I listened to an argument yesterday between two friends. My two friends are completely and exactly the opposite from each other. One black. One white.
My black friend is a conservative business owner, who is scared that the Coronavirus will put her out of business. She is treading the fence in the anti-mask camp, as she see’s everything she has worked for slip away.
My other friend is white, liberal, and showed up at Black Lives Matter protest with her Black Lives Matter mask on. She is front and center as an ally and is always pushing our other friend to fight for Black Lives Matter harder than she does. This is my friend who confronted a man in the grocery store because he was not wearing a mask. All five foot five of her was willing to go the distance with this lunatic who was screaming about his freedom.
I love them both. I see them and hear them both. I do not take a side when we have our monthly girls club check in, which we have been doing since we all had young kids in the same elementary school. Rather, I help them mediate to a consensus. The give and take of real dialogue and problem-solving.
I help them to see and hear each other.
What I see in both is a kindness and a personal mission to save the planet, to save our democracy, to save our future for our kids. I also see that they are going about it differently. And you know what…that is okay too.
Trying to make sense of our world right now is virtually (pun intended) impossible. Connecting via Zoom or Google is not relational, as hard as we are trying to make it to be.
Albert Einstein once said, “The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.”
And I am thinking it is time to change our thinking. While none of us will have the perfect answer, if we are not willing to come to the table together like my two friends and talk out our differences, we will never get to any solution.
I am ready to move forward. And I am ready to see this from your perspective. I am just asking that you be willing to see our problems from my perspective as well.
Right now, today if I see you…can you see me? If I can see your side. Can you see my side?
Right now I feel like breaking into my favorite Michael Jackson tune about making the world a better place…“If you want to make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make that change.”
Man or woman in the mirror. We are all a part of the problem. And yet, we can all be a part of the solution.
I see you. Can you see me?
“And That’s A Brilliant Glimpse of Insight!”