I am sorry that so many people are frightened, and so many people are angry. I am getting a lot of messages about it.
I have spent a considerable amount of time in my life dealing with panic and anger, and so I am passing on five steps I believe can help bring me back from the precipice, or from the world of self-righteousness and anger, a nation where I once dwelled but have abandoned for love and purpose.
As always, I am not telling anyone what to do, simply sharing what I have learned, and what has worked for me. I am wary of giving advice unless asked, but a lot of people are asking, and on both sides.
l.There is no truth on Facebook or Twitter, you will not find comfort there, you will be face-to-face with all of the anger, complaint, misery and trauma of the world. You will, if you are sensitive, and especially if you are co-dependent, absorb all of the lament and rage of the world, and that can suck up your insides like a big, hungry Octopus. Be with yourself and look inward, not outward. Read a book, go to a movie, stream a comedy, make love, take some friends out to dinner. Distract yourself from the great distraction and put your mind on another track.
2. Stay off of cable news, it is the largest and most profitable supplier of hatred, anger and confusion in our culture, from CNN to MSNBC to Fox News. If you believe they are offering you the truth, you will become angry, broken and lost. None of these people had a clue as to what was happening in our country over the past year, why would you believe them about the future? If you need to check on the news, do so once a day, or twice. Not all day.
Donald Trump may be horrid or surprisingly effective, I just don’t know, I do know he is not going to bring down the Republic.
3. Find your sacred space. We can’t all live in hermitages like Thomas Merton, but we can all find a private space that is ours. A place to think, meditate, be self aware, a place to feel safe and private. And to contemplate what part of this hysteria is personal, and what part is political. The task is to separate the two, and not mix them together. I sense many people are losing touch with reality, getting stuck in a bog of fear and eternal arguing and outrage.
Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are both polarizing people, although in very different ways. Trump is a menacing, even frightening figure to many people, especially women who are keenly aware of all the sub-texts of this election. His victory is not only a victory for him, but to many people, and for some of the darkest and most hateful and sexist elements in the country. I don’t know if this is literally true, or will be true.
But panic and hysteria suggest something that is triggered on the inside, not the outside. One woman told me she realized Trump evokes her angry and abusive father, he brings up this terror in her.
Whatever the cause, I understand the feeling is intense and very painful. Trump’s victory promotes fear and grief in an unprecedented way, at least in modern times. That is the issue for many, not just politics. It is, to some, as if the very idea of harassment and brutality was endorsed by the nation. I don’t believe that to be the case, but I completely understand the feeling.
The personal is the part you can deal with now. The politics will come soon enough. And men feel it too, don’t be fooled. Be self-aware.
4. Do not argue your political beliefs. Certainly not with strangers and also not with anybody you don’t absolutely trust to listen and treat you in a civil way with dignity and respect. Your life is not an argument, the more you argue, the less you will accomplish. Find your spirit, and get to a good place. It is always healthy to talk or write about how you feel, and to be honest, but it needn’t be an argument and shouldn’t be. That is unhealthy and corrosive and emotionally dangerous.
Stop arguing the merits of the election, we all know the arguments, it is important to move past them. And do not argue them on Facebook, of all places. If someone comes onto your blog or website and writes in a hostile or hateful way, delete them instantly and without comment, and ban them from your page. Consider them hateful intruders into your private space. You wouldn’t let hateful people into your home, don’t let them in your home online. And do not argue with them, that is fuel to the fire.
5. Seek perspective, read some history. Think of people who lived in Poland in 1940, or the thousands who died in the London bombings of World War II. Or people who endured our Civil War, with half-a-million dead in a much smaller country. Or the genocides and tragedies and sectarian wars that have ravaged the Middle East and much of Africa. Think of the half-million dead in Syria and the millions more who have fled their homes.
In America, for all of our conflicts, we are still among the most fortunate nations of the world. We have a system that has endured many conflicts, most much worse than this, for more than 200 years. I live in the now, no one predicted this past year, no one can predict the next. I do not care to soak up all the fears and phobias this election has sparked, it feels hysterical to me. I want to wait and see what happens, and then figure out how to do the most good I can do, either through my blog, books and photos or by some other means.
Those are my five steps to better ground, I thought I should share them, you may have even better ones on your own. Do what works for you, but step out of the panic and anger and conflict. Get to your spirit, your soul, your good place. And stay there awhile. Next year may being challenges for people on both sides. You don’t want to be freaking out as a permanent way of life.
I hope we can all pause and get to higher, more solid ground. And start talking to one another in a civil and reasoned way. I am always working on listening and empathy, for me, the foundations of true communication.
Speaking for myself, I completely reject the many comparisons I now see between the rise of Donald Trump and the rise of Nazism in Germany. I am Jewish. Many members of my family died in the holocaust. Comparing the Holocaust with this awful election is, to me, a grave disservice to both events. Nothing like the holocaust is presenting itself, no matter how disturbing. You can make your own choices, but those are conversations I will not participate in, analogies that are offensive to me and completely unsupportable at this point in time.
Take a step back, a couple of days off from this. Breathe a bit. Life does go on and will go on. The world is not coming to an end. Neither is our country.