The word progress as we use it seems to be used in this way mostly:
“Progress(ing) means to grow or move forward”.
It is viewed as a tree, which grows its branches towards wherever sunlight brings its stalks and leaves to reach out towards. And so, it is important to remember that this word progress has a meaning. However long this meaning will remain is up to us, but I like it and so I am writing this essay in its favor.
Looking through various dictionary definitions, I found that the definition of progress boils down to one single use case. This is barring deprecated or irrelevant definitions such as “a royal journey marked by pomp and pageant” or “a tour or circuit made by an official (such as a judge)”.
A forward or onward movement or development towards a goal.
It is my argument that progress cannot exist without a goal. Progress without a goal is simply change. For example, if you are trying to hang a painting then you can nail in as many nails as you’d like, and you would be moving and developing the situation, but you are not making progress, because you are not achieving the goals or approaching the goals you set. In fact, you can even scrap the latter part which says “towards a goal” as this is redundant. Forward and onward movement already implies a direction, and a direction only exists when there is a destination.
So, one that moves towards a goal is progressing. Viewing social discourse through this terminology then becomes a bit awkward. That is because we can all agree that we want progress, but we cannot agree on what progress is. But is it not just movement towards an objective? Well, what is our objective as a society? If you are not psychotic then your answer to this is that everyone is able to be strong, healthy of mind and body, prosperous and fulfilled.
So, I would say it’s safe to assume everyone wants to progress towards this shared common goal. Well, most of us can in fact agree with this. Yet we still seem to run into troubles, often big troubles that cause great societal strife, division and friction. Well that is due to the simple fact that sharing a common goal seems apparent, but it in fact is not. That is because we all have different needs, each individual and each grouping of individuals have different needs and desires that conflict with each other. A healthy mind and body is different to a meditative yogi than it is from a white collar financier. Being strong is different for a woman than it is for a man. Prosperity inherently hinges on scarcity, you cannot prosper without enjoying resources that could belong to someone else at that given time, but by chance simply do not. You can agree on the values you are trying to progress towards such as justice or freedom, but those rely on perspective and everyone’s perspective is different.
I am hoping that the picture I’m painting is becoming painfully obvious. ‘We’ do not have shared common goals. And if the climate in the world, news and the internet means anything it goes to show that our goals are anything but common and are more fragmented than ever. The word progress has simply been hijacked by idealogues who repeated it enough that in the end to simply oppose their ideas means opposition towards progress. And opposition towards progress means you do not want progress towards strength, health, freedom, justice, prosperity or fulfillment rather your goals are more sinister. But this is not true. It is simply a buzzword that elicits vivid imagery of a kumbaya world.
And I think we all want that to some extent. Prosperity and peace, is the end goal and the people that want destruction are a vast minority. We simply all have different visions for what the journey towards these goals looks like. And I suppose we took our heritage and faith for granted, because they formed the traditions on which all united purpose and shared goals within a nation was built on, and now those goals are dispersed and all that it seems that people want is to enrich themselves as quickly as possible before whatever the inevitable catastrophe you’ve been told will happen happens.
9/20/2025