Giving Is Easy – But Receiving is Hard (The Giving Chronicles – Part 3)

 ^“Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap; for the measure you give will be the measure you get back.”

The real test if someone has had a conviction, conversion, or life change event is not what they say, or in this case write, it’s what they do. You can say anything, claim anything, but does your behavior change?

You can dismiss or explain away my “Christmas conviction” if you wish, but my behavior definitely changed. Within days, I donated $100 after I got hit with two unexpected big repair bills. But the impact didn’t stop with that one check. That image of the kid with no Christmas presents had been burned into my brain.

As a result, donations were made to various Christmas gift fund drives in 1988, 1989, 1990, and 1991. But there was no check written in 1992. I had been downsized from my job in October, a casualty of the economic recession.  Now, I found myself on the other side – not giving help, but needing help.

But I was much too proud to ask anyone for help – even too proud to receive any help. I would have to be near death before I might agree to receive any aid from anybody. However, soon after the job loss, it was communicated to me that people were going to offer me stuff, and when they did, I was to accept the gifts graciously and say “thank you”.

You see, when you reject the help of others, you prevent them from following THE MAN’s “give command”. If you don’t receive the gift, you prevent that person from receiving the blessing of giving the gift. That’s wrong for you to do – a bad transgression.

And yet, I only actually asked two people for help the entire time. Yes, I had lost my income, but more worrisome was losing my health insurance. My oldest daughter (there were two now) had a seizure disorder. The seizures would occur at random times and, depending on the severity, could produce a $20,000 hospital bill before insurance. Therefore, going without insurance was not an option, and a cheap policy wouldn’t suffice. I would have to find a way to make the expensive COBRA payments.

I was given the name of a social service worker who a friend thought could help me with this expense. I thought it would be a wasted call since I lived in a different county than the agency served. I even started the conversation by apologizing for even calling her. But she didn’t care where I lived, she asked me what county I had worked in. Oh, it seems the funding covered both people who lived in the county or had worked in the county. Then she instantly approved me for two months of COBRA payments. I asked my mother later for help for the other two months' payments I would end up needing. And asking you mother for help is much easier than asking others.

“Give, And It Will Be Given To You”

But even though I didn’t ask, it doesn’t mean I did not receive. I had faithfully given in those prior years, and now it was coming back to me in awesome, incredible, mysterious ways. There were three distinct events that are relevant to THE MAN’s proclamation on giving. (the quote that begins this post)

#1 All The Bills Get Paid

I didn’t publicize my situation, but I didn’t hide it either, and almost immediately, people offered me assistance. It was difficult to receive it, but I put my pride aside, accepted the help, and said thank you each time. I can’t remember all the people and all the ways people assisted. I do know that my friend Larry, who died of cancer a year later, paid my electric bill for two months. Yes, I was in a financially difficult situation, but all the bills got paid with money from unemployment compensation and my wife’s part-time, holiday job.

However, things took a peculiar turn in early February. So much money was being given to me by a host of people that I had excess funds after I paid the bills. This was difficult for me to process. I felt guilty receiving money that I did not need. My solution was to give away the excess funds to two needy people. There was a person with cancer whose financial light was reported in the newspaper. I don’t remember the second one. I mailed out the checks, but within three days, that money, and more, had come flying back to my mailbox from other people.

This was one of those literal God-fearing moments where you put your hands up in front of you and take a step back in awe. I gave away no more excess money and when I returned to work several weeks later, my bank account was higher than before the job loss.. Let that sink in; I was unemployed for four and a half months and ended up with more money than I started with.

#2 A Very Merry Christmas

I instructed my wife to spend as much on Christmas gifts for our two young daughters as she typically would. You can tell Christmas gifts are important to me, so why should my girls suffer because their father doesn’t have a job? So, my wife and I didn’t exchange gifts that year, and she bought the girls everything they needed, or asked for.

But then, two days after she had completed her shopping, an anonymous letter arrived in the mail with $100 worth of gift certificates at Toys Are Us, with a note to buy gifts for my daughters. The “Geoffrey Dollars” had an expiration date of December 24, so off to the store I went. 

And it was difficult spending $50 (in 1992 dollars) on each girl after we had already bought all their obvious gifts. It must have taken me ten minutes pushing that full cart around the store one more time to spend the final ten dollars on that last gift.

Running Over, Into Your Lap

Both receiving more money than your expenses, and buying $100 more Christmas gifts than planned could be considered an overflow of blessings about which that THE MAN had decreed. But it is the third event that provides the stunning, complete, literal answer.

Next Time: The Story of the Three Turkeys

 

 

Time For A Change In Perspective - The Giving Chronicles, Part 2

 

Most life-changing events are big, prominent happenings, occurring externally but impacting internally. Then there are those subtle, quiet rumblings that impact from the inside out.

It was the first week of December 1987. I had returned home from a mentally exhausting workday. Within minutes, my wife had delivered the following news:

-       The refrigerator, which had been making strange noises, would need a major repair.

-       The VCR[i], which doubled as our video camera, had stopped working and would need to be fixed before Christmas.

-       My master’s thesis[ii], which my wife had been typing into our first ever PC, had vanished from the 5 ¼” floppy disk[iii].

Money was tight since my wife wasn’t working in order to raise our young, slightly-special needs daughter. Two major repairs would put a dent in the holiday budget. It would take weeks for the thesis to be retyped, putting me way behind schedule for the submission deadline.

If these events had been spaced out a few days, they still would have stung, but the impact would have been more easily absorbed. But hitting all at once was more than my psyche could take that evening.

I could not calm down. I kept rolling each of these events around in my head, like a closed-loop horror film that I could not turn off. After dinner and putting my daughter to bed, I plopped down on the couch and turned on the television, hoping that would provide a much-needed escape from my worries. But I couldn’t even concentrate on the program because it was being preempted by the one running through my brain:

refrigerator bill … VCR bill … lost thesis … refrigerator bill … VCR bill … lost thesis …

I couldn’t stop the loop while awake, so I decided to go to bed, even though it was just past 8:30. Except for illness, this is the earliest bedtime in my adult life.

However, I am not the least bit sleepy. I’m wide awake, lying there in the dark, staring at the ceiling, with the same horror loop freaking me out.

I was in distress; it was quiet, it was dark. So, naturally I reached out to THE CREATOR for help in my plight. And I learned something important. THE CREATOR doesn’t respond well when you offer up whiny complaints about your first-world problems.

First, there was the strong rebuke. “You’re actually complaining because your fancy, expensive VCR is broken?”

Okay, when you put it that way. I guess that it is rather petty. Let’s forget I even brought it up.

But it was too late …

Next came the revelation. I was told to imagine an expectant child running down the steps on Christmas morning, only to encounter just a Christmas tree, with no presents underneath it. (This is a powerful image – if you don’t believe me – quick, imagine it yourself right now.)

And this hit me where it hurts. Because I was an only child, which meant on Christmas morning, every single gift under that tree was mine, all mine. And better still, I was an only child of an only child, which meant every present under Grandma’s tree was also mine. (Gee, and you wonder why I love Christmas so much?)

But the image of that kid with no presents ravaged me. It tore my soul open, and I was hemorrhaging spiritual blood. “Yes, that’s an awful scene – but what can I do about this?”

Then came the command. My church had announced the previous Sunday they were collecting money to buy watches (apparently someone had an excess supply) to give to underprivileged kids as Christmas gifts. I immediately dismissed it as something I wouldn’t bother with.

But now, I was expected to donate more than token money to this cause? Oh, no! Absolutely not!  I got to pay for the refrigerator. I got to pay for the VCR. I got to pay for Christmas. No. No money left for watches. Okay?  Oh, not okay? Not okay, at all. $100? Really? Okay, really … 

So that Sunday, I wrote a check for $100 for watches for Christmas gifts for some kids I didn’t know and would never meet. And it did feel good to know none of those kids would go “giftless” this year.

The credit card took a hit, but the refrigerator got fixed. The VCR got fixed. And Christmas got fully paid for. It took my friend Fred, one of the early computer whizzes, all of five minutes to find where my thesis was hiding on that tricky floppy disk.

Christmas 1987 turned out great. And life went merrily along. But that encounter on that unsettling December evening would have a life-long impact.

 Footnotes for those younger readers:

 [i] Video Cassette Recorder. It recorded television shows onto videotape. Mine was an expensive model where the part containing the tape detached. A separate camera plugged into it to record home movies.

[ii] This was a full MBA which took four years to complete going part-time. A thesis was not required but I choose to do one through independent study because I enjoy researching an writing.

[iii] The first floppy discs were flimsy and had to be handled with care. You had to insert them into a “floppy drive” each time you started up the computer and then you saved your file on another floppy disc. The only way to “backup” your data was to save the same data on two discs, which you almost never did.

 

 

The Giving Chronicles – Part One “Give and it will be given back to you”

(Author’s note: This is the first post of a multi-part series that begins in 1987. It is an unusual way to start off. However, this topic needed to be covered at some point, and I did not want to stick it in the middle, disrupting the narrative. So, please put up with this one, which seemingly has no point. I promise you - we are about to go on a most fascinating journey)

“Give, and it will be given to you”

This is a universal truth; in that, it is espoused by most major religions. The idea is that if we do good, help others, or give assistance, that the cosmos will ultimately pay us back in kind.

It is this concept that “life is fair” that somehow naturally lives deep within us. And even though we know life is not fair, sometimes cruelly unfair, it still makes us feel better if we think things will even out in the end, and we will be rewarded for every good deed that we do.

However, religion introduces rules for giving because that’s what religion does. There are rules for everything else, so it stands to reason there would be rules on how we are supposed to give away our money.

When THE MAN walked this earth, the rich and pious had written many rules about how a “holy” person should give his resources. Of course, the rules favored the rich, like our tax laws today, because the rich wrote the rules.

The rich used these rules to abuse the poor people psychologically and spiritually. The poor felt ashamed and frustrated because they could not meet the stringent requirements. Many of them may have stopped giving all together because it was too demanding. However, it can be assumed the laws enabled the rich to avoid paying “their fair share” and providing some loopholes.

And to set things right, THE MAN proclaims this:

Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap; for the measure you give will be the measure you get back.

There’s a lot in that short statement. So, let’s break it down.

Give

Into this ugly mess, THE MAN brings forth wisdom to set things right. Strangely, he does not go into a complicated discussion about why all the invented rules are wrong. Nor does he rebuke the common people either. He does not launch into a lengthy sermon on the proper attitude towards giving – the people already know that and are well aware they are not following the guidelines.

No, THE MAN utters a simple one-word command – GIVE. He doesn’t say when to give, how much to give, who to give to – just GIVE. So, forget the rules, forget the complications, forget the excuses – just GIVE.

And It Will Be Given To You

And there it is …. Life is fair, and if you give to others, someday the cosmos will pay back the favor, and you will get a reward you for your generosity. Even Steven! Karma! Payback!

Yes, here THE MAN is on the same wavelength as many great philosophers and prophets. However, there is one huge difference. It’s right there in those seven words. You read right over it, and we’ll come back to it in a moment.

If THE MAN had stopped right there, the statement is universally accepted and consistent with natural beliefs, but He did not. He kicked it up a notch.

Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For the measure you give will be the measure you get back.

In those times when you bought grain, most vendors would pour the grain until it filled your vessel and send you on your way. But the sellers who provided the most value would pour the grain in the vessel, press it down, then shake it together to condense it, and then repeat the process until the grain was tightly packed and you received the maximum amount. 

So what THE MAN is saying is that you will get more than a fair return on your giving. And then He lifts the bar. He pumps it up. He raises the roof.

After your vessel contains the maximum payback, more grain is going to be poured on top. So much, that you can’t contain it - so much that it overflows and spills over into your lap.

What THE MAN is proposing: Give, and you will receive back more than you gave. So much more, it will overflow.

And this happens not by luck, or chance, or karma, etc. It is deliberate. Because the other difference in THE MAN’s statement alluded to previously is “ and it will be GIVEN to you. If it is given, then there must be a giver. THE MAN is saying THE CREATOR will purposely and generously give back to you.

This is far beyond the teaching of other religions and philosophers. THE MAN has truly raised the bar. It’s what separates the God from the gods.

Of course, on the surface, it appears the message is that if you want to get rich, just give stuff away to people. Or maybe, just give me your money, and you’ll get more money back – a spiritual Ponzi scheme, as it were. And many religious hucksters on television have perverted this teaching to become rich over the years.

But that is not what THE MAN is laying down. This proclamation must be evaluated in the context of all the teaching about the attitude of giving and the spiritual aspects involved. The people hearing this knew they were falling short. And THE MAN talked more about money than you would expect when He was here.

But the statement is no doubt bizarre. Many people reject it as silliness, proof that THE MAN was some type of misunderstood lunatic. Others just find it not believable. Even his followers find it difficult to process or defend this statement, only believing it by faith, but …..

So, it’s a crazy, unbelievable statement …. Or is it?

 

 

 

Editor Jane Was A Big Pain

(Chapter 11 of my book, Turkey Terror At My Door! contains essays about two high school teachers who were instrumental in me becoming an author. Because these were part of a “high-school” series, I couldn’t give credit to one other person responsible for my success.)

I arrived on The University of Akron campus in the fall of 1976. I  concentrated on my studies for a couple of months, but eventually wandered up to the student newspaper office to display my high school writing success on a bigger stage.

Few students read The Buchtelite (the name a holdover from when the school was known as Buchtel College). Akron U was a commuter school operating in the center of town. It was one of the most boring campuses in the country. There was usually nothing of significance for the newspaper to report on, and when there was, most of the students didn’t care. Many referred to the school as Apathy U.

As a result, most of my freshman humor writings were intended to be shocking, outrageous diatribes designed to catch people’s attention by slapping them in the face. The paper only ran them because they weren’t dull, and they had nothing better to print. If these articles were published today (first, they wouldn’t dare), I would be immediately expelled from the college. If I ran for political office today, these awful, politically incorrect essays would make headlines.

Before my sophomore year, I marched up to the Buchtelite office and pitched my idea to write a weekly humor column called Ake’s Pains. I was brash. I was outrageous. I was filled with all the naïve bravado of a 19-year-old guy. There is no way they should have ever agreed to this. But Editor Jane said, “Sure, let’s try it!” I’m not sure if she really liked the idea or she just needed to fill space on the editorial page once a week.

Therefore, Jane became my first real editor. And as a writer, I hate editors. Because editors take your perfect writing, mark it up, and change things until your work becomes less than perfect. And make no mistake, my writing was perfect, absolutely perfect, because I was a 19-year-old college student and I thought I knew everything.

I hated Editor Jane. Now, only as an editor, mind you. Regular Jane was sweet, pleasant, intelligent, funny, and also - - cute! Nothing to dislike there. But I always became agitated during our weekly closed-door (so nobody could hear the yelling) meetings when we reviewed my upcoming column, which meant Editor Jane telling me what I couldn’t say or changing how I said it. In my mind, she was ruining my writing by sucking much of the humor right out of it. 

But the column from week one, was still a big hit on campus. The students loved my satirical wit and how I made fun of stuff on campus. They thoroughly enjoyed how I stuck it to “The Man” every week.

However, “The Man”, or the administration, was much less enamored by my rants. I could imagine the big-wigs getting all red-faced when the Buchtelite hit campus Friday morning. To them, I was not funny at all. I was a scourge, and they took offense at my viewpoints.

For example, students had discovered cockroaches in one of the dorms —a very embarrassing situation for the administration. The following week, I wrote that the biggest event on campus was the cockroach races being held in West Haven Dorm, with the winner being Secretari-roach. (You old-timers will get the joke)

At the time, I hated Editor Jane and how she diluted my writing. However, when I look back at my progression from a writer to an author, I realize that Editor Jane played a critical part. I would not have written three books if it was not for the hated Editor Jane.

Editor Jane was able to skillfully edit my work so that students still thoroughly enjoyed it and found it humorous, yet it was not so disgusting that the administration shut me down. And I’m sure there were phone calls from the “V.P.s” telling her that enough was enough – that the Ake guy was a real pain and needed to be silenced. But Editor Jane never buckled to the pressure. She threaded that needle perfectly.

Editor Jane had my best interest at heart. She coached me, mentored me, improved my writing, and helped me. She never rejected anything I submitted outright. She never limited my topics but was able to smooth out those literal sophomoric expressions into popular pieces.

She gave me an opportunity that I didn’t deserve and made me successful at my craft at that critical point in my literary career. And for all that, I hated her. I took her for granted. I viewed the situation from the selfish perspective of an immature college guy with no appreciation at all for how much she was helping me.

Because of Editor Jane, I wrote columns for three years in college, experimenting with different styles my senior year. I thought Ake’s Pains was done when I graduated. But 31 years later, Ake’s Pains was resurrected as a humor blog and was the catalyst for all three of my books.

We need to appreciate those people who are helping us now and have helped us in the past, and express that appreciation to them. More importantly, we need to be the one who helps others along the way, because we have no idea about how our efforts may inspire someone to achieve greatness.

 

 

 

 

Nobody’s Perfect – So Stop Expecting Them To Be

Recently I had to replace my old clock radio. Yes, I’m a Boomer, so I use a clock radio rather than my phone alarm to wake up every morning.

I am glad my old unit finally died because I hated it. It was difficult to tune, and I had to adjust it frequently because the controls were poorly positioned. Resetting the time was complicated and always necessitated reading the instructions. And the battery backup mechanism was busted. 

However, my new clock radio has many great new features. The radio is easy to tune and has a digital display. I can also set the time and alarms easily and quickly. It has dual alarms, one for weekdays and one for weekends. It even has two USB ports for charging my devices overnight. 

This new clock radio is tremendously superior to my old one, and I would love it, except for one glaring deficiency: It doesn’t keep time very well. It is proficient in all things, except that clock part, the core purpose of why it exists.

And in contemplating the absurdity of this irony, I realize the clock radio suffers from the same fate as us humans: No one is proficient in everything. Everyone has weaknesses, blind spots, deficiencies, Achilles heels.

When the molecules are mixed in our DNA, some abilities are in short supply; others may be lacking altogether. This results in mathematical geniuses who are incapable of driving a car. You have politicians who are extraordinary problems solvers who lack empathy for the people they are trying to help. In my case, I can make sense of complex data, seeing how all the pieces fit together. However, if presented with a simple assembly of anything, those parts suddenly become impossible to connect. Some parts of your brain are exceptional; other parts are barely proficient.

You would think that in all the billions of people whoever lived, the DNA would just click in just one time to produce the perfect person, but it never has. (I’m only considering DNA that exists on this planet for this one)

The peculiar thing is that even though we know the perfect person doesn’t exist, we expect our fellow human beings to be perfect. We readily acknowledge that we have faults and weaknesses, yet we get frustrated when people behave stupidly or fail to perform to our standards. And why we even have a concept of “perfection” is a mystery.

We tend to value our proficiencies more because we are good at them and then dismiss those areas where we are weak. Thus, we get highly agitated with others when they make a blunder doing something we are good at (how could they mess that up?) but identify with and show empathy to people making the same mistakes as we do.

An important aspect of wisdom, gained from experience, is to know your strengths and your weaknesses. This knowledge permits you to avoid failures and admire those with different skills which you lack. If you don’t know your strengths and weaknesses, it’s time for a bit of self-reflection.

I don’t know why we expect anyone to be perfect. No one is perfect; we are all far from perfect. Either there is some strange evolutionary benefit of having high expectations (maybe we killed off all those who frustrated us too much), or we were created as imperfect beings by a perfect being. The latter may explain where our concept of “perfect” originated.

Key Thought: Do not expect other people to be perfect because you are not perfect.

Just as people irritate you because they are different, be assured you are just as irritating to some other people. For example, intelligent people can be frustrated by the actions of the less intelligent. And the less intelligent get annoyed when the eggheads can’t explain things in simpler terms and get upset over trivial matters.  

When we don’t expect perfection from other people, we aren’t as irritated and judgmental when they fall short. It also helps us in our personal relationships with people different than ourselves.

But the challenge now becomes to be more tolerant of others when they fail. This is difficult when that miscue causes a loss of time, money, or something else from us. If we can offer our strengths to help other’s weaknesses and get that same assistance with our struggles, life would be so much better. However, to be forgiving, tolerant, and compassionate does not come naturally to us, because ….. we are not perfect.    

Her Hourglass Ran Out Of Sand

(You may question my revealing private correspondence in this post. You will understand why, when you get to the end)

About eight weeks ago, my good friend Darla (a pseudonym) messaged me with the distressing news that she had been diagnosed with liver cancer. We had seen each other for the first time since the pandemic at my book signing event a few weeks previously.

We had made plans to have breakfast sometime, and now she wanted to schedule it. A few years ago, I had helped her regain her confidence and self-esteem after a brutal divorce. Now she needed my support to help her in this trial. 

At breakfast, I had expected a somber discussion, but Darla was just as cheery as ever, with a dazzling smile and delightful laugh. She said the prognosis was good, and she would be fine after a few weeks of chemo. They were running more tests, but she was convinced she was not in danger.

I wasn’t so sure. There were some serious things I wanted to discuss with Darla, but I didn’t because her mood was so positive, and I didn’t want to raise any doubts into a pleasant conversation.

A couple of weeks later, Darla messaged me that the test results showed she had stage 4 breast cancer that had spread to her liver. However, she remained positive, saying it was treatable with only a few additional weeks of chemo needed.

To me, this sounded worse, much worse. As a good friend, this meant we had to discuss some deep, heavy stuff. The doctors are responsible for your physical condition. Your friends can help you with your psychological condition. But a real friend will also be concerned about your spiritual condition. So, I messaged her and asked her where she was spiritually and about her relationship with THE CREATOR.

She replied that she was fine, but then went on, in 334 words, to describe her degree of religiosity. It included her belief in a mixture of Catholicism, tribal customs, and personal philosophies. She had created her own standard, which she was confident she was meeting.  

I was still skeptical. If she had told me she was just fine, then this conversation would have ended there. But she had typed 334 words to convince me, and maybe herself, she was prepared for the end. She had told me she was fine physically when clearly, she was not. Now she had told me she was also fine spiritually.

It would not have been easy to discuss all the aspects of her discourse.   That may have been the purpose, to make me go away. But I still wasn’t sure. So, I gave her three questions to ask herself and then answer, emphasizing that she wasn’t to answer back to me. Because she doesn’t answer to me.

The questions:

1. When is the last time you attended mass/church?

2. If you did attend mass/church now, how would it make you feel?

3. Why do you think you would feel this way?

I prefer not telling people how to think or what to believe. However, I want people to consider the alternatives, expand their possibilities, and think through their choices in different ways.

Of course, this dialogue would take a little time. But Darla was sure she had more time, so I thought I had enough time to help her walk herself through the process.

I realize that many people reading this will disagree with my approach, finding it way too subtle. However, many people reading this will say it is way too forward, believing I should have said nothing more at all.

Whenever you do something that people on both sides of an issue disagree with, either:

1.    You did the right thing.

or

2.    You are an idiot.

In this case, I’m not sure about #1 – but I hope it’s not #2. And you can comment about this all you want, but I don’t care – I really don’t care. Because I don’t answer to you.

If Darla followed my instructions, she would need to consider the answers to these questions herself, and I would not be involved further unless she wanted my help. But she insisted on giving me an answer to question #1, saying she had been in church a year ago for her mother’s funeral.

Of course, this was answering the question about being in a church, which was not the question's intent.  She also asked about my motivation for this discussion, trying to deflect the issue back to it being my problem.

I restated the three questions, modifying question #1, to exclude weddings and funerals. She again answered back to me, not herself, saying she didn’t know the answer to question #1, which in her mind meant she didn’t have to deal with questions #2 and #3.

I encouraged her one more time to complete the exercise, expecting there would be more discussion of the issue at some point. I did not hear back from Darla for ten days. I hoped I hadn’t upset her, but I was expecting an update on her treatments. So, I sent this message late Saturday morning:

How are you doing/feeling?

That evening I had a wonderful time at a party with relatives and friends on vacation in the mountains of Pennsylvania. It was fun and relaxing, and one of the best aspects is there was no cellular service. Meaning I could enjoy the entire evening without distractions, and most importantly, there would be no heart-wrenching news.

Late that night, I returned to my Wi-Fi-connected residence. I noticed that Darla had not responded to my message. But her photos were all over my Facebook feed, with touching tributes from her daughter and friends.  The sand in her hourglass had run out quickly – much more rapidly than she ever expected. And just as with my friend Graham, Darla is gone – and she left this place far too soon.

And this news made me physically ill, gasping for air as all the negative emotions balled into one flaming meteor rapidly bouncing throughout my brain. I tried to process the previous five weeks in five minutes. I was angry for a moment at THE CREATOR for not giving me more time to reach her. But the reality is, if more time would have worked, then more time would have been granted.

And I can still hear her laugh …. that delightful laugh …

I never imagined that I would be sharing those three questions publicly. Initially, it was close personal communication only intended between Darla and me. However, if you need to ask these questions to yourself, please do. But if you believe you have lots of time ……

 

 

 

 

Don’t Let The Haters Prevail

Can we assume for this dive into deep, heavy, stuff that love is the most potent force in our world? And if this is true, then hate must be the second most powerful force. Hate could even be equal to love in power, but it can’t be greater, or we still wouldn’t be here.

If love is good and hate is evil, we live in the continuing struggle between good and evil, which has existed since the beginning of time. This is true no matter your spiritual or non-spiritual beliefs.  A society, culture, country, whatever, provides the best environment when the amount of love is greater than the amount of hate, or when evil is held to a minimum.  And the greater the love and the lesser the evil, the better it is for all people. If this sounds much too obvious and basically fundamental, consider what is happening in our present culture.

There are people promoting hate all around us. Step one, is to divide us into groups by skin color, social class, political party, religion, masking, vaccines, or whatever they can. Step two, is to try to get us to hate the people in the other groups. By doing this, they are able to gain power over us and exploit people for their own benefit. They essentially gain power and influence by promoting more hate.

Now at this point, you may be thinking: That’s right! That’s what those  people – the people in the other groups that are not ours -  are doing. Except that “those people” are reading this also and thinking the same thing about you.

It is so easy to get pushed into your “identity” group when people hurl hateful statements and accusations your way. However, once you identify with a group, it is natural to begin hating people that you perceive hate you. And that’s how the hate multiplies, and that’s how the hatemongers seize power over you. And as the amount of hate surges in our culture, life gets tougher, doesn’t it?

“But those people over there, look at what they are doing. Hear the awful things they are saying.” And again, they may be saying the same thing about you. You can’t control what others are doing. You are only responsible for yourself. In this caustic environment, we need this introspection often.

But hate is dangerous - because evil begets more evil. And the natural tendency is to hate your enemies. Taken to the extreme, you will want to kill all your enemies to achieve what you believe is good.

If you are doing anything that increases the amount of hate -  if you cause other people to hate each other, you are not part of the problem: 

YOU ARE THE PROBLEM

It becomes harder to resist joining the haters every day. Evil people are at work generating enemies for you. Recently, a commentary argued that hating groups of Americans was fine since people have always hated others. He must really enjoy hating people. He knows it's wrong, and yet he attempts to justify his

hatred. But is “there’s always been hate and haters” an acceptable standard? If not, what is the standard?

Of course, THE MAN had something to say about this persistent, destructive human condition:

You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’  But I say to you, Love your enemies ….

If you think this is difficult for you, the audience this was delivered to was completely surrounded by enemies. One group was persecuting and exploiting them, and the other group wanted to kill them all. We often dismiss this mandate because we may believe it is unattainable. But basically what THE MAN is saying is:

The solution, antidote, remedy, etc., to the evilest destructive force in our world – hate, is the most potent force for good in the universe – love.

At a minimum, even if we can’t love our enemies, it is wrong to hate them. THE BOOK mentions love 686 times, and hate only 127 times. And I doubt any of the 127 portray hate in favorable terms.

All the haters will tell you what they are doing is “for the greater good”, but there is no greater good than love, which includes loving your enemies. Change needs to happen, but change has always needs to happen.  It’s how you get to that change that matters most, and hating people is not the way.

Don’t let the haters turn you into a hater. If you can’t love your enemies, at least show them all the love and respect you can.