Making important choices
Let's come together and make good choices
Second of Three Posts
By Tim Wilson
Today Americans will have their final opportunity to make a choice at the polls that many say is the most consequential in our nation’s history.
That may or may not be true. But I believe that tomorrow and each day going forward, all of us have opportunities to make choices that can make our world, our nation, our communities, and our neighborhoods better places to live for everyone.
For starters, we can choose not to judge others based simply on the choice they make, or we suspect they make, on Election Day. None of us should be defined by a single vote, a position we take on an issue or the stereotypes others attach to those.
We can choose to give people the benefit of the doubt when we feel wronged. None of us are perfect. We can’t always know if their transgression was a dastardly plot or a simple mistake. As a carpenter’s son once said, “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.”
We can choose to disagree without being disagreeable. Do you agree with your spouse, a person you chose to live your life with, on everything? If you say that you do, you are probably either lying or own an exceptional pair of prescription rose-colored glasses.
We can choose not to form opinions based on what people look or sound like, where they live or where they used to live, who they love, how they choose to worship or not worship, or any number of differences we see. The world would be boring if we were all Ken and Barbie.
We can choose to remember every person is some mother’s child, not a demon.
We can choose to recognize the value of every person that is not based on their bank account or resume.
We can choose to seek what unites us rather than be laser-focused on what divides us.
We can choose to respond to the appeal by President Abraham Lincoln as he tried in vain to prevent our nation from tearing apart in its deepest and deadly divide, the Civil War. “We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."
Let’s hope we listen this time and turn to those better angels.
To read the introductory post, follow this link: Introductory post
To read Jim LaJoie’s post, follow this link: On being a good citizen