Until we learn to value our connectedness over our separateness, we will keep having massacres.

[renie408]

I have been wondering why it is this stuff happens more here than other places and I think it just hit me. America worships the rugged individual. (I know this guy wasn't an American, this is not specifically about him) Instead of thinking, "how can WE get through life?" we think "screw them, what can I do to get by?" Instead of seeing a homeless person and thinking, "Poor bastard. He has it rough.", we need to think, "what can I do to make things different so he doesn't have to live that way?" When somebody cuts you off in traffic, instead of thinking, "that asshole!!", remember the last time you weren't driving so great and realize that everybody does that sometimes. When somebody is in pain, when somebody isn't doing so well, when somebody is being a jerk...don't think about what is wrong with THEM. Think about what is wrong with US.

We are all in this together. Until we start to figure that out in this country, there will be pre-emptive strikes and mass shootings and constant strife. I feel humble when I consider how much arguing and how angry I have been at people over the past week or so for not thinking the way I do.

I dunno. Maybe being right isn't the most important thing.

[Dora]

1. John Donne, Meditation XVII

....
No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were: any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee. Neither can we call this a begging of misery, or a borrowing of misery, as though we were not miserable enough of ourselves, but must fetch in more from the next house, in taking upon us the misery of our neighbours. Truly it were an excusable covetousness if we did, for affliction is a treasure, and scarce any man hath enough of it. No man hath affliction enough that is not matured and ripened by and made fit for God by that affliction. If a man carry treasure in bullion, or in a wedge of gold, and have none coined into current money, his treasure will not defray him as he travels. Tribulation is treasure in the nature of it, but it is not current money in the use of it, except we get nearer and nearer our home, heaven, by it. Another man may be sick too, and sick to death, and this affliction may lie in his bowels, as gold in a mine, and be of no use to him; but this bell, that tells me of his affliction, digs out and applies that gold to me: if by this consideration of another's danger I take mine own into contemplation, and so secure myself, by making my recourse to my God, who is our only security.

[renie408]

2. Beautiful.

I have, of course, heard the first line a million times, but didn't know the context.

[OneBlueSky]

3. you nailed it . . . but what's missing is the fact that the corporate media and the power elite . .

actively promote divisiveness and discourage notions of interconnectedness and compassion in everything they say and do in order to maintain their control over the masses . . .

whats keeping us at each other's throats is not happenstance or historical dialectic or our failings as human beings . . . rather, it's a calculated and pervasive campaign to exacerbate and exploit our differences instead of encouraging us to recognize our common humanity . . . this is how power remains in power, tightens control, and robs the middle and lower classes to enrich themselves . . .

it's called "The American Way" . . .

[renie408]

4. We need a grassroots movement

to take back our society. We need to remember TRUE values of tolerance, generosity, compassion and restraint. Those are universal and are not exclusive to one religion or even to religion at all. These are the values that man has to learn if he wants a chance on this planet. Each person has to say, "It starts here. With me. I will try to recognize that I am part of the whole."

This reminds me of reading about the Maharishi Project.

[ends_dont_justify]

5. Tolerance and caring is the key

If humanity could ever better itself in any way, I would say the answer lies in those two fundemental concepts alone....sure, we have proven ourselves intelligent and proven we can do quite a lot. But where the entire world faulters is in the same way, everywhere. We have rogues who come with nothing but hate and emptiness and commit atrocities to the innocent. I believe it's because humanity has stopped growing in those two important ways....learning to tolerate that which is different, and learning a caring empathy towards everything around us.

[Annces]

6. I agree

This is the extreme of situations that happen at every level, when we are not helping each other as a priority, siblings, parents, neighbors, fellow students, coworkers. It can get really rough trying to make it when everyone has their own gig going. That is why some people join those wacko religious groups IMO.

[renie408]

7. Yep. They join to be part of something and to feel like they have a group

looking out for them. The same thing with churches or softball leagues, I imagine. But people with issues don't wind up in mainstream groups because they can be exclusionary. They wind up shooting up their schools or in cults.