world of scarcity- that there’s not enough.  Entitlement is a comparison story that always puts us against others, that crumples all generosity and puts us in the passenger seat- a victim of our circumstances.  This simultaneously puts us ahead of all others and sets us as inactive passive members of society.