Re-inventing Trinidad & Tobago

My friend Gregory Wight (himself a prolific and serial writer) has given me what I consider the missing piece (and the counterbalance) to my initial concept of redeveloping Trinidad & Tobago into a society that works and works well, and I would like to share them both here.

These ideas were exchanged in something like a 'council' aimed at the title of this piece, and my contribution to the discussion was the idea of excellence based on the belief that if we all aimed for excellence in every endeavor then we would have no choice but to rebuild a better version of ourselves and by extension our country.

My favorite author Khalil Gibran said it best in his thought provoking work 'The Prophet' - 

'And what is it to work with love? 

It is to weave the cloth with threads drawn from your heart, even as if your beloved were to wear that cloth. 

It is to build a house with affection, even as if your beloved were to dwell in that house. 

It is to sow seeds with tenderness and reap the harvest with joy, even as if your beloved were to eat the fruit. 

It is to charge all things you fashion with a breath of your own spirit, 

And to know that all the blessed dead are standing about you and watching.'

In my opinion, deliberate, purposeful excellence is a major pathway to re-development, but based on these discussions (apparently) not the only one.

The sad truth is that many of our problems are based on people making poor choices or deliberately wrong choices in pursuit of their own objectives at the expense of who or whatever obstructs their path, and we live in a country where most of our citizens wake up already feeling advantaged; almost every transaction wants to leave a sour taste based on poor value for money or service offered, and worse, should you encounter one of those people who believe that the end justifies the means, then it is literally you 'to catch' as there are no real avenues here for recourse or redress.

Taking a bribe, giving a bribe, looking the other way when corruption occurs, littering, speeding, littering, breaking major roads, providing deliberately shoddy service, misbehavior in public office, murder, disrespecting others all share a common bed.

They all require the same break with social norms and a fall away from decency whether learned or not.

Based on this realization at the most basic level, the government ought to be creating mind-space for this concept before attempting to remake the wheel and this is my/our advice.

We need to get back to basics.

Watching each successive Government wrestle with the breakdowns in society without taking the time to find out what exactly they were fighting is (in my opinion) the root of their collective failure.

This situation cannot be legislated away and calls for us to literally come up higher, or as Einstein said: "We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them."

The idea Gregory put forward was the concept of 'personal responsibility,' where individuals are asked to make the best choice available regardless of situation and to be guided by their conscience when tempted to do otherwise.

Simply brilliant.

Taken collectively it could be referred to as 'social responsibility,' and social responsibility combined with excellence in all endeavors naturally shifts the country as a whole from a place where 'who dares wins and who vex loss' to a place where we become a community of one people living in harmony under one flag.

Imagine waking up in Trinidad & Tobago where the words of our national anthem are not hollow sounding and wishful thinking 'isms.

'With boundless faith in our collective destiny we could solemnly declare that side by side we would stand come what may, and pledge our lives in defense of these principles and in our native land, a place where every creed and race would find an equal place in all manner of pursuits and representations and share in the same freedoms to express themselves religiously, culturally and otherwise.

Combined with excellence, personal responsibility would become guiding rails on which, if we were to run all our endeavors, would work to re-invent Trinidad & Tobago for the benefit of and in the best interest of all.

Of this I am absolutely convinced and sure.