Is Being Right Overshadowing Compassion?
Wherefore Art Thou, Compassion?
Warning: Rant Ahead
I’m getting more and more disenchanted with Social Media these days. Everyone seems to want to post articles and quote law (or what passes for law these days) to prove their point of view. The amount of hate that’s being spewed could, if harnessed as energy, power a large country. People I know who are basically good and kind are trying to shift blame or justify ignorance of human decency simply to be right; to justify choices they made. To what purpose?
Human rights are disintegrating before our eyes. We are seeing some of the worst periods in history for showing the ugly heads of hate resurfacing. One side continues to find reasons it’s OK, while the other pounds their chests and shouts from the rooftops, not in love, but in hate. I find myself mentally drafting a post or a message blasting them all, but to what end? I don’t need to be right. I don’t need to feed the hate. It all makes me so sad.
I’ve Been Accused of Having My Head in the Sand, But is it Me Or???
I have been in the minority almost since the beginning of our latest national debacle (which, unless you’re ignoring it all, which isn’t such a bad idea, is hardly isolated to the shores of our great-only-in-our-shadowed-minds country). My exhortations to look beneath the horrific attacks on human dignity, 
Constitutional rights, and outright murder to the real motivation behind the preponderance of such acts continue to fall on deaf or worse, militantly aggressive ears. Time and again, I’ve been shouted down, or ruthlessly berated for my failure to jump on any of the causes without reservation.
How many more “while you were focusing on Cause X, Congress quietly took away another right or freedom” posts and articles must we see before we realize we are, as I’ve been saying for at least a couple of years now, allowing ourselves to be led to the slaughter, innocent, or maybe simply disbelieving lambs. My words may have little effect, and being able to say “I told you so” is but an empty victory.
Our once great country is splintered and divided into a million fragments fueled by idealism and selfishness.
How many of us can honestly say “I give love and compassion to everyone” without adding “Except for…” or “But I won’t give up…”?
Feeding the Pain Body
We continue to feed the beast with our anger and outrage. My personal image of the Devil is one who feeds on anger, pain, hate—all the negative emotions Eckhart Tolle would say are coming from our pain body. I am beginning to understand the logic behind blood magic. One who wishes to used and abuse others has a pain so deep, they can only function when they cause suffering in others. Pain and hate have replaced love and kindness in their hearts. They make the Grinch look like Mother Teresa. And that’s the kind of people who are leading us around by our noses right now.
Think about it. In the last few years, we’ve had massive outcry over things like #OccupyWallStreet, #MeToo, marches for science, pink pussy hats, and the increase in school shootings with its resulting (and highly manufactured, if you ask me) outcry for more gun control. More recently, we have refugee children being separated from their parents and put into internment camps (WWII and the Japanese, anyone?).
The Signs Should Read “Distraction Ahead”
Every single time we are focused on something we deem horrendous, inhumane, or distressing, 
Congress slips something else past us guaranteed to help those in power, and strip the rest of us of more of our rights and privileges. At some point, people will wake up, but will it be before we’re stripped of the rest of our freedoms and shoved into internment camps ourselves?
At the moment, we’re still trying to fight the evil amongst us with their own weapons, and we’ve yet to win a single battle. Sure, they’ve offered a concession or two, but only to pacify the less diligent and get the herd mentality running in another direction so atrocities can continue undeterred.
Yet, for me, the end of many long-term friendships over the barrage of media grabbing issues is the saddest, most heart-wrenching casualty of the grand-standing, manipulative antics of our current administration.
Does All Hope Rest on the Millennials?
I watched an episode of Samantha Bee last night, and the part which resonated most strongly with me was a piece about a man who’s leading a movement to impeach Trump. Meanwhile, the Trump supporters are using the campaign against them to rally their own camp with “they’re trying to impeach him, but we won’t let them” campaigns of their own. Do we not yet realize things like underground railroads and secret societies were far more effective in the fight for good over evil? When you show all your cards, the enemy has time to launch a counter-attack, and the enemy amongst us is ALWAYS 20 steps ahead in this game.
Admittedly, in our digital age, it’s much harder to fly beneath the radar and organize people, but it’s not impossible. I’d like to say our last, unlikely hope is the Millennials, as attached to the digital world as most of them are. But who better to break a broken system and rebuild it better?
They learned computer-eze like the rest of us learned our milk language; almost from the cradle. Many can hack things we wouldn’t even believe were hackable in the first place. And yet, maybe the answer is to go off-grid before that right, too, is completely eliminated.
Being Driven to Rant Because I Have No Answers, Only Frustration
Unfortunately, I have no answers, only a multitude of questions, and a deep distrust for anything and everything I hear or see from the media, both social and traditional. Too much truth and honesty are being squelched these days to trust the diluted pablum we’re being fed. Even the most intelligent are sharing “facts” from sources which include candidates for public office. Why in the hell would they tell us the truth? They want our support and our vote, so they’ll say whatever they think we want to hear. It’s not like politicians are known for keeping promises.
This post has, unlike most of what I write, turned into a bit of a rant. I unfollowed several people (on both sides of the issues) this week because the political bullshit they were sharing was mind-numbing in its distortion of the facts (whatever they might be at this point) beyond all recognition.
I’ve reached the point where, even while watching something like Samantha Bee which tries to be equally disdainful of both sides of the house, I want to see their sources and look them up myself, then find at least 5 reputable sources confirming what I’ve read. Though I fear the number of reputable news sources is rapidly decreasing to zero. I immediately dismiss any post or article from a political candidate, official, or party, knowing they’re distorted. Yet, I do read some of them, if only to educate myself as to how farfetched the story-telling gets.
Is A Dystopian Society Only a Nightmare?
Maybe that will be my next novel. I’ll see if I can create a society even more dystopian than the one in 
which we currently live. I’m not sure I can. They do say truth is stranger, and in this case, more horrible and dehumanizing than fiction. Clearly, the only ones who learned anything from the atrocities of Hitler, Mussolini, and Kaiser Wilhelm are those who’ve studied them at length and are doing their damndest to recreate those worlds in a more sustainable fashion. I can’t handle that level of evil even from a TV show (I stopped watching “Bones” until they killed off Pelant), much less write my own story.
They say we shy away from the uncomfortable because we need to face it to grow. I’m not so sure diving into the depths of a twisted mind is part of my journey. There’s enough on my plate as I seek answers to the mindset of people who see suicide as a reasonable choice, and have to fight the urge to go down that one-way rabbit hole. Yet, I do want to understand what motivates people to treat others with willful disregard for human dignity. Who seem to exhibit the antithesis of compassion. Who are morally and ethically bankrupt. Until I understand the mindset, I don’t feel qualified to offer any viable solutions.
When the Dust Clears, I Am Still Grateful
My gratitudes today are:
- I am grateful I maintain a discerning, if unpopular mindset.
- I am grateful there are still sources for fact-checking, if we’re willing to put forth the effort.
- I am grateful for the continued existence of healthy debate, even if it’s harder to find people and places (including myself) who can put emotion aside and exchange information.
- I am grateful for continued inspiration for my thrice-weekly posts. We’re in turbulent, confusing times, but I never run short of material.
- I am grateful for abundance; compassion, kindness, free speech, intelligence, discernment, challenges, lessons, upheaval in my life that leads to a better understanding of my purpose, support, connections, peace, harmony, health, philanthropy, and prosperity.
Love and Light
About the Author
Sheri Conaway is a writer, blogger, Virtual Assistant and advocate for cats. Sheri believes in the Laws 
of Attraction, but only if you are a participant rather than just an observer. She specializes in creating content that helps entrepreneurs touch the souls of their readers and clients so they can increase their impact and their income. If you’d like to have her write for you, please visit her Hire Me page for more information. You can also find her on Facebook Sheri Levenstein-Conaway Author
Flash forward to a night when I sat in the ER awaiting test results, and doing writing prompts to keep myself amused. As often happens, the seemingly innocuous prompt became a veritable rant about the times my dad had mistreated me or shown preference to a virtual stranger over me (like the time he let my then sister-in-law drive his RX7 but made some lame-ass excuse for not allowing me the same privilege).
While I sat in my curtained cubicle with my earbuds in my ears, the music only slightly reducing the ambient noise around me, the emotional cacophony poured forth as years of pent up anger demanded release. I cursed and railed against the man to whom I’d given only love and devotion, at least until even his crankiness became exhausting if taken in large doses. Yet I still called, I still checked in, and I still listened to him rail about this person or that, murmuring sympathetic noises while he ranted.
convince myself to believe the words I spoke. I’ve made great inroads into positive affirmations about my outside packaging, and really do love my meat suit, flaws and all. But that inner marshmallow, the young girl whose face peers back at me from an ancient black and white photo above my computer still believes she doesn’t deserve to get as much love back as she gives. Despite all of my exhortations to the contrary, a piece of that little girl is my mom too.
Today I gained a new perspective on the mind of a person who chooses suicide. It came from a journalist who was also a friend of Anthony Bourdain’s, and shared a mindset with the chef many of us can’t relate to, but I suspect, far more understand better than they’ll admit. Because, well, suicide is a sin, right? It’s wrong, it’s selfish, it’s a cruel thing to….well, you get the picture. It’s a whole lot of BS that’s been flung around for so long, a large segment of the population believes it without question.
yourself, but for heaven’s sake, don’t get squeamish or try to run away from the word, or brush it off like it was a mistake or something. Acknowledge it. Accept that it’s real. Realize it is often embedded in the coping mechanisms developed after experiencing a trauma.
This is where I am starting to get why my mom went ballistic. My aunt and others believed the way to help her was to tell her she needed therapy. If you ask me, that’s about as sensitive as telling someone who just miscarried that it was “God’s Will”. I don’t think anyone wants to hear someone tell them they think they’re nuts. I may well be a few ticks off of normal, but unless you’re joking, and I know you’re joking, I’d suggest a less offensive approach.
as easily as I can hunker down in my house with the blinds shut and the cats piled on top of me while I watch something mindless on TV. And I’m doing it more and more. But some people can’t reach out. They need us to do it for them.
The ride was wild and uninhibited, opening up doors I’d sworn I’d nailed shut. But in the end, I realized one vitally important thing: I have to put my efforts into educating people about mental health and depression, de-stigmatizing them so people who need help but can’t ask will find that help in all of us. Even more, I need to keep working to de-stigmatize suicide, not only for those who saw it as their only option and are no longer around to defend their actions, but for the family, friends, and loved ones they leave behind. It’s time those who had no control over another’s actions stopped bearing the overwhelming guilt, blame, anger, and pain of something over which they had absolutely no control, and in fact, probably never saw coming.
The truth is, I am still not sure where I’ll fit into the continuum between the masses who are ignorant of the challenges faced by people who suffer depression or other mental health issues and the large portion of our population who are often ignored and forgotten along with family and friends who are also at a loss for how to help. I suspect that now I’ve put my purpose into words; into a short description, those who serve the people I want to help will start appearing in my life. But patience isn’t my strong suit.
allow them to see you mean them no harm. If you don’t, ingrained behaviors take over causing them to flee if they can, fight if they can’t. All of us have that fight or flight mechanism. Many of us have learned to minimize its influence so we can try new things, and explore outside our comfort zone. But what about those who can’t?
I’ve known people who love to dance, but would never be the first one out on the floor for fear people would be watching them. Until someone voiced that fear, it never even crossed my mind. When I realize there are people who succumb to their fears instead of being able to challenge and overcome them, it makes me very sad but also inspires me to look for ways to help.
of picking it back up again, but, until yesterday, hadn’t been able to bring myself to do it. I realize it’s merely another obstacle I must conquer, but to do so, I need to grab hold of the ladder and put my foot on the first rung.
Years ago, I had an employee who tried my patience excessively. Every time I’d ask her do something a little different from what she was used to, she’d spend two hours whining and complaining about what I was asking her to do, and making excuses for why she couldn’t. Eventually, she’d do what I asked, in about 1/10th of the time she’d spent complaining about it.
my passion projects, I am continually mired in excuses and, let’s be honest, an Everest-sized mountain of self-doubt? With everything else, I learned long ago to look at what I have accomplished rather than what I have left to accomplish. Where am I losing sight of it with my writing which I truly love?
we believe we need to climb. We allow the part of us that hates change (and maybe exercise too!) to fill our heads with negative self-talk, excuses, and fear. And for what? So we can remain in the rut we know we hate forever? How dumb is that? Yet every one of us is an expert in self-sabotage.
I suddenly realized it isn’t always about understanding why you’re avoiding something. Trying to figure it out is adding to the list of avoidance measures you’re using. Sometimes you have to stop overthinking the reasons behind the problem and get back to the business of doing what you do best. In my case, remembering that I could be the most amazing writer on the planet, but if I never finish and publish anything, none of my lofty dreams will ever bear the fruit I seek.
the midst of my friends and dance community. Today, I’m writing, somewhat bemused about being connected.
We all have our insecurities, though some of us have become better at getting past them than others. There will always be that little voice in our heads trying to convince us to pull back into our shell where it’s “safe”. It’s the voice who is perfectly content to remain inside our comfort zone, or what I not-so-fondly refer to as a rut.
but the people who make decisions for a business. Whether I like it or not (and my introverted self still quakes at the idea of socially interacting, but less so than it used to) all successful business people are good at building relationships. They find connections between themselves and others that are much deeper than the obvious, superficial preferences.
When I do feel connected and engaged with someone, I feel their emotions rising and falling. I start to connect with what makes them feel passionate, angry, sad, or exuberant. I know when they’re talking about something which gives their life its real meaning. What I’m learning at this point is to avoid shutting myself down or panicking when I feel those waves of emotion flow over me. Instead, I have to learn to use the information to help gain an understanding of the unspoken wants and needs of the person I’m speaking to.
A few years ago, I gave myself permission to stop living down to the expectations of others; to rip off the masks I’d donned to conform with those expectations, and expose the raw gem I’d been hiding away. It was the best decision I have ever made.
a protective shell as well as a certain amount of invisibility in an often harsh world. What many of us fail to realize is if we have the courage to be ourselves and expose ourselves to the hurt, we’ll grow stronger automatically. Our skin will thicken with each trauma, creating a transparent barrier, even while we allow others to see the genuine article rather than some cobbled together version of what we think they want to see.
Perhaps that’s one of the positive aspects the Millennials have tapped into. Many aren’t willing to be what someone else wants them to be or conform their behavior to the “norm” so they’re launching their own endeavors. Entrepreneurialism is certainly on the rise and more people are choosing to work from their own space than to commute to someone else’s. After reading about the horrors of one friend’s commute when the company she recently joined moved its offices to a far less convenient location, I’m even more inclined to stay off the roads during rush hour. (Which is also a misnomer if you’ve ever been on the 101 or 405 during heavy commuting hours. Except for motorcyclists, I haven’t seen anyone rushing anywhere!)
I spent the first 40 or so years of this lifetime attracting people who were wrong for me on many levels. Yet, they were right for the person I was pretending to be, and taught me some valuable lessons along the way. After years of wondering why I never seemed to fit in, I realized I never would as long as I tried to be someone I wasn’t.
We live in a world where we’ve been brainwashed into believing we have to be some modern-day version of the Stepford Wives. That society was rotten to the core, and many parts of ours is too. The good news is, more and more people are breaking away from a model which assumes we should be happy with a hierarchical society where a few people run everything, and everyone else is a mindless drone. I say, it’s about damn time!
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