Sunday Thoughts after the Election

So…. this message is primarily for my Democratic and liberal friends, who are also people of faith and spirituality. Especially if you’re Black, like me. But not only if you’re Black. I’m not a woman, and I’m not a person who is LGBTQ+, but I know that Black folks, women, LGBTQ+ folks, our allies and advocates, and others are hurting mightily. And many of us also believe in something bigger than ourselves — God, or a higher power of some kind. Maybe it’s the universe for you. We have that in common. So, from that place of commonality, I hope this will hold up for you. (And a shout out to my two friends who will remain anonymous, but who inspired this conversation this morning. Thank you.)

Let’s face it. We’re going to be navigating national (and frankly, global) conversations about identity, connection, disconnection, unity, division, isolation and belonging — through the lenses of race, gender, religion, and politics for a long time to come. These are our lived experiences, so we have no choice but to navigate them. The real question is how we do so. And I believe to my core that our ability to hold our sameness and our difference together in our spirits, our minds and our hands is the key to our survival and collective thriving.

I’m navigating the deeper spiritual, psychological and ethical questions around acceptance, power, tolerance, injustice, inclusion, boundaries, self-care, resistance, faith, spirituality, righteousness, truth-telling and love. It all feels so contradictory. I feel like I’m in a twilight zone of hypocrisy and I want to scream. I want to point the finger, too, and blame everyone who feels differently than me as the root cause of the problem. But I can’t let that take hold. Because I know it will do damage to me. Because I know radical acceptance is not surrender, it is not letting “them” win. It is not giving up. It is the key to serenity, to finding a way to focus on what can actually be done, and to then muster the courage to do that.

That said, it’s been hard to know when or how I should navigate space with some people. Part of me is afraid, not knowing whom I can trust, because, obviously, we all felt so deeply about this election, we all felt there was so much on the line for the future of the country, both candidates said that in very different ways. We’re already seeing people taking their racism and misogny to next level with texts telling Black students they are effectively enslaved once again and telling women and girls that their bodies belong to someone else. So how could we not be broken and dismayed if our candidate lost? Frankly, all of us were told this was a choice for the future of America, a choice between good and evil — by both parties. And all of us who believed it showed up to vote, and our side lost. So does that mean we have no future? Does that mean our belief doesn’t matter? No, it does not mean those things, but the wound is fresh, beloved. It is still very, very fresh.

It’s been hard to continue to extend myself into spaces where I know people don’t agree or align with me. Sometimes that’s because what they want for themselves and what I want for myself are different. And sometimes that’s because I have to accept that some of them don’t care if their choices cause me harm. (I know some of them feel the same way about me and my choices.) And in a few cases, I know it’s because some of them actually do wish me harm. (I don’t thinkI know these people personally any more, but they are out here, just refer back to the texts I was talking about.)

It’s been hard to be in places where I am unsure of who I am around. And yet, I cannot give into that fear. I cannot project my fears about the worst of people onto all people. I cannot substitute my confusion with fear. I cannot let my anger metastasize into fear. Because then I become what I denounce. I become fear itself.

I don’t think retreat is the answer. Partly on a practical level. While ultimately, the people have the power, sometimes we have to learn how to wield it, and how to navigate structures where people have unjustly and artificially consolidated power and are using it to further their own interests, and not to care about yours or mine. In those cases, my retreat and isolation makes their jobs easier. It might feel better, safer, in the short term. But it’s like building a moat around a tiny castle in the middle of endless hostile territory. I haven’t changed the big picture. Just the little one. I don’t want to do anything that makes it easier for people who are set on unjust power and systemic oppression to do what they want to do.

So where do I draw the line? Do I engage? Do I fight? Do I resist? Do I heal? Do I protect my loved ones and myself? What if one of my loved ones were “one of them?” Then what? Where does one draw the line? If I am to engage, what does engagement look like with people with whom I experience such deep fundamental differences, with whom I feel such profound separation from? I don’t think I need to make it easy for those who would oppress me to do so, and yes, I need to protect my peace — my physical, mental, emotional and spiritual sanctuary. But at what point do I risk seeing oppressive people as less than human? And if I do that, am I not the hypocrite? And if my would-be oppressor showed up on my doorstep near death, dying of thirst, would I say, “Nah, you voted for him,” and shut the door? Or would I give them a drink?

I hope I would give them a drink, and I believe I would. Even if they would not do the same to me. Not because I need their gratitude or appreciation for their survival. But because my emotional and spiritual health are essential for mine. And because it would be a start.

Extremes are frustratingly easy, but the tough questions — the tough decisions — are in the gray, and truly, when it comes to this, we don’t know what we don’t know.

Oh sure, we know some things sometimes, about ourselves and about others. About “them.” We know, some of the time. But we don’t know everything all of the time. And I am deeply compelled to seek the answer, the truth of this, the why behind it all. Because I believe my peace, my joy and purpose are dependent on my ability to lead with understanding and hope, even when it is deeply painful to do so, even when it feels deeply vulnerable and irrational to do so — and I think yours are, too.

And here’s where the spiritual, faith-filled part comes in. (While I am not religious, I do believe in following the principles of a spiritually-grounded life and I believe in a higher power, which I call God.) I believe that some of the original teachings and texts of my Christian upbringing, along with the sacred texts of a number of other faith traditions, remind me of a simple axiom that is worth living by:

I think I need to love my HP (higher power), love my neighbor, and love myself.

So I want to align my actions through those three things. If it checks all the boxes, great. If it doesn’t then it’s a way for me to decide if I need to engage. I may sometimes make a small sacrifice of self to show love to my neighbor. I may sometimes have to say no to my neighbor or stay away from them for a while to love myself. But if I accept perpetual separation from my neighbor, then are they my neighbor? How can I ever love them? (And i’m using neighbor to mean anyone other than myself or my HP — i.e., other humans.)

I still don’t know how to love those who hate me. But I’m working on it as an act of strength and God-ness, rather than a show of weakness or white adjacency or what have you. I don’t think that being willing to engage with people who don’t agree with me doesn’t make me weak or naive. I don’t expect people living at the edges of extreme beliefs or who have hate or operate from willful ignorance to change their minds. And I don’t have the capacity to spend a lot of my time or energy catering to extremists or trying to get them to change their mind. I don’t think that’s my role. But I don’t have to hate those who hate me. That is a choice and that choice is up to me. And more, I do want to be there to meet them if and when they do change, as unlikely as that prospect might be.

Change is possible. Even if it’s unlikely, it’s possible. And even if it’s just one, that’s better than none. This may be what it means to be a light in the darkness. For all of us really. Just to show up the best ourselves, in pursuit of loving God, our neighbors and ourselves. And let the universe have its way with the rest of it. (Because it’s going to, anyway.)

I can say without shame I have changed a lot over the years. I have learned to love and accept people I had deep — I mean DEEP — differences with. I cut off many people in my life when I didn’t agree with them or they didn’t agree with me. It was all fear.

And fear is the fuel of ignorant minds and hard hearts. So why fuel what I disdain? Why feed what I despise?

And when I became less ignorant and less hard-hearted from my perspective, I was able to engage with people who were also becoming less ignorant and less hard-hearted from theirs. That’s the middle I’m talking about. It’s a place where we can connect across difference, where we can hold difference in one hand, and sameness in the other, and make better choices about how we respect the one and build through the other.

I think this is what my calling for people to experience hope and revelation looks like in action. I think some of you are called to this kind of leadership, too, as burdensome and exhausting as it may be.

I know it is tough to live in a society that sometimes hates you both lowkey and out loud. But it is important to me to realize that not everyone who thinks differently hates me. They are not all evil. The minute I think that, I myself have violated the essence of what it means to be a good human as I see it, to walk in alignment with my HP. I put myself in conflict with the universe when I reject the humanity in others, even when I feel they are doing their damndest to reject mine — and their own, for that matter.

So, look. I know some of us are shaken by this election, because we’re processing it on multiple layers that in our minds made the choice extremely clear and made the outcome extremely frightening. I am grateful to VP Harris for the incredible job she did. And, there were political headwinds that she had to overcome that sometimes even the best, most qualified, most prepared folks can’t surpass, even with millions of us leaning into them together. We are worried about what will happen to us and those we love. We are confused about why people voted the way they did. I get it, because we thought that the issues of protecting democracy, choosing hope over hate, and not rewarding a person who did so much damage to our government and our country another shot to do it again, were more important than the issues people who voted differently care deeply about — like the economy.

But here’s the thing… as hard as it is for some of us to get our mind around it, many people who voted for him are saying the same thing about our beliefs and values. They saw the things I believe in as existential threats to their way of life. I don’t understand it yet, and I may never. But I am deeply inspired and motivated to try.

I’m 100% clear-eyed thatI racism and misogyny were significant factors in this election. Absolutely. Why? Because they’re factors in American life! How could they NOT show up in this election?

And.

They are not the only things.

And for some, they were not the primary factors (or even conscious considerations, as hard as that is for me to accept). I know a lot of people who were and are really worried about things like inflation’s impact on their households. And that is hard to overlook. It’s not just “the price of eggs.” I’ve been broke. I’ve been homeless. I know what it is as a child and even as an adult to not have enough, and to depend on others for the basics in life. I’m grateful that is not our reality today, but I’ll never forget what it felt like. One of the scariest feelings you can feel is the uncertainty of where you will sleep or if you will be able to eat. And we cannot deny that this has been going in the wrong direction for many Americans for a very long time, and some of it is breaking down now. I believe the economy in a post-pandemic, post-global recession world takes time to recover. I believe explaining what we avoided is always a hard message to deliver. And explaining why the steps taken so far are more likely to result in improvement than the alternative, even though everyone doesn’t experience that improvement yet, is hard. I believe some of that is because of misinformation, some due to willful ignorance and not wanting to face our nation’s challenges together, and some because it’s actually just how they feel. Sucks, but sometimes that’s what it comes down to.

But this is where it comes back to the truth of it for me: I can do three things in any circumstance: I can love God, love my neighbor, love myself. Those choices are always available to me, and they are neither my weakness nor yours, beloved. They are my hope. They are my joy. And they are my strength.

So, now what?

Well, sometimes things gotta get all the way broke before you can fix them. I think we’re in the middle of that. We thought this thing was about to get fixed. But it’s not ready. It’s not ready yet!

So, if you are particularly exhausted, rest. If you are confused and saddened, rest. If you are unsure who to be with or talk to, take a break.

Let the power of our collective impact, the light of the best parts of our shared humanity recharge you. Let the spirit of your Higher Power sustain you. Take on faith. Take on courage. Take on love. Be these things. Shine your light into darkness and proceed with the confidence and humility befitting of the wonderful human being you are. Do not give into fear. Follow the path the universe has prepared for you and let God lead you. And whether that place is closer to home in sanctuary, or venturing out into the wilderness, if your motivation is to love God, love your neighbor and love yourself, you will do the right thing.

I still think the best is yet to come. I still believe we can and will be a more perfect version ourselves as a nation. But I believe we have more obstacles yet to overcome on the way there. I still believe we have much we have to learn about one another, much conflict to work through, many wounds to heal and many gaps to close. It won’t be easy, but I’m not walking away from it. And so I choose to navigate the journey with hope, joy and love.

For some of us, that is the work, and that is more than enough. This is how we Sojourn, America.

Love y’all. Mean it. 🙏🏽❤️