This I Know to be True
It’s the morning of November 6th and the winner of the 2020 presidential election has yet to be declared. Apparently, I need to stay in the not knowing for a while longer.
When I check my text messages, I see that a friend sent me a text informing me that there has been a massive voter fraud and Trump actually won by a landslide. He is hoping that the National Guard will be called out and Trump will remain in power as the head of our country. My heart sinks.
I have many friends that voted for the Republican ticket. If Biden wins, the majority of them will be disheartened, but accept the decision that resulted from the democratic process. There are also people in my town who believe that if Biden is elected the United States will become a communist county overnight.
I have friends who voted for Biden and believe that if he doesn’t win, and Trump remains in power, that we are headed for a situation reflective of Hitler’s Nazi Germany. They think that the Trump claims that Obama, Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden should be imprisoned for launching a coup against his administration, and that he is fighting a deep state of pedophiles are groundless conspiracy theories.
My friend’s nineteen-year-old son, just voted in his first presidential election. On his way home from voting he said, “If Trump is re-elected, I don’t hold a lot of hope that I will live past 50.”
This year, between the election and the pandemic, I have tried to stay in the not knowing. I have listened to my friends’ opinions that fall on opposite ends of a spectrum and everywhere in between. I have been a sounding board for friends on both ends of the continuum. I love all of these people. I feel very honored to have them in my life, and yet, I am amazed that the opinions of my friends can be so vastly different.
As I sit here looking out at the quietness, the peacefulness of the pond, I ask myself this question. What do I know? What is the bottom line, in my heart of hearts, that I know to be true in this time of unknowing?
With this thought in mind, I sat down with my morning cup of coffee and opened the book I’ve been reading. These are the words that met my eyes.
“Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity cannot survive.” — Dalai Lama
This I know to be true.
There have been many times in these past months when I have struggled to stay grounded. Living through a pandemic, and listening to people say that life as we know it will end if their candidate of choice is not elected, has had an impact on my physical body, my mind and my emotions. I know the importance of staying grounded in the midst of the craziness that can seep its way into my psyche if I allow it.
There is a thing that I started doing a few years ago one December when I was feeling the stress of the holiday season. As I was driving to my destination, I noticed that there were a lot of drivers that were cutting people off in traffic, running red lights, passing in no passing zones, and tailgating people. I caught myself calling them idiots and focusing on their lack of safe driving skills.
I realized that I was just adding to the frenetic energy that seemed to have taken ahold of people that day. I switched gears and started seeing each car that I met surrounded in a beautiful bubble of pink energy. Doing this helped to bring me back into the moment and lowered my stress level.
I have had a lot of opportunities to practice this during the pandemic and the days leading up to the election. This week I found myself adding a new element to my practice of surrounding vehicles, and pedestrians, in the pink energy bubble. Besides visualizing the bubble, I began feeling genuine love for the people whizzing past me as I surrounded them in the pink bubble of energy.
I found that it provided me with an opportunity to practice non-judgement. If you have read any of my earlier posts you know that I spent a lot of years judging my mother. Perhaps because of this, I have to work to stay out of falling back into that well-worn groove of judging people.
I have no idea of who the people are in the vehicles. No way of knowing if they are Trump supporters or Biden supporters. Could some of the people be extreme leftist, or extreme right wingers? Possibly. Is the person in a car speeding past me a pedophile, an anarchist, arsonist, rapist, racist, murderer, robber, a mask wearer, a non-mask wearer? They could be, I have no way of knowing.
And as I sit in the unknowing, I send them all love. I send it knowing that in a world, that has seemingly turned upside down this year, if we don’t look at our friends and neighbors with love and compassion humanity will not survive.
With Love & Energy by the Pond,
Laurel
laurel@energybythepond.com
