I have been gone from home for 53 days. Quite a few horrible things have happened since I have been gone. A bombing in Baghdad, an airport shooting in Istanbul, a shooting in Nice and five shootings in the United States.
There seems to be a great deal of blame, lack of responsibility and misunderstanding.
Religion and race are being generalized, reactions are made without thought, and everyone thinks they know the answers.
People refuse to see the grey between the black and white.
Over the last two months, I have had the pleasure of being a minority. I have been treated with love and respect by people of different religions and ethnicities. I have connected with Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus and Christians over the basic principles of humanity.
When we strip away the labels and classifications we have given ourselves, one truth remains.
We are all human.
We have the same needs to survive. We have the same thoughts, feelings and desires. We all deserve the same rights.
The outside environments and situations create our differences.
These differences, and our ideas about what they may or may not mean, are what create the belief that we are better or worse than others.
As humans, we like to believe that we are greater than animals. We are smarter, more sophisticated and more civilized.
But are we?
Different species of animals co-exist in their environments. Together, they achieve what is needed to survive. There is harmony in life and death in the Animal Kingdom.
Why is it that we, as one intelligent species, cannot live in harmony with our own kind?
Why is it so many choose to place blame, guilt, and shame on others, instead of improving ourselves?
The problems of the World are not the World’s problems.
The problems of the World are personal problems that the individuals have chosen to ignore. Instead of looking inward and identifying our fears, inadequacies, pains and frustrations (as well as their sources); we choose to react outwardly. We choose to blame our parents, partners, societies, God and the things we do not understand.
Take responsibility for your actions, behaviors, feelings and thoughts. Don’t let the negative fester. Let go of the pain, guilt, blame and fear that controls you. Fill that now empty space with love. Love for others and yourself. With peace; peace of what was, what is, and what will be, despite you. Remove your own inner conflict; your need for pain, fear, excuse, defense and anger. With all that gone from inside you, you will no longer project such things. You will no longer react to such things, although they may still be around you…. But, by ceasing to partake in the cycle, you have begun a small revolution… This minute action will consume your body and your mind. It is as contagious; powerful and infinite.
What epidemic would you choose to spread?
Pain, anger, fear and blame?
Or peace, love, understanding and compassion?
Every day you make this choice within you.
Every day you spread an epidemic.
It is your choice what you spread within your world.
