American Impasse, Part IV

Continued from Part III...

Witnessing the uncontrollable anger rise in political leaders is damaging to society. The utter lack of self-awareness along with indulgent exhibitions of one’s own traumas and personal affronts on a national stage is causing our country to appear weak and broken. We are acting unamerican. America helps other countries during their moments of crisis – because should we face our own crisis – these countries will be the ones to offer us support. Neighbors take care of neighbors. But our selfish desire to divide the country into red or blue, or black or white - is causing us to weaken as a society – we have become unreliable, losing our national identity amongst other world powers.

We are creating a world in which the youngest members in the global society only know of America as a place that is plagued by a discontent that runs so deep that it's citizens are angry, aggressive, and armed- a place where shootings and violence are a daily occurrence. What happens when tourism dries up? - When nobody wants to make the journey to America because the risk of becoming a victim of a mass shooting is just too real. Is this the America we are striving towards? An America that other nations fear, or look down on as weak because we lack emotional control and the ability to resolve issues without pulling guns on one another or closing the entire government?

When we have people getting shot because they went to school that day, or turned onto the wrong driveway, or ate the last microwavable sandwich, we aren’t living a life of freedom- fear introduces a different sort of captivity. People begin avoiding crowded places, they stop attending parades, concerts, and community events. They don’t speak up when they see people engaging in suspicious behavior because they don’t know who may be carrying – they stop offering to help others in need because they fear getting shot for interfering – this is where we are headed as a nation. When politicians say that there is nothing that can be done about gun violence and we need to just pick ourselves up and move on from the latest tragic event – they are permitting this behavior to continue. Please don't vote for politicians that have given up on the safety and lives of American citizens. There is always work that can be done - please be responsible with your vote - pick someone that is ready for the challenge and ready to work for America. Someone who is aware that the American economy and the way we currently act as a society is not sustainable and a change is needed.

America needs a conservative and a liberal party to maintain a balance in society, but that’s not what we’re getting. Reasonable minds can, and should, differ – differing helps us to grow and can also serve to reinforce our existing beliefs. How can we truly know that our beliefs are sound until we test them, measure them against the other available options –the answer is we can’t. Untested beliefs are blind and incomplete – how can we be certain that we are making the right choice before exploring and ruling out all other options? Some may tell you not to – because they don’t want you to hear other sides. They may say that those sides are dangerous - they’re called fake news, lies, and agendas – but are they really? Maybe that’s just what you’re being told – verify any new information before accepting it as true. Even if you trust the person speaking – they could have been misinformed as well.

Whenever we feel anger rising in ourselves maybe we should pause to determine if it's the right emotion for the moment. Not everything needs to be met with anger, and most problems cannot be effectively and sustainably solved in the presence of anger. There are other human emotions that are being neglected due to the overuse of anger. Perhaps disappointment, frustration, sadness, or shame would be more appropriate than anger. Anger is just the easiest and most convenient – it’s a base human emotion that we are all capable of. It's easy to call it to action, but controlling the emotion once it's latched on is where the difficulty lies. Anger is an intense emotion that causes important cognitive functions to not work properly, things like logic, reason, and patience become inaccessible and our anger causes us to act out of turn; clouding our judgment– it consumes a lot of energy, causes us to become inarticulate, untrustworthy - a loose cannon. Anger is easy to spread because it’s highly contagious. The next time you tune into a political rally, or your favorite news channel – ask yourself if you are being forced to feel something as you watch? Before you allow yourself to pick up someone else’s anger decide if you really want it. Consider what it will do to you physically and emotionally; Imagine the rage coursing through your veins, the strain on your beating heart, the tension that makes your body go stiff and rigid, the stress of being unable to control your own mind – the inability to escape the relentless thought loops as your focus is drawn again and again to the source of your ire. When we allow anger take over our limbic system too often we risk becoming an angry person. When the anger absorbs all other emotions so that the only one we get to feel is anger – then the real costs are subtracted; relationships, jobs, reputation, health – the things that keep us alive and happy. What do we gain from picking up the anger? A community of other like-minded angry people? A quick surge of adrenaline? Keep a tally on how much you gain from anger vs. how much you lose – you may find that your own anger isn’t even worth the cost, let alone taking on the additional costs of bearing someone else's.

Life is short, the prime of our lives is even shorter, and we only get one go at it – one take before the curtain is drawn forever and nothing can be undone. When your time comes to an end do you want to look back and see that everything you worked for in this life was for naught, because instead of building a happy life for yourself and your loved ones, you were too narrowly focused on preventing others from living out their dreams? To me, one of the worst things would be to be remembered as an angry, unevolved human who was so focused on the affairs of others that I neglected my own personal growth. It’s ok to be wrong – just learn from it and move on. When we are obstinate on always being right we risk stunting our own evolution as humans – closing ourselves off to the lives and experiences of others in this world means that we may never come to realize that it’s fine for multiple things to be true at the same time.

All of the material acquisitions we value in life are worthless in our death. We can’t buy, or trade, our way out, nor can we force people to honor us as we lay dying. As time goes on, all that will survive of us is whatever words others choose to write or speak about us. And of course, the internet. Everything lives on infinitely on the internet, but some things stay relevant longer, depending on what future societies regard as truthful. The other stuff just gets relinquished to the depths of the internet where expired trends, fake news, and infinite threads of shallow thoughts go to sink further and further down into the abyss of endless data.

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