It's the Nice Ones

It’s something that seems to be happening more and more these days. Maybe it’s happened to you. It certainly has to me a few times. You’re having a conversation with someone, maybe even someone you know quite well, and everything’s going along fine until suddenly, out of the blue, they say something so uncharacteristically hateful that you’re absolutely floored. Flabbergasted. Shocked and at a loss for words.

It’s not directed towards you, of course. After all, this person is perfectly polite and seemingly decent. It could be about a foreign country, people of a specific sexual orientation, a celebrity, a certain race, another religion, a politician, some socioeconomic group, or any other number of people. The subject doesn’t really matter. Regardless of the targeted individual or group, the person says something so biased, so ignorant, and so heartless that you just can’t believe that it came out of the mouth of someone you thought you respected.

It hurts. It’s jarring in a way that’s difficult to describe. It almost feels like the person reared back and punched you in the stomach, but they didn’t. There they are, standing there, looking normal as ever. Acting like they didn’t just say the most abhorrent thing you’ve heard in recent memory. And it makes you wonder, “How could a person who seems so decent and kind be this misguided and hateful in this one area?”

These experiences are painful because they induce cognitive dissonance. There’s a disconnect between what we expect from reality and what we actually experience. When we know someone to be a good person most of the time, we expect them to be a good person all of the time. And let’s be honest: It’s usually those we consider the best who let us down the most. When they act in a way that isn’t fitting for a good person, it messes with our heads in a big way.

Really, it comes down to this: We struggle to understand how the same person can be both compassionate and hateful, how they can have such light and darkness inside of them at the same time. When we see it out in the world, it horrifies us. But have we ever stopped to consider that maybe this dichotomy between love and hatred exists in all of us?

I’ve found that the more I commit myself to practicing compassion, the more I recognize the darkness inside of me. As I seek to expand my love for others to include more and more people, I run into problem areas where my more primitive side fights back against my desire to show compassion. It’s easy to show love to those close to me, and even to strangers, but what about the people I hate? What about the people I disagree with? What about the people who I feel like are making the world a significantly worse place for everyone else? The truth is that I’m not always faithful to show compassion to them.

From time to time, I find myself surprised and horrified by my own capacity for hatefulness. Especially in our current political climate, it is far too easy to demonize other people, decide that they aren’t worth our consideration, and dismiss them as worthless. I’ve been guilty of this myself, and I’ve had to repent of some of the things I’ve said about others. It’s not that my disagreement with them changes; it’s that I choose to recognize them as people, even if they are bad people, and show them the consideration every person deserves.

Compassion is a wonderful thing, and we’re all called to practice it. But if we ever feel like we’ve fully mastered it, then we’ve actually fallen into the trap of self-righteousness, and we’re destined for a fall. We can’t let our compassion lead us to become complacent or judgmental of those who aren’t compassionate. The truth is that we each have the capacity for darkness inside of us. We can all do better. And so we’re each called to wake up every morning and decide to love others a little bit better today than we did yesterday. If we aren’t actively working to improve, then we’re allowing hate to creep back in.

And if we aren’t careful, we may one day find ourselves looking in the face of a horrified friend as they see the darkness inside of us reflected in something that we’ve said or done. I’m committing myself to do the work to ensure that something like that never happens again, and my encouragement to you this week is that you’ll make that commitment, too. We can all do better at practicing compassion. Will you do what it takes?

Self-Love Is Hard Sometimes

“Love your neighbor as yourself.” —Jesus (Mark 12.31)

In a piece a few weeks ago, I noted that loving ourselves is a prerequisite for us being able to love others. I didn’t say much, but I thought it was enough to get the point across so that I could move on. The more I thought about it, though, the more I realized that this topic deserves more than just a note buried in a blog post in my archive. Because it’s important, and I think it’s something we all struggle with from time to time. I know I have. So this week, I want to dedicate my entire article to this concept of self-love and its importance in our lives.

Growing up, we receive a lot of mixed messages about the way we’re supposed to approach our own self-image. We’re taught that we should love and admire ourselves just the way we are, but also that we shouldn’t be prideful or conceited. We need to value and appreciate ourselves, but we’re supposed to be sacrificial and put others first, too. “Love yourself, but not too much,” the world tells us. And while I think there’s some value to these well-meaning messages, they often leave us confused. Maybe even lost. And in the process, we can end up losing our entire sense of self-worth.

This is a true shame. When we aren’t able to love ourselves, we miss out on many of the great things of life. We can’t foster healthy, reciprocal relationships with others. We can’t excel in our careers and hobbies. And we can’t connect with God in realistic, enriching ways. We can’t do any of these things because we’re too caught up in ourselves, our insecurities, and our unfulfilled needs to live the abundant life God has for us.

Perhaps worst of all, when we don’t love ourselves, we can’t love others. The great commandment tells us to love others as we love ourselves. It doesn’t say “more than” ourselves. Or “instead of” ourselves. It says we should love others as we love ourselves, which means that self-love is necessary for loving others. The truth is that no matter what, we’re always going love ourselves better than we love anybody else. It’s human nature. So if we can’t love ourselves, how can we expect to be able to love anybody else?

Loving ourselves can be hard for a lot of different reasons. Maybe we don’t like the way we look. Maybe we’re dissatisfied with where we are in life. Maybe we’ve made decisions that we aren’t proud of, and they change the way we view ourselves. All of these things can harm our self-image and eventually interfere with our ability to like ourselves, even to love ourselves.

But the truth is that self-love, like any other kind of love, can’t be based on anything superficial. It can’t be based on something a person does, the way they look, or their position in life. Love is rooted in identity, who a person is. And self-love is no different. We’re supposed to love ourselves not because we’re perfect or successful or anything else. We’re supposed to love ourselves because we’re people created in the image of a God who loves us. That’s where our identity, our value, our self-worth, and ultimately our self-love come from.

By the way, that’s where love of others comes from, too. Right now, my big mantra is, “People are people.” And that’s why we love and value them. Because they’re people created in the image of God and loved by him. So if we can’t recognize that about ourselves and apply it in a way that allows us to love ourselves, we can’t possibly do that for others.

I’m not saying that it’s always easy. Even I struggle with self-worth and self-love from time to time. But that’s why we have to have a realistic view of ourselves in order to love ourselves well. Just like you truly can’t love someone you don’t know, you can’t love yourself until you strip away all of the extra stuff, look yourself right in the face, and choose to love what you see. You may be broken. You may have made some mistakes. You may not even like where you are in life. But you are created in God’s image; you are loved by him. And that’s more than enough reason to love yourself.

There’s nothing wrong with needing help from time to time, either. When we struggle to love ourselves, sometimes we need a reminder of who we are. And those who love us are more than happy to come alongside us and see us through the dark times until we’re able to love ourselves again. It may be scary to reach out and ask for help, but when we do, we often find that it’s been there waiting the entire time.

And once we love ourselves well, we’re free and able to love others. We can see their value and cherish them for who they are because we’ve already gone through that process ourselves. We can follow the command to love others as ourselves, and we can love others well because we’ve learned to love ourselves well. And that, friends, is a beautiful thing. It’s my hope for myself and for each of you that we get to a place where we can love ourselves for who we are and then extend that love to others as Jesus taught us. May it be so.

Black Panther

It’s been a while since I’ve done a blog post about a movie. I must admit that it wasn’t my original plan to be writing about Black Panther this week, but it was so good and so impactful that I just couldn’t help myself. It shook me to my core. (One might even describe me as “shook.”) And so here I am again, writing to you about some superhero movie you may or may not have heard of.

But this won’t be a traditional movie review. I’m not really here to tell you what I liked or didn’t like about the film. I’m not going to analyze the visuals, the music, or even the plot, really. I’m here to tell you why this movie is important and why you should see it even if the superhero genre isn’t your thing. Because as much as Black Panther is an excellent superhero movie and a good movie in general, it’s also just good. It’s good for your soul. It’s good for the world. It’s good for humanity. And it matters.

To me, Black Panther sets itself apart by speaking deeply into some really important issues.

Oppression

The first thing you’ll notice about Black Panther is that it is a black movie. It was created by black artists, features black actors (including one playing a black superhero!), and portrays black lives in rich and full ways. And unfortunately, an important part of black experience is oppression.

If you’re unaware of the global, historical oppression of African peoples and their descendants, or if you think it’s good to get a refresher from time to time, this film is for you. From the modern-day streets of Oakland to the historical African savannah, Black Panther takes a wholistic view of oppression in a way that I’ve never seen on film before. It’s upfront, sympathetic, and real. It helped open my eyes to just how big a problem this sort of oppression is, and I think that’s something we all need.

Privilege

On the flip side, the film also spends a lot of time dealing with the concept of privilege. Where does it come from? What are its effects? What responsibilities come along with privilege, especially when it comes to the question of how one relates to those who are oppressed? The main character in the film finds himself in quite possibly the most privileged position in the world, and the arc of the film follows his process of figuring out what to do with it. As someone who also comes from a background of privilege, I related to T’Challa’s internal struggle and found it convicting to watch onscreen.

Isolationism

But his journey isn’t just a personal one; it plays out on a national level as well. If you know anything about the character of Black Panther, you know that he comes from the secretive African nation of Wakanda. In order to protect itself and its resources, Wakanda poses as a third-world country and refuses to interact with the rest of the world. This can’t last forever, though, and as the world gets smaller and smaller, Wakanda is forced to consider in what ways (if any) it will engage with the rest of the world. We in the United States, at least, find ourselves asking these same kinds of questions, so getting viewers to consider them is a success in and of itself.

Heroism

In the wake of these previously-mentioned factors, people are forced to make a decision: How am I going to respond to the wrongs I see the in world? How am I going to use my influence to make a difference? And without giving away too much of the plot, I’ll simply say that this movie does not shy away from portraying differing answers to this question. And ultimately, the film wants to know, “How does a hero respond?”

But it isn’t simplistic in its portrayal of other points of view, either. As I watched this movie, I saw parallels between the diversity of the characters’ worldviews and the diversity within real-world movements like the civil rights movement in the sixties and Black Lives Matter today. What the film left me with was an even stronger conviction for my view but a greater understanding and sympathy for other views as well. And that makes me want to do better so that I can help rid the world of the factors that lead to the less heroic worldviews in the first place.

Solidarity

Finally and most importantly, the film is a call for solidarity. The whole point of featuring black voices and black experiences is to draw others in and create a sense of unity. When one group suffers, we all suffer. And one when one oppressed group is set free, we’re all set free. Only together can we solve the centuries-long, world-wide problems that have been handed down to us. But we can each take steps to solve those problems, and the Black Panther is an excellent example of that.

A lot of this stuff isn’t new to you. Black Panther is close to my heart because it speaks to things I care about and write about. It touches on a lot of topics that are important to me, and it speaks to them in ways that I never could because of my lack of experience. So if you like reading what I have to say about these topics and want to know what people much more qualified than I am have to say, or if you’re tired of hearing me go on and on about this stuff and need a new perspective, or if you just want to be a better, more informed person, I hope you’ll check Black Panther out. I promise it’ll be worth your time.

Compassion as Intelligence

“If I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge… but do not have love, I am nothing.” —1 Corinthians 13.2

People tell me I’m a fairly smart person. I always make a point to inform them that I don’t deserve the honor, but that doesn’t stop them. They think this about me not because of anything I say or do, but because of some pieces of paper I have hanging on my wall. We tend to associate years in school with intelligence and assume that those who achieve higher degrees in academia must be smarter than everyone else. I’m not sure that we’re on the right track here.

Don’t get me wrong. I love school. I love studying and attaining knowledge about the topics I’m passionate about. That’s why I consider myself a lifelong learner and why I try to alway keep my mind open to new ideas. Study and learning should be admired and rewarded because they do add value to one’s life. They add knowledge, which can lead one to become more intelligent, which is a noble thing to be. But is it really the most important thing?

It’s pretty common knowledge that there are different types of intelligence. Some people are “book smart” while others are more “street smart.” One person might be incredibly gifted with music, but another is a genius at math. I find myself to be skilled with language, but I’m terrible at thinking spatially. (Don’t ask me to be your navigator or your interior decorator.) There are so many different kinds of intelligence that one can have, and it’s great that we recognize and celebrate these various ways that people can be smart. But there’s one type that often goes overlooked.

I believe that the highest form of intelligence human beings can attain is compassion. We don’t usually think of compassion as a form of intelligence, but it really is. It requires understanding people, seeing the world from other points of view, and making decisions based on that information. That’s pretty smart if you ask me. And it has some characteristics that set it apart from any other type of intelligence known to humankind.

Compassion can be applied in every area of a person’s life across their lifespan. It doesn’t matter who you are or what situation you find yourself in: Compassion always comes in handy. Because no matter what you do, you’re going to be doing it with other people. It could be a team of other people or a single partner. Either way, knowing how to connect with people, understand where they’re coming from, and communicate with them in a considerate way will always help you excel. It’s a skill that can be applied anytime and anywhere.

And it can be practiced by anyone. You don’t have to be a savant or a prodigy to be good at treating other people compassionately. You don’t even have to get up from your chair. Compassion is a skill that someone can practice regardless of their physical ability, mental capacity, age, or any other factor. It’s available to each of us if we’re only willing to open ourselves up to it.

It doesn’t require books or classrooms or teachers, either. Compassion isn’t so much something we learn externally as it is something we discover inside of ourselves. We’re each blessed with the God-given ability to love others the way God loves us. It’s in our programming. Learning to practice compassion is actually just unlearning the selfish and prideful ways we’ve learned to approach the world due to our brokenness. Really, compassion is the most natural form of knowledge because each of us already has it in us; we just have to get past all the junk and learn to embrace it again.

And more than anything, compassion has the power to change the world. Science, math, music, literature, language, and all of those other subjects are great, and they have a lot of potential to do good. But none of them come close to the impact that compassion can have on the world. A single act of kindness can change a person’s life. And a bunch of kind acts put together can alter the course of history forever. It can give us and others the ability to live our best lives, find fulfillment, and pass that kindness on to others. And there’s no limit to what that can do.

Compassion can be used anytime, anywhere, by anyone. You don’t need anything special to learn it because it’s already inside of you. And when you choose to practice it, you can influence the world in important, lasting ways. That’s why I think compassion is the highest form of intelligence we humans have available to us.

Throughout my studies, I’ve found that what impacted me the most wasn’t the information that made me smarter; it was the handful of experiences that made me a better person. I could spend my whole life learning every fact there is to know about theology, religion, psychology, and the like, but if it doesn’t change the way I approach the world, then what’s the point? It’s nice to be smart, but it’s a lot nicer to be good. And I think that this is the ultimate goal of education, knowledge, and intelligence in general: to form good people.

So yeah, we should study to learn the sorts of knowledge we traditionally think of when we talk about intelligence. But let’s not limit our understanding of it to that small set of skills. And may we never neglect to value, pursue, and reward compassion, because it’s the most important form of intelligence any of us can attain.

People Are People

It seems elementary, right? People are people. Well, duh. Everyone knows that. It’s not like that statement is saying anything new. It’s not saying much of anything at all, really. Saying, “People are people,” offers about as much information as saying, “Apples are apples,” or, “One equals one.” The statement is already self-apparent, so there doesn’t seem to be any reason to make it at all, much less write an entire blog post about it.

And yet, I constantly find myself needing a reminder of this fundamental truth: People are people. Because as hard as I try to practice compassion, empathy, and solidarity with others, I’m always tempted to deviate back to my natural, broken state. Selfishness, prejudice, and pride are constantly trying to sneak back into my worldview, and so I have to stay vigilant in order to keep these vices from infecting the way I treat others.

I don’t think I’m alone in this. At the end of the day, we’re all in the same boat. In my faith tradition, we call it “fallenness.” Others may refer to it differently, but we all recognize it. Humanity is plagued with this very accurate sense that we are misguided, broken, even lost. We have this tendency to focus on ourselves, our needs, our desires, and our opinions to the point of obsession. To the point that we can’t see anything else. To the point that we forget that other people are people, just like we are, with needs, desires, and opinions of their own.

It’s easy for us to understand that we are people. Each of us experiences our own lives as complex, important, and somehow central. We’re the heroes of our own stories. And whenever we feel like our personhood is being compromised in any way, we become immediately defensive of it. We don’t want anyone disrespecting us, neglecting us, or discounting us because we matter. We are people, after all.

But the second we look outside of ourselves, it becomes much more difficult to fully recognize someone’s personhood. We can’t experience other people’s lives firsthand the way they do or the way we experience our own. We can’t totally understand the complex feelings and experiences of another person, no matter how hard we may try. We can’t feel their hurt. We can’t feel their deepest needs. We can’t see things the way they do. All we can do is observe from the outside (when we even bother to do that), and that viewpoint offers us a tragically incomplete picture.

We struggle to recognize the personhood even of those closest to us. Growing up, we tend to think of our family members as supporting characters in our stories rather than as protagonists in their own. Far too often, we neglect to consider situations from our friends’ points of view and simply make decisions based on what we think is best. And who among us has not been guilty of prioritizing our own needs above those of our significant other, believing what we need to be more important than what they do? Even when we love someone, we are inconsistent about remembering that they are a person and treating them as such.

How much more difficult, then, it must be for us to recognize the personhood of people we seemingly have no connection with, or even those we perceive as being in opposition to us. We rarely, if ever, consider the fact that strangers on the street, or on TV, or in other countries, are people just like us. And even when we do, we often neglect to carry that recognition into it our conversation and decision-making.

It isn’t our default state to recognize that other people are people. But here’s the truth: People are people. And it’s our job to overcome the temptation towards self-centeredness and to consistently remember this truth. That’s what compassion is, really. And as we begin to practice recognizing this truth in our daily lives, we realize a few important things.

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We realize that other people have inner lives that are as rich, complex, and important as our own. Remember that comment someone made that hit you the wrong way because it brought up some difficult memories? That happens to other people, too. Remember when a stranger smiled at you on the street and it changed the trajectory of your whole day? You’re not the only one. Remember when you said something you didn’t really mean and became frustrated by the miscommunication? Yep, other people experience that, too.

Each of us navigates the world with a million different thoughts, emotions, memories, and more bouncing around in our heads at any given time. These things impact the way we act in the present, and the way others respond to them can have lasting effects into the future. It’s so easy for us to take these things into account when we consider our own actions, but we rarely do so when we consider the actions of others. We tend to evaluate ourselves based on our internal intentions, while we judge others only on their external actions.

Recognizing the complexity of others’ internal lives leads us to take into account the context of their actions as well as the actions themselves. Why did that person treat you that way? Did they just receive some bad news? Did you remind them of someone who had been mean to them in the past? Maybe other people are just jerks, but you can’t really know that until you get to know them, their history, and the way they think first. Once you do that, you’ll probably find that other people are just as well-meaning as you are, even though we all fail to act out those good intentions sometimes.

And this gives way to a really freeing practice: giving other people the benefit of the doubt. We’re always willing to cut ourselves some slack when we do something we’re not proud of because we recognize all of the complex factors that go into our decisions. How about we do the same for others? People are people, and if we’re going to give ourselves the benefit of the doubt, we should probably do the same for them, too.

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As much as recognizing the personhood of others serves as a reminder that they experience the world in much the same way we do, it also shows us that every person’s life experience and worldview is unique. Just as you contain a multitude of memories, beliefs, and opinions that shape who you are and how you approach the world, so does everyone else. And these various factors combine to create drastically different results.

Have you ever wondered how two intelligent, well-intentioned people can look at the same situation and come to opposite conclusions about it? We tend to believe that if everyone would just put away their biases, misguided opinions, and bad logic, they would be able to use their brains and all see the world’s issues the same way. (Specifically, we assume that everyone would come to the same conclusions that we’ve already come to ourselves.) But that just isn’t the case.

And that’s because every single person experiences the world in a different way. No two peoples’ stories are alike, and thus, no two people are alike. We all come from somewhere; we were all taught certain things growing up, and we all experienced things that caused us to either affirm or reject what we were taught. Believe it or not, every person on the planet believes that their opinions are just as correct as you believe yours to be.

But we don’t have to view this as a bad thing. Research shows that groups with more diversity are actually better at solving problems than groups made up of people from similar backgrounds. Sure, they have to work through differences of opinion, conflicting priorities, and clashing personalities, but once they’ve done that hard work, these groups actually come up with solutions that are more effective than anyone else could.

Every person’s experience is legitimate, and thus, every person gets a voice. Your memories, reflections, and opinions matter to you, and those of others matter to them just as much. And they should matter to us as well, because they are just as real and just as valuable as our own. I’m not saying that every opinion is correct or that all worldviews should be considered of equal moral merit. (I’m looking at you, Nazis. You can kindly shut up.) But I am saying that we have a responsibility to hear and seriously consider the opinions of others, because they are just as real as our own.

We can get stuck in a rut of thinking that our thoughts and opinions matter more than those of others simply because they’re ours. But we often forget that every single person on the planet feels the exact same way. It doesn’t have to be like this, though. When we humble ourselves, admit that we can’t possibly be right about everything, and truly listen to the experiences and opinions of others, we are opening ourselves up to a more wholistic, compassionate, and accurate view of the world. And that’s a beautiful thing.

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But more than anything, recognizing the personhood of others reminds us that other people matter. This is a simple truth, but one we all too often forget. We are ambitious, self-centered individuals who will do just about anything to get what we want, and in the midst of all that, we often lose our sense of the value of other human beings. It’s not that we purposefully decide that other people aren’t important. We just get so focused on our own goals, our own ideas, our own self-improvement, that we neglect to stop and consider that others matter just as much as we do.

The reality is that they do. Whether it’s your best friend, your worst enemy, or a stranger on the street, every single person matters. Each and every human being on this planet is a person with agency, intelligence, feelings, and something to offer the world, and thus every single one of them has value.

In my faith, we sum it up this way: Every person is created by God in God’s image, and thus, every person has worth. I think that’s beautiful. But you don’t have to believe in God to recognize that people have innate value. When you recognize that every other person is a person just like you, it’s not much of a stretch to recognize just how valuable they are. Because they are important. They matter.

No person is more valuable than any other. I matter a whole lot to myself, but I’m also called to remember that every other person I encounter matters just as much as I do. I’m no better than anybody else. My needs, desires, and goals are no more important than anyone else’s. And neither are yours.

We all need the same things: food, water, shelter. At the most basic level, we all want the same things: love, peace, fulfillment. Sure, our goals may differ and even seem to conflict, but that doesn’t mean that any one of us is any more or less important than any other. We’re all the same. We’re all equal. And we’re all called to care for one another.

Taking this truth and applying it in one’s life is difficult. It requires both depth and breadth, recognizing just how much a person matters and then applying that recognition to every single person on the planet. It’s hard, but it’s not impossible. We celebrate the best among us who have already recognized and practiced this truth, but in reality, it’s the responsibility of each of us to do the same.

It starts with us. We have to love and value ourselves. For most of us, that’s a natural practice most of the time. When we struggle with that, we have to start there before we can love anyone else. But once we’ve got that part covered, it’s time to look outside ourselves. It’s time to love other people the same way. It’s time to heed the great command, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” We start with those closest to us and work our way out until eventually, our compassion includes everyone in the world. And we can only do that by first recognizing the personhood of others, the truth that people are people.

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Your friends are people.
Your family members are people.
Your peers are people.
Your coworkers are people.
All of them: people.

Those you pass on the street are people.
Those you wait behind in the store are people.
Those you see on TV are people.
Those you read about on the internet are people.
Everyone you see is a person.

Those you agree with are people.
Those you disagree with are people.
Those you like are people.
Those you hate are people.
And those who broke your heart? Yep: people.

Rich people are people.
Poor people are people.
Politicians are people.
Criminals are people.
Doesn’t matter; still people.

Straight people are people.
Gay people are people.
Bisexual people are people.
Gender-nonconforming people are people.
You don’t have to approve of every aspect of someone to recognize the fact that they’re a person.

Christians are people.
Muslims are people.
Atheists are people.
Agnostics are people.
And everyone in-between. They’re people, too.

Welfare recipients are people.
Homeless people are people.
Refugees are people.
Immigrants—legal or otherwise—are people.
Society tries to de-humanize them, but we know the truth: They are people.

Foreign civilians are people.
Enemy soldiers are people.
Terrorists are people.
Dictators are people.
Nothing can change the fact that they are people.

Sex slaves are people.
Child laborers are people.
Victims of abuse are people.
All of the lost, forgotten, neglected, and ignored.
They’re people, just like you and me.

Every person is a person. Love them or hate them; agree with them or disagree with them; approve of them or not; it doesn’t matter. Every conversation, every decision, every opinion must begin with the basic premise that people are people. That is the only foundation for a just world. May we each do the hard work necessary to recognize and live out this fundamental truth in our lives.

People are people. Let’s treat them like it.