Here I am. I am not hiding. Yet I have to confess that it might be easier if I just crouch low behind that pink Himalayan salt and the olive oil-based butter stuff that sits on my table. It is crazy out there. I watch too much news and go online too often to keep immune from the insanity that we are all dealing with. We have become part of this tribe or that tribe and we can no longer speak to one another. It’s because each tribe has its own language and dare I say each has its own reality. And so it is safer to hide.
Maybe it’s just easier to hide. Why engage in a conversation that ultimately leads to name calling and rejection? If one can step back from the carnage, though who can keep flying down the highway when a train wreck is visible over to the left, there is much to learn. I am not sure there is an easy path to take that leads us away from tribalism and into real community, where it is safe to disagree, safe to have a real conversation where each side learns something from the other. But that’s not where we are now.
Often I get caught up in the noise. It triggers something deep inside of me. Maybe it pushes the button of some ancient hurt that I only vaguely know. But a few words, an obtuse accusation can set me off. And there I go like a untimely launched rocket, whizzing in the air, making more noise than causing explosive damage. Yet I can easily convince myself that the verbal volleys that I have launched have caused the change we have all impatiently awaited. But that is not the case.
So I emerge from the hidden places that are only too easy to find. I put myself out there, acknowledging the hurt that I create and the woundedness that I experience. Hiding isn’t the answer. There may not be an answer. I keep looking for the thirty minute solution to a systemic wound. I can see why I do. I watched too many thirty minute television programs that followed a familiar pattern. The issue was announced, the conflict experienced, and the solution found. If Ward Cleaver could find a way out of the chaos in thirty minutes, why can’t I?
So here I am. Not solving a thing. I can only say that I see the problem. Somehow tribalism has to give way to real community. But how? Maybe I will leave that for another day. I haven’t thirty minutes tonight to find the answer.
Until next time,
DP
I think we have to go back to a -cup-of- coffee table conversation. Social media is a frenzy for people to come out with their guns blazing at you. We have to sit face to face, and see the voice tone, care and concern – or perhaps real rhetoric and stubornness that comes from years of pain and feeling less-than.
Maybe I’m wrong, but the cup of coffee would at least compensate – if I am 😇