A lot of people have a lot of ideas about how other people could be making the world better. One of the keys ways to improve it would be to simply get rid of all of those other people. The real trick is how you go about making them go away.
There are a lot of people who would strongly disapprove of racism or sexism or ageism that would very publicly and aggressively practice what I would call prioritism. These differences arise when people do not share priorities, as is the case when some people value natural resource jobs and others prioritize the environment, with most people ultimately being in a fluctuating bell curve in the middle.
Protecting community assets is what government and regulation were built for. So there is no need for hatred or fights, people are better to focus their energy on the systems that exist and use those to change regulations (or even governments) if they have concerns. There literally is no problem if you’re busy working on a solution that just doesn’t exist in time yet, but holding angry or worried feelings in our hearts is not good for us any more than if we were hating a race or religion. It’s our heart that carries the hate.
Too many people are seeing the world in a very simplistic, binary way because the media presents it to us in short soundbites and then only discusses those as though they represent all of the actual interpretations. Their very job is to create conflict where there isn’t any, so we cannot use the media as a basis for us to experience outrage on a personal basis. That’s an expensive and toxic emotion to experience so it should only be undertaken when there is an upside to the person paying the price.
Opening our minds means we must avoid slotting people into categories. Not because you can’t use other categories to defend your categories, but because categories only exist in the ego-world. You want to start connecting with people in that other world–that uncategorized, undefined open space where all people are equal and there is no separation between the individual members of a group or even between them and the thing being done. This is what any good band will do when they’re feeling on. They’re connected.
If you find a lot of they, them, me, you, and I in your speech or self-talk then you know you’re not connected and you’re invested in binary thinking. People need to be defined for those temrs to make sense, but what’s best is to forget the definition of the person and focus respectfully on their statement, action or creation. Drop me and them thinking. Just deal with the issue. It’s a good place to be clinical. Let your motivations to work on the solution be emotional, but let the work itself be as rational as it is positive.
There are a lot of beautiful, very well-intentioned people who invest enormous amounts of time in very negative and combative approaches, all in an attempt to force solutions on the world. Since that naturally creates resistance, just diverting that energy to more positive approaches will absolutely be felt by all of us. Do not invest in fighting. Look for opportunities to build bridges and create greater understanding. That is your route to a better world.
Positive actions will lead to a positive situations. Take your opportunities to remove energy from negative thinking and turn it instead into positive action. Both you and the world will be better for it. So go make friends with someone on the other side and get them to teach you about why they’re on that other side. It will do you both more good to talk than to shout.
Enjoy your day.
peace. s
Scott McPherson is an Edmonton-based writer, public speaker, and mindfulness facilitator who works with individuals, companies and non-profit organizations locally and around the world.
A serious childhood brain injury lead Scott to spend his entire life meditating on the concepts of thought, consciousness, reality and identity. It made others as strange to him as he was to them. When he realized people were confused by their own over-thinking, Scott began teaching others to understand reality. He is currently CBC Radio Active’s Wellness Columnist, as well as a writer, speaker and mindfulness instructor based in Edmonton, AB where he still finds it strange to write about himself in the third person.
