The thing of it is, we created this mess.

It’s easy to blame, villainize, point fingers and condemn. We’ve taken sides, and we all know our side is the right one, in our heart-of-hearts we know.

Like many of you (ok, none – I know I’m writing this purely for my own amusement and no one is actually reading this blather but me), I’m sitting here in my bubble, hidden away from society behind a keyboard which gives me safety and anonymity to spew forth whatever drivel I choose. Lies, truths, it doesn’t matter. No one is going to hold me accountable. No one cares. And that’s how we’ve gotten here. We just don’t care about one another. We sort of co-exist but it’s not a community, and it’s certainly not the kind of existence that fosters growth and understanding. We are all alien to one another, strange and indifferent, and it’s because we do not have to actually interact with one another in any meaningful way. We share that we are human, but, maybe that’s being generous. We are homo sapiens who happen to occupy the same piece of rock out of the some-quantity-larger-than-the-largest-number-I-can-comprehend of rocks there are in what we casually call “space”. We have taken something unique, wonderful, and maybe even somewhat miraculous, and turned our existence, our humanity, into something quite trivial.

We are heading toward extinction.

Okay, maybe I’m being melodramatic. It’s hard to look out of the bubble and not see the hate, the hate-breeding, the awfulness of our human nature, and still be hopeful. It is painful to know that we are allowing our “have vs have-not” culture to take over and continue to sow discontent among us. It is painful to see how we are destroying one another instead of working harder to build each other up. It shouldn’t be about me winning and you losing; it should be about me winning and ALSO you winning, and maybe you even come out ahead of me. Imagine that, me putting you first, or better, by putting you first I, too, stand to gain?

Isn’t that what loving thy neighbor is about?

We seem to have forgotten what it is to be a neighbor, not just in the “my house is next to your house separated by a fence” way. Being a neighbor is being mindful and aware that you are NOT the only person around and you HAVE to co-exist with other people, not just the ones immediately next to you but ALL of them. You are my neighbor in the grocery store, in the mall, six states away, six countries away. You are only a stranger when I choose to see you that way. 

Co-existing, loving your neighbor, or not, all of this is a choice. And this is why I am terrified of where we are and why I am struggling to see a way forward. We got ourselves here and we desperately need to find a way out.