The Big Society is out there. It seems the only criticism is that some cannot make enough money from it. Shame on you. It is of course, in its non-monetary way, rough at the edges, variously present in a big way or small, solidly present in 'happy' communities and often seen as 'a little working class, council estate, and to do with times past' by those who see little of the help it gives them. Yet these descriptors confound our less happy communities. It is far wider and far more influential in its present form, than given credit for. And the Big Society - and its potential - are both huge.
So let us move towards the Big Society potential. It is all! It can change lives. It can move us towards and even be the cause of our being the happiest nation on Earth. Oh, now this is telling. The happiest nation on Earth is not the richest or even nearly so. What is the per-capita GDP of Bhutan? What is the average income? Hmmm, now where does this get us?
Did this start with a concern about money? So let us drop this, since there is evidence that money does not make you happy. Where is the gap, exactly? Is it the need for depressive negativity (blaming the 'they'/someone else) in an otherwise every-reason-to-be-quite-positive society? A society where those who have will keep and those who have not will not get because of the keepers? Now, here we have some useful dividers...are there keepers out there?
This society – yes, the Big One, has many positive contributors. It is the neighbours and those along the street, of course. As it is our friends in the village, our work-colleagues and our networks, teams, industry, commerce, sport and the arts. We just need to up the game, realise the potential....start liking people, including ourselves, and learn to trust, to give a little more towards a nicer world – One Big Society. And a smile.
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