www.VIGILANCEVOICE.com
VIGILANCE VOICE.COM
"All the news that's fit to print about fighting Terrorism with Vigilance!"
 

Skip Intro: GO TO STORY DIRECTORY

Welcome To the Principles Of Vigilance

       My name is Cliff McKenzie.  I am a survivor of Nine Eleven, and a Sentinel of Vigilance.  I'm also Editor of the VigilanceVoice.
       The VigilanceVoice was born on September 11, 2001.   It came into existence as I sat in the rubble of the World Trade Center, looking up at the cloud-choked September sky remembering the people leaping from burning buildings and the horrendous crash of two giant Twin Tower icons that buried nearly 3,000 in the first Terrorist attack by a foreign nation since the War of 1812.

VigilanceVoice Editor Cliff McKenzie,
giving "thumbs up" for Vigilance

       I recall pulling a group of crying women against a wall as the buildings around us exploded.  Frightened, they screamed mournfully:  "We're all going to die.  We're all going to die!."   As a veteran of more than 100 combat operations in Vietnam, I had some experience facing death.  I said in as comforting a Voice as possible:  "Think of something beautiful.  If this is our last moment, think of something beautiful!"
       To this day, I do not know from where those words came. I only know they remind today that beauty exists in Vigilance and ugliness in Terrorism.
       In the aftermath of the buildings' collapse, I sank into the rubble amidst the ashes of death and destruction and pounded out my thoughts and feelings of that precise moment in history.  I knew I was at the epicenter of an event that held monumental proportion. I knew I must capture it in its raw majesty. 
      No photograph or painting can ever encompass the horror of war.  I knew my words were only grains of sand on a beach of historic human violence, but I struck the keys of my ancient MacIntosh laptop with the same passion any artist might knowing that this may be his or her last painting, his or her last report, last legacy of man's inhumanity unto others.
.   I also knew there was something powerful in the ashes of destruction.  The more I hit the keys on my computer, the more I knew I was being directed to find the secret of the ashes. Everything had been pulverized. Human beings were atomic fragments floating through the air, part of pall that shrouded everything. But, within it, inside those atoms, at the core of the horror and destruction, I knew there must be something of value, some lession, some message that would be worth the incredible loss of life.
I sought to find the answer, and if not right then, to capture the pieces of the puzzle so I might later put them together. Today, millions of words later, the puzzle unfolds via the VigilanceVoice.com.
                                                           THE VISION OF THAT DAY
       My vision of September 11, 2001, included witnessing a halo around the burning Twin Towers.  I saw a great ring of white whirlwinding around the buildings. At first I thought it was a flock of doves or seagulls caught in the vortex of black and red and orange balls of fire gushing from the viscera of the building. I was amazed the birds could withstand the heat and considered them a sign, a message.
       As people trapped inside leaped from the windows--some alone, flailing their arms fruitlessly as wings, others holding hands in a unified leap of life to death--I kept switching my attention back to the massive circle of white fluttering objects dancing around the Towers. I continued to be amazed at how a flock of birds could be caught in the currents of such a catastrophe.
       In those moments of switching my eyes from the horror of death to the ecclesiastical sight of a white halo composed of birds, the reality of what I was actually seeing dawned. At first, I didn't want to accept the truth. I wanted the message of meaning to overpower the harsh reality that what I was witnessing wasn't a flock of doves giving tribute to the trapped people dying by the minute, but in fact , millions of sheets of paper caught in a cyclonic ebbing and flooding around the building. The "halo" was held by some magnetic force of heat and updrafts, kept aloft by the fire's thirst to feed on oxygen.
       Despite the truth my "doves" were paper, I called the ring The Sentinel of Vigilance Halo.
       It was and is my signal that the spirits of all those who died that day rose up and remain standing guard over Ground Zero as reminders we must fight the Triad of Terrorism with the Principles of Vigilance. I likened the "Souls of the Sentinels" to the Spartans who the Greek poet Simonides saluted for holding back tens of thousands of Persians 2500 years earlier.
      Since September 11, 2001, I have written daily a diary on the issues of Terrorism and how the Principles of Vigilance can overcome them.   Over the past three years from Ground Zero, I have averaged some 2,000 words per day written on how we, Parents and Loved Ones of Vigilance, can protect our children and ourselves from the ravages of the Beast of Terror.
      Including other materials I have written in this website, the total words I've dedicated to battling Terrorism amount to nearly 2 million (2,000,000).   Each and every word has but one purpose--to remind the reader that Terrorism is nothing more than a combination of Fear, Intimidation and Complacency.   Further, that to combat this Triad of Terrorism--Fear, Intimidation, Complacency--one needs only apply the Principles of Vigilance--Courage, Conviction and Right Actions in behalf of the Children's Children's Children.
       To aid readers in achieving the goal of becoming a Sentinel of Vigilance, or a Guardian of Vigilance to protect future generations from the Beast of Terror, I have provided a number of tools and systems.
       The primary tool is the Pledge of Vigilance.  It is a simple vow taken by a dedicated Parent or Loved One of Vigilance that reminds him or her of the duty and responsibility to help a child battle Fear with Courage, Intimidation with Conviction, and Complacency with Right Actions for future generations.
       The engine of Vigilant Effort required is simple.  I've provided a formula for Sentinels of Vigilance, reminding them they need only encourage One Percent more Courage than Fear, One Percent more Conviction than Intimidation, and One Percent more Right Action than Complacency to defeat the Beast of Terror in any battle.
       Since Terrorism is not just about blowing up buildings, or suicide bombings, but also includes the self-destruction of a person's worth by delimiting human character and poisoning human values, the battle of self-worth is an endless one.   It stretches back to the beginning of time when Cain clubbed Able to death over a petty jealousy, and looms today in its grandiose form with Kim Jong Il rattling nuclear weapons at the world.
       But sandwiched between the dawn and sunset of Terrorism is its endless nights, when a child is ravaged by nightmares, or grows up thinking he or she is unloved, uncared for, less-than, not-as-good-as others for a wide variety of reasons that have little do with race, color, creed, economic, political, social or religious status.
       The mother who drives her children into a lake to die is one extreme, but a mother who turns angrily to a child seeking love and attention and yells:  "Don't bother me, I'm busy," can inflict as much Terror in a child's heart as a stranger with a knife to the child's throat.
       My goal in the VigilanceVoice is to bring to the surface the Hidden Terrorisms of the soul, which I believe are the breeding grounds for all Terrorism.
      We, who look into the mirror and see the loser, the failure, the righteous, the lord over others, feed the Beast.   Whether rich or poor, successful or unsuccessful, we can fall into the Beast's discipleship through swallowing the selfishness of Pride, Anger, Greed, Lust, Envy, Gluttony and Sloth--the fuel that fires the Beast's wrath upon others.
       Being a Sentinel of Vigilance means we inspect our own house first and identify the Beast Within and do our best to control and manage his or her hunger to rule our lives, to direct our behavior in ways that limit our humanity and cleave our ability to pass on the great qualities we possess as human beings not only to our own children, but all other children.
       Once we have a handle on our own Beast of Terror, we then begin to help our children and loved ones tame their Beast.   We supply them with the tools of Vigilance we have used to keep our Beast at bay.  We become Sentinels of Vigilance, guarding ourselves and others from the Beast who lurks in the shadows of all of our minds and souls waiting for our Complacency, our Intimidation or our Fear to fling open the door to the Beast's arrival.
        Homeland Security, I believe, begins within us all.  It starts with the Pledge of Vigilance being downloaded and posted on your refrigerator door, and read daily as a reminder to keep your guard up against the Beast who is doing pushups, waiting for that precise moment to rear his or her ugly head and turn your tongue into a rapier, or to make you cower in the corner of your self until your sense of futility manifests itself into Complacency, signaled by such statements as:  "What can I do?  I'm a loser! I'm a nobody!"  Or, worse, "I'm somebody special.  I'm too busy.  Let someone else do it!"
       While none of us is perfect in our battles with Fear, Intimidation and Complacency, equally true is that none of us is sharp at battling them unless we counter their effects with Courage, Conviction and Right Actions in behalf of the Children's Children's Children.   We, as human beings, can ill afford to let the Beast of Terror rule our lives, either from the image reflecting us in the mirror, or in the skies over our heads.   We cannot abdicate the role of being a Parent of Vigilance or Loved One of Vigilance without paying a huge price of neglect.
       This website is about providing you, the concerned Citizen of Vigilance, with the tools to improve your life today, and the lives of those you most care about.  
       As you read the stories I write each day, I urge you to relate them to how you might better secure your home and family and loved ones from the ravages of the Beast of Terror.
       Human Common Sense is the most powerful of weapons against Terrorism, but one of the most dangerous of all thoughts that paves the road for the Beast is the one that suggests or implies that someone else is in charge of your Homeland Security.
      Nothing could be more false.
      We must take the Sword and Shield of Vigilance in our grasps, and use them to fight the Beast.   If we don't, the Beast will consume us in pieces, taking a bite here and a chunk there until the foundations of our human character are eaten away and we fall deep into the rut of Complacency, demanding that others do something while we sit in our armchairs griping and complaining.
       The great pay-off for this effort is knowing we have armed our children and Loved Ones to be able to withstand the Breath of the Beast when he hisses in our ears we are "unworthy," or "unable," or "unfit" to stand up as a leader in our own behalf.
       I personally fight my Beast daily, and have for many years.  I do not pretend the battle to be easy, but I do share it is ultimately rewarding when someone you love and care about uses the tools you pass on to enrich his or her own life and faces Fear, Intimidation and Complacency with Courage, Conviction and Right Actions that benefit future generations.
       Each time that happens I know the battle with the Beast has been worthwhile, even if the distance between the effort and the result seems forever.
       So, I ask you to read the website carefully.  Keep in mind that the stories you read all have one purpose--to supply you with tools, information and motivation to better ward off the attacks by the Beast of Terror either upon yourself or those you love.
       You will find stories written by wife, GMa Lori, designed for children.   Her aim is to reveal to parents how to better communicate to the child, and she uses her experience with our three grandchildren as guideposts for her messages.  Her goal is to fight the Triad of Terrorism with the Principles of Vigilance, just as mine is.
       Hopefully, you will find what we write for you a roadmap to help you better defend yourself and your family from the nefarious harm the Beast wishes to inflict upon you and your loved ones.
       You can start your Journey to Vigilance today by downloading the Pledge of Vigilance.   Then, start practicing the Principles in your daily life.  And, pass them on to your loved ones.
       You can only become richer as a human being and safer as a guardian to the future as a result.

       Vigilantly Yours,

       Cliff McKenzie

GO TO STORY DIRECTORY
Apolitical Comment:   The VigilanceVoice attempts to have no politics.   It seeks to be apolitical, arguing the need for Vigilance as best it can from the point of view of the Children's Children's Children.  We attempt to present our views  free of race, religion, political, social, economic, cultural prejudices and righteous opinions. We are not always successful.  Personal prejudices based on our cultures and belief systems do creep in.  Our intent, however, is to keep our vision pure and uncluttered as best we can to make our point.   That point is that the Rights of Children are universal, void of trappings measured by the color of their skin, the land in which they are born, the culture the child grows within, and the belief systems taught to the child. The Equal Rights Of The Children's Children's Children's Future to be free of the Beast of Terror supercede, or should, any and all of our failures to present arguments void of some hint of our political and social views. We ask you to not judge us should you think we have violated our apolitical position.  Instead,  we ask you to judge our intent to preserve and protect the Vigilant Rights of The Children's Children's Children to be free from the Beast of Terror's Fear, Intimidation and Complacency.  We feel confident that intent, in this arena,  is as pure as humanely possible.  Cliff McKenzie, Editor and Founder, VigilanceVoice.com.

 

 

www.VIGILANCEVOICE.com
©2001 - 2005, VigilanceVoice.com, All rights reserved -  a ((HYYPE)) design

Your contributions are needed to support the VigilanceVoice. Send $1 or more, either through PayPal below, or in cash or check. You can also help by investing in a local ad in your community paper promoting the Principles of Vigilance and how to overcome Emotional Terrorism. Go to Donation Page For More Information
Solution Graphics