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Grateful Humanity and the Muddy Middle

Happy Thanksgiving! Having one day a year where you focus on what you are grateful for is good, but for me, living in gratitude daily, is better.

Did I inherit gratitude or learn it? I have no desire to engage in that debate. I'm just grateful I'm grateful.

I was reflecting this morning on my newfound beliefs, or perhaps my recently discarded beliefs, and I realized that if I had to choose one changed belief that that has most dramatically changed me, it would have to be my belief that people are good.

Yep, I no longer believe in Satan or sin. And even though I don't believe the Bible to be any truer than any other book, I do love how the author had his God declare all his creations "Good."  No one is evil. Yes, some people commit horrible, nasty acts, but not because they are evil, but because they are not well. Hurting people hurt others. This realization is far more empowering than believing that some people are simply corrupted. We can help heal hurting people and thereby help prevent further hurting. But believing some people are evil, that's just a lazy man's excuse to wait for Jesus to come and save the souls. I prefer we be saviors to waiting for one. But that's another post for another day. . .

Today, I'm thinking out loud about how this realization has radically transformed me. Judgment and condemnation for my fellow man have been damned allowing compassion and love to freely flow. No longer do I look at others in distrust and disgust, but instead I see divine human beings with infinite potential. I see myself in them and I understand that had my life been like theirs, I may have acted like them. Instead of seeing jerks, freaks, and sinners, I see oppressed, misled, and uneducated survivors trying to make their way the best they can. I see insecurity in all its forms: braggadocio, exaggeration, ridicule, and all other sorts of socially awkward and annoying behavior. I not only see it in others, but I more clearly see it in myself. This realization no longer terrifies me but ties me to my fellow human beings. Others are simply extensions of myself By seeing them, I see me--clearly. It's a virtuous, humanizing cycle binding me to all of humanity. And what is humanity but humans tied together in love?

Whenever I contemplate the larger societal contribution I'd like to make, it always centers around helping others awaken to this realization. I want every human soul to rejoice in their goodness. I want to erase any idea that they are bad. When I think about executing my plan, I get stymied as to whether I should start in the pre-schools or the prisons? To me, both need the message. If I start with the pre-schoolers, I could reduce the future prison population. If I start in the prisons, I could liberate current captives.

And while I hem and haw about how to begin, my mind screams "The work is waiting! Stop hesitating! Just begin!" It's just so hard when I want to be all in. How do I do such full-time work in a half-assed measure? This undertaking is no part-time endeavor! And therein lies my whole damn black and white dilemma--All or nothing. Such a blessing and yet such a curse.

Perhaps this next year I can strike a balance between the two extremes. Some ideologies perish slowly and my belief that you must be either hot or cold came from an ass-hole Biblical God who religiously spewed the lukewarm from his lips. The reason I'm unable to function in the moderate middle is not lost on me. May next Thanksgiving find me making peace and progress away from the extremes and toward the loving middle.

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