Category: Love

A few weeks ago, as I was driving up to Michigan City, I saw, in front of a small white clapboard sided church next to the highway, this message on the church marquee:

Jesus is coming.

We hope He gets here before November.

Interesting how that stops being funny the more you think about it. Humor often masks fear –and the most common thread of emotion running through all of the public “conversation” this past year is Fear.

Fear that makes people speak and act in haste, say and do things that they never would have if they weren’t tired and afraid and on the defensive. Friends and family members find themselves at odds and become vocal because everyone has been scrubbed so raw by verbal vitriol that we’re all walking nerve endings and it doesn’t take much to sting and hurt.

And thanks to social media, you can find yourself defending a position you don’t really believe in because you expressed it in public, in writing, at some point when you were tired or scared or both.

I find myself again, this campaign year, holding out for it to be over – and I’m not alone. I hear that same sentiment reflected back wherever I go: “I just wanted to be over.” “Is it November 9 yet?” As if we could get back to the business of being normal, ordinary, decent people in a vibrant free society once the election is over.

What does it say about us that we have so let our system of “government” devolve to the place that it barely matters which presidential candidate wins the election because we just want it to be over? Or, better yet, we want someone to save us? Because, ultimately, we have no faith that any of the people who are poised to govern us and serve the public good will actually be doing that.

In reality, it isn’t about politics or the issues or serving the public good ~ it hasn’t been for a long time. It’s about the insidious and subtle erosion of those virtues that our parents taught us and that we try to teach our children: honesty, integrity, respect, and responsibility; the importance of compassion tolerance, and empathy; and of being contributing members of our communities. Or even common courtesy  or just plain human decency.

Unless you’re a sociopath you have a conscience. You have one for a reason. Listen to it.

This presidential campaign, especially, has devolved into public displays of intolerance, rudeness, misinformation and out right lies perpetuated and spreading like a disease throughout the public consciousness via social media and so-called mainstream media. And it just goes grindingly on, until we’re all so raw and hurt and weary we just want it to be over. An entire society of individuals who increasingly feel as if they’re being water boarded – because it won’t be over on November 9. Regardless of who is elected as president, the divisiveness will go on.

It’s time to stop this.

You can’t change other people’s behavior by force any more than you can change their opinions by shouting louder than them. If you want strong, honest, and responsible leaders you have to be strong and honest and responsible yourself.

Try not to react to verbal barbs and pot shots from people who are themselves emotionally raw and tired and scared. And try not to participate in the propaganda machine that is social media. If you’re too tired to go and check out that post for yourself and verify that it’s true, don’t share or retweet or whatever.

If you want to have an impact in government, start with your own family and friends and community. Get involved on a local level; do your best to serve your constituents and make your community a better place. As far as this, or any, election goes, if you’re going to exercise the privilege of voting, then take responsibility for educating yourself about the candidates, their track record in dealing with people, serving their communities, etc. Once you have, vote your conscience ~ and be grown-up enough to let other people vote their’s ~ then do your best to exemplify the virtues of respect, for yourself and others, honesty, empathy, compassion, and responsibility that you want to see in you leaders.

It isn’t about Hillary or Donald. Ultimately it’s about each one of us, individually. That old saw about being the change you want to see in the world is a cliché only because it’s true.

It all starts with YOU. So be the person who behaves with honesty and integrity and responsibility, be a person of good conscience who sets a higher standard. Don’t just keep your head down and hope for the best ~ or for a savior to get us out of this mess.