This posts initial publication date will be on Election Day in 2022 in the United States. Unfortunately, Americans are becoming more like our politicians, finding fault and making enemies out of citizens who think differently than they do. I am guilty of this too, in fact, most of the time, I can’t understand how humans with the same complex brain can come up with the cockamamie stuff the other side comes up with…
But they do. And I can’t change that. I’ve clung to the hope that those in my sphere of influence would change, but mostly, they don’t.
I can be cynical and adverse, grumpily contend that nothing will change, that humans, or Americans, or the other side are dumber or meaner and deserve the pratfalls only I can foresee. I can setup a big vinegar stand on the corner and try to attract customers pickled in their ways. Likely another lonely venture.
Or, I can take a radical and harder approach, and I can be equanimous to ideas and especially to the people raising them to me. I can take my friends and family and fellow citizens at face value and at least appreciate that they got to their opinions by their own means and, even if I think they are wrong, have the graciousness to accept them as the truly held beliefs they are.
But I expect each of you to do the same.
We need to stop assuming that someone isn’t hurting when they take a position different than ours, or that they are inhuman, amoral, or an enemy to be dealt with in the most negative way.
This is not to say that we should accept bad ideas. We shouldn’t. But we should consider them with due diligence: maintain wisdom from reading and researching, reasoning to create a better idea, and convey it with civility.
Importantly, bad ideas do not mean the people are necessarily bad people. We should be very leery of this conclusion—the gracious position is the benefit of the doubt.
So this election season (and beyond) try to be 18% more gracious to your fellow man. Add a smile and a kind word as a tip to your clerk at the grocery store. Don’t look at your phone during a meeting that other people have prepared for. Give something for nothing. Speak kindly. Act with dignity, like your grandmother is watching or like it’s your dream job interview.
Simply do it, act with grace, because it is the right thing to do, thee heightened state of humanity. Do it, because you mean it. Let’s elect equanimity, grace, and goodness going forward.