A reminder.
We need to relearn how to disagree agreeably with those we want to insult.
You might think, “Totally. I agree. I would never be an online jerk.” And yet, we are all online jerks, these days. If someone disagrees with us, we might try to disagree respectfully. But if we’re a Bernie fan or a Hillary fan or a Trump fan or a #BlackLivesMatter supporter or a Tea Partier or a Guns Rights person or a vegan…really, whatever we’re most passionate about…we tend to vilify those who might dare disagree with us. “Not me,” you say? But what if that person were racist? Then we can be a jerk to them, right? Call them out?
Wrong. Peaceful non-violent activism is practiced when we are offended. When there is oppression. When we are faced with aggression or prejudice. It’s not something to practice on those who already agree with us—that’s easy. To change our world, we must talk to those outside of our yes-men choir.
Listen to yes men enough, as Elvis did toward the end of his life, and you might just turn into a…narcissist. A miserable narcissist.
If we want to be happy, if we want to be of service to this world, we have to open up. Practice feeling our heart, however sad or tender or insecure. We have to feel our fear, instead of pushing it away or turning it into macho anger.
We have to remember how to agree to disagree agreeably. That’s the foundation of democracy, the commonwealth (or any relationship)—an ability to be honest, and respectful, both. To exist in a community.
Questioning someone’s character because they have a different view than you does not change their mind, and just creates more separation in this world.
“I destroy my enemies when I make them my friends.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
…for more, see Waylon discuss this on video.
Yours in the Vision of an Enlightened Society,
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