Thriving Beyond the Label

A Three-Minute Read

Like duct tape wrapped around an old leather shoe, labels may serve their purpose early on. But after a while, it’s high time to move on.

Such was the case with John Denver, a talented singer-songwriter whose career lasted four decades, but peaked in his first one - the 1970’s. He became famous through light and airy songs such as “Country Roads,” “Thank God I’m a Country Boy,” and "Rocky Mountain High” - and these three songs received probably 90% of his airplay. He was thought of as a squeaky-clean country boy, but there was so much more beneath the surface.

When I was a college radio disc jockey during two of those peak years, I was struck by his passion for life in general, but also his compassion. Over the years my respect for him grew as he progressively directed more and more of his songwriting and notoriety toward peace and human rights issues - especially as he addressed world hunger and environmental causes. The song I’ve showcased below is the title track of his seventeenth studio album and I’d love to hear your thoughts.

“ . . . There’s a man who is my brother, I just don’t know his name.

     But I know his home and family, cause I know we feel the same.

And it hurts me when he’s hungry and when his children cry.

     For I too am a father, and that little one is mine.

It’s about time we begin, to turn the world around.

     It’s about time we start to make it, the dream we’ve always known.

It’s about time we start to live it, the family of man.

     It’s about time it’s about changes, it’s about time. . . “

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Every day we get to make choices - whether we want to reinforce the here and now, with its “Us Against Them” charge, or to make investments in diplomacy and peacemaking where getting ahead is not the driving force. The former strategy has failed countless times, and the latter has never been tried.

Humanity as a whole just can’t seem to grasp the concept that when we attack “Them,” literally or figuratively, we end up harming ourselves. Retribution may come directly or indirectly, sooner, or later. Look no further than the twenty-two US military veterans who commit suicide every day here in the U.S. Neither Russia, Iran, nor Hamas could kill that many Americans consistently, and yet we do it to ourselves with every war that we fight. Only when diplomacy and peacemaking become more important than the concentrations of power and wealth, will we see an end to this travesty.

And yes, “It’s About Time”

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