It is by the grace of the same God that we all get to walk this earth. A lot of us often forget this. Or don't want to know it. But we are all stuck together, with one another, liking it or not. It is especially for that reason that I find it baffling that race is still an issue for a lot of people. Shouldn't it be both inevitable and inescapable that we must coexist? Why do some people cling so dearly to their hatred, like Gollum and his Precious! But coexist we just and coexist we shall even if it kills some of us. It surely shouldn't have to be so bleak, darlings. and I do hope that one day we can move beyond mere tolerance to actually coming to love and celebrate the very presence and existence of all of us in our great diversity. Though it seems that just tolerance can be kind of a short term goal, but we really have to move beyond tolerance, way beyond.
I just had an argument on the phone this morning with a colleague, one of the occupational therapists at one of the mental health teams where I work, who seems to think that she is my supervisor, and the issue was all about my decision to give up a difficult client whose racist views I found particularly troubling. So, we argued back and forth, and I trust it has been for both of us a learning curve, but in this climate fraught with tension and racial hate, I really need to protect myself, and I am no longer working with this particular client.
Yes, kindness. I am reminded. Even in thirty minute arguments with young occupational therapists that don't really have a lot of life experience. and kindness towards ignorant mental health clients who seem to be sunk in racial prejudice and hate. Kindness has never been so necessary as it is now, right now. We are being schooled through this pandemic, and I think, as a friend mentioned today, that people are now really starting to see how much we need one another. So, what does this tell me about what my next step is going to be? First of all, I think it's important to dispense once and for all with this nonsense of individualism and heroism such as was being spouted by Joseph Campbell, among others.
This is all about the hero, the young man (or woman) who has to go through a number of life trials, testings and difficulties in order to discover their true calling in life, and then emerge as a heroic figure brandishing the silver sword of truth, or whatever. But this heroic destiny is every bit s false as it is egoistic, being based and founded on the American construct of the rugged individual that lives apart from the support or nurturing of their community.
But we don't need heroes. We need one another, and we have to act together. yes, it is often through enlightened nd empowered and charismatic individuals that we get mobilized, but then it is for us, the collective, to embody the spiritual power and force being manifested by these leaders so that we can really become transformed as community and as individuals. We otherwise end up being oppressed and held in thrall by despots and demagogues, such as whom were first introduced to us as our heroes of deliverance.
Together we rise, and together we fall. It isn't that I have a special calling or destiny. We all do. Rather, how am I going to take whatever God has given me in order to use it to the common good? So far my record is pretty dismal. I have had to leave the Anglican Church, once and for all, and there are no new offers pending from anywhere. Best I sit this one out for now. Best that I continue to work well, and work better, with others.
No comments:
Post a Comment