Our True Selves – Archiving Our True Selves • One Deed at A Time

Imagining Our Way to Amended Futures

“The theme which myths and fairy tales sing of...which impels masses into movement, the desideratum [defining desire] of founders of religions... [of] philosophers... [of] scientists... [of] poets... statesmen and revolutionaries...”

PERSONAL

Imagining Personal Amends to Self

In her compelling manifesto for amending our relationship to our true selves, "Unworthy: How to Stop Hating Yourself," Anneli Rufus invites us to imagine 'what we might do today if we didn't despise ourselves.'

HISTORICAL

Imagining Our Historical Amends

“No baseness or cruelty of treason so deep or so tragic shall enter our human world, but that loyal love shall be able in due time to oppose to just that deed of treason its fitting deed of atonement.” —Josiah Royce

PERSONAL / INTERPERSONAL

Imagining Interpersonal Amends to Others

"There is in every person that which waits, waits, waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in herself. There is that in every person that waits—waits and listens—for the sound of the genuine in other people...

ANCESTRAL / HISTORICAL

Imagining Our Ancestral Amends

Acts of injustice done / Between the setting and the rising sun / In history lie like bones, / each one. — Auden

PLANETARY / FUTURIST

Imagining Future Amends to Our Planet

”It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience . . . To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another and to preserve, and cherish, the pale blue dot; the only home we've ever known.” —Carl Sagan

INSTITUTIONAL / HISTORICAL

Imagining Our Institutional Amends

“Sometimes a whole people needs healing work. Not a tribe, not a nation. Tribes and nations are just signs that the whole is diseased. The healing work that cures a whole people is the highest work, far higher than the cure of single individuals.”

INTERSPECIES / FUTURIST

Imagining Future Amends to Other Species

“Scientists estimate that 150-200 species of plant, insect, bird and mammal become extinct every 24 hours...greater than anything the world has experienced since the vanishing of the dinosaurs...”

From Woke to Un-Woke and Re-Woke

Back in my seminary days a professor cautioned us against...

Theophus SmithMay 2, 2023

From Woke to Un-Woke and Re-Woke

Back in my seminary days a professor cautioned us against becoming puritanical with this witty description of a puritan: ‘a...

Theophus SmithMay 2, 2023

Next Steps for Men ~ From ‘Oppressor Selves’ to True Selves

Discovering Our ‘Oppressor Selves’ in order to Reclaim Our ‘True Selves’ As an African American man I’m still discovering how...

Theophus SmithJune 15, 2022

Flip the Script for Community Policing

What if we were tripping to help instead? Black & Blue Lives Matter Together Our nation’s visionary efforts to transition...

Theophus SmithApril 6, 2022

Winning OURSELVES is the prize in this invitation first to IMAGINE making amends.

We are the rewards as we ‘operationalize’ our imagination at OurTrueSelves.com.

Here’s how. In the not too distant future, let’s just DECIDE to—

- imagine mistakes corrected
- imagine harms healed
- imagine misdeeds repaired — one deed at-a-time — FIRST.

And THEN inspiration can empower and sustain us as we actively make amends, or join others doing so in real time.

Meanwhile we offer each other examples and comments, categorized and archived here, or copied and shared elsewhere.

That’s our prize, our reward for just imagining amends: our true selves reclaimed; reclaimed as noble, honorable, reliable, estimable, or desirable again.

Imagining Amends . . .

. . . One Deed At a Time

Imagining Our Way to Amended Futures

Imagining Personal Amends to Self

Imagining Our Historical Amends

Imagining Interpersonal Amends to Others

Imagining Our Ancestral Amends

Imagining Future Amends to Our Planet

Imagining Our Institutional Amends

Imagining Future Amends to Other Species

From Woke to Un-Woke and Re-Woke

From Woke to Un-Woke and Re-Woke

Next Steps for Men ~ From ‘Oppressor Selves’ to True Selves

Flip the Script for Community Policing

Winning OURSELVES is the prize in this invitation first to IMAGINE making amends.

We are the rewards as we ‘operationalize’ our imagination at OurTrueSelves.com.

Here’s how. In the not too distant future, let’s just DECIDE to—

imagine mistakes corrected

imagine harms healed

imagine misdeeds repaired — one deed at-a-time — FIRST.

And THEN inspiration can empower and sustain us as we actively make amends, or join others doing so in real time.

Meanwhile we offer each other examples and comments, categorized and archived here, or copied and shared elsewhere.

That’s our prize, our reward for just imagining amends: our true selves reclaimed; reclaimed as noble, honorable, reliable, estimable, or desirable again.

— OurTrueSelves.com