The Great Divide

No matter how hard you try to convince yourself otherwise, America and maybe even the world seems fucked. There is this gigantic bitter divide between the populous. People are angry, resentful, scared, and passing judgment on each other without merit. The most common adjective being tossed around to describe the general mood of the nation is hopelessness. You feel it too. You know you do. We are all guilty of it and even worse, we are all blaming the “other side” for our troubles.

So what the hell do we do?

We have compassion right? Compassion for those that are afraid. Compassion for those with different views. Compassion for those that are suffering. Compassion for your neighbor and even yourself. Someone get me, Oprah...YOU get compassion and YOU get compassion and YOU get compassion. Problem solved. Wrong!

Compassion under normal circumstances is difficult. Compassion in our current environment is impossible! The reason we cannot express the empathy we need to is that we are all completely convinced that “we” are right and “they” are wrong. True compassion is not the same as expressing sympathy towards an individual, simply because we feel bad they cannot be persuaded to share our views, and regret that they continue to exist with beliefs we have determined to be incorrect. This type of disingenuous benevolence does nothing but strengthen the divide.

In order to truly tackle this issue, we MUST lose our egos. Forget what it is that you think you know. Instead, concentrate on the things you don’t know. Specifically, why the “other side” acts the way they do, feels the way they do, and thinks the way they think. Most importantly, FORGET about being right or wrong. That is not important and is often a lot more ambiguous than you realize.

Having walked a mile in another’s shoes you will find yourself much more open to the transformative healing that needs to take place. Only by truly connecting with each other can we finally come together in the unity this world so desperately needs.

Shields up.