Anger and violence are everywhere. Family violence in our homes, bullying, and shootings in our schools, anger on the sports field, the playground, and road rage in our cars are the chosen ways for many to solve problems. But, does it really resolve anything? Cultural differences and differences of opinion aren’t solved by violence and anger. They only deepen the wedge and wounds of separation, creating more distrust and violence.
We’re bombarded with newscasting that dramatizes theft, home invasion, corruption, killing, kidnapping, and more. And this is just about what’s happening locally in our own neighborhoods and nearby towns. Yes, it makes for headline news, but do I really need to know all that 24/7? Do you? Unfortunately, it fills our waking and sleeping states and who knows what distortions it generates in our subconscious minds.
Are we undergoing a moral crisis in this country and also globally? Is there hope for peaceful coexistence, collaboration and cooperation, and the conscious decision that we are stewards of the world we live in?
Stewardship means the care and responsible oversight of something of value and pertains to the management of property, finances, and estates. Commercial stewardship refers to caring for the domestic and service requirements of passengers and guests on ships, trains, airplanes, and restaurants.
Today we’re rightly concerned with the stewardship of our natural resources for the purposes of preservation and sustainability over time and for leaving a legacy for future generations. Yet, it seems vital right now to extend the meaning of stewardship to each other. We decide that it’s time to recognize the joint responsibility we all have to safeguard one another. Human life and human dignity are valuable assets to protect as I believe all life is. Life is worth caring for and preserving.
Just as we choose our friends, recreation, and our preferences about clothes, cars, and food, how we act and what we transmit to others verbally, physically, or in our minds is also a choice. Choosing service beyond self-interest is a critical selection. Technological developments advance us in so many wonderful ways and truly connect us instantly across vast oceans and time zones. Yet, the spiritual and humanitarian values that can preserve and advance civilizations have unfortunately regressed.
Individually and collectively, we have an urgent and growing responsibility to support and practice compassion, goodwill, peaceful conflict resolution for one another and for ourselves with the utmost care.
We can quiet the internal churning of hatred, intolerance, impatience, and anger. Think before spewing hate and embracing greed. And, we can also remember and find ways to recognize that when we wrong someone else, we also wrong ourselves. Together we are immeasurably wonderful and powerful, and we can create a world that breeds love and creative possibility.
We are often all in a skirmish to win and we should get out of it to enter a communication that is attention, valorisation of diversity as the richest and broadest possibility.
The only key to establishing a profound dialogue with people whose hearts are hardened by so much violence is to listen to them first with the heart. Listening and dialogue with the heart work miracles, which happen when the person, even the wounded, depressed one, is listened to and welcomed for who they are, where they are with all their fears and fears of them.
It takes that pinch of humility that allows us to overturn all the usual schemes, to recognize that everyone is our teacher because everyone has learned something from the book of life. I think this humble style is the key to building a better world in our own small way, making one’s contribution at a time when we are heading towards self-destruction.