Touching Bases as Fellow Members of the Human Community

 One of the things that I love about writing is to sit in front of my keyboard with feelings and thoughts that are running through my heart and mind. Things that are stirring me to reflect upon and share what is going on within this world of reflection. I have a need to share ‘what’s what’ with me with others, hence my blog and my relationship with the Mindful Word. This need to share is a part of my sense that we are all in this together. We are all a part of the human community.

 

Today I am living with the fact that there are people walking our streets who are hungry, sleeping on the streets in the rain, without a roof over their heads, without medical care…A larger than believable portion of these folks are those who have served in the armed forces, people who were willing to give up their lives in the service to their county.   

 

It used to be said that individuals in such a life space bring this upon themselves. They wouldn’t be in this place IF they only acted responsibility, if they got a job, ifthey stayed away from drugs or alcohol.’ Run that by a Marine who lost a hand or his hearing in combat, who received a medal of valor for his service to his country who finds himself living on the streets.

 

Judgments about others are cheap, easy to dispense and generally off the charts in being an accurate reflection about who that other person is. What about those who are born into poverty, are afflicted by medical needs that cannot be taken care of in their childhood because there wasn’t enough money to pay for such care? People who have been nutritionally and emotionally without food and emotional support all of their lives? 

 

What is it that possesses a person to put down someone else who is going through the dark valleys of emotional and or physical limitation and pain? It is my experience that usually those of us who put down others do so because of the sense of limitation we feel, our experience of pain and the suffering that we experience in our daily life that allow us to identify with these fellow members of our human family. And we want to distance ourselves from anything that reminds us of our unmet needs and suffering.

 

There are two things that I feel deeply within myself. The first, ‘there, but by the Grace of God, go I.’ I could have been born with some sort of physical or intellectual limitation.  I could have been born into poverty. I could have been born in a part of the world that can’t feed its children or citizens. In short, anyone we point fingers at and are critical of, could be you or me, by the accident of birth. Again, ‘there, but by the Grace of God, go I.’

 

The second thing that I believe deeply is that our task in life is to treat others as we would want to be treated. If we embraced these two life paths, we would be able to address and solve any problem that we find in our human community.

 

Your feelings and thoughts are welcome…

Namaste…

 

 

 

Moving from the World of Alternative Facts To the Real World of What Is So

  

I was quite struck by the group of Trump supporters who Judy Woodruff recently presented in an interview during the PBS News Hour. The image of parakeets and parrots came to mind.  I am not trying to be snide or cruel.  My thoughts went to how both birds can copy sounds, words and even phrases. “Polly-want a cracker” readily came to mind. 

 

I thought about how these folks, all of them, believe that ‘the election was stolen,’ and that ‘Trump is still legally the President,’ even though he lost the Presidency to Biden by seven million votes. 

 

The election was claimed by these people to be filled with fraud, even though it was considered the most honest election in the history of the Presidency.

 

These folks insist that ‘Hillary is guilty of committing a crime for which she needs to go to jail,’ even though there was no evidence of her intending to commit a crime, even after fourteen hours of being grilled by those who were attempting to find her guilty.

 

They assert that ‘Trump did not try to change the vote outcome in Georgia, even though there was a taped phone conversation to the contrary.

 

 They repeatedly claim that ‘January 6^th was simply a peaceful protest and was not an attempt to overturn the peaceful transition and legitimate election of Joseph Biden, as President of the United States.’ This in light of Trump’s televised addresses that fired up his supporters to stop the orderly transition of power. There were, also threats made on the Vice President’s life, if he did not support Trump’s takeover of the government. We are being poorly served by those parakeets and parrots who only repeat what they hear, as the truth about what has been going on in reality. 

 

Then, we have those of us who ask who, what, when, where, why and how in regard to what is said and acted out. We are in better hands and on firmer footing by this faction of our political community. Moving from the realm of Alternative facts to the real world of the truth about what is so, is essential in our democracy. If we cannot believe what we are being told by our ‘leaders,’ how can we make those decisions that really matter to us as responsible members of our American Family, or as members of the world community. Questions like:

 

·      Is pollution really a threat to the air that we breath or the water that we drink? If it is, are we really committed to addressing a solution to this problem?

·      Is our food chain really being threatened by climate change? If it is, what are we doing about it?

·      Is our nation of laws and order being threatened by those who act as if they are above the law? What about a woman’s right to choose whether or not to carry a pregnancy to term? 

·      Is our economy on firm footing or are we in a dangerous fiscal period? Why are members of our American family having to sleep on the street at night and choose between food, shelter or medical care in their daily lives? 

·      Why do those who we have voted into office, are not responsibly addressing the needs of the people they represent?

·      And why are we not, in many instances, treating others as we would want to be treated?

   

And finally, we need to ask who, what, when, where, why and how to what is being said to us so we can be informed in our voting and decision making as members of the American Family. That is the very least we can demand of ourselves as responsible citizens.