Recently I found myself sitting in a Christian service that
was intended as an organizing event in opposition to my spiritual
community. My intent was to bring
education, love and compassion based communication to the table of
discourse. During this event many
hateful statements were made about my community, Labels such as “devil
worshipers” “evil” and “abusers of children” were being thrown around: I
squirmed in my seat.
There was indignation boiling in my blood, anger at the
ignorance I was surrounded by and the activist within me called me to immediate
and forceful action. I sat, listened and
found my connection to Divinity and sought to view those in attendance as
also containing the spark of the divine.
In choosing to focus on compassion and heartfelt action that
reflected my beliefs in compassion, understanding and honest non
confrontational communication I was soothed, my inner need to be offended was
washed away by my connection to Divinity.
When I was allowed to speak, I was awash in compassion for
these individuals who were speaking from a place of baseless fear. My words
were chosen to be of service and honor the divine flame that burns within us
all. Gone was the need to oppose,
convince, be right, overpower.
In this experience there is a powerful magic lesson. When offended the connection with
divinity is strained, personal ego and self-interest take a front seat and sabotage
any expectation of honest and compassion based communication.
I have been doing much pondering on this subject since.
There are so many examples in our community of individuals and groups being
offended and shutting down the ability for divinity to be a guiding force in
our communications. Individuals
see their relationships as in service to self rather than as in service to
others. Over time I have witnessed
multiple examples of people expressing that it is a positive thing to let go of
relationships that no longer “serve them”.
What my recent experience has reinforced in my life is that
taking offence in conversations is an expression of personable ego. Those with
whom I disagree are valued partners in my journey; that my relationships and
friendships are about my service to my friends, associates and community, not
their service to me.
In choosing to not be offended we can engage in compassion-based
communication that has the potential to change the world. I have also become acutely
aware of how destructive to divine energy the temptation to be offended can be.
If we disagree, the two worst options are to escalate or to
take our ball and bat and go home. We can choose to surround ourselves with the
divine power of compassion-based communication.
There is Divine power
in choosing not to be offended.
10 comments:
Such good advice.
I've been thinking that your calmly addressing their fears and misunderstanding in such a polite, kind manner had much to do with the positive outcome in this situation. That's a lesson to be remembered.
I've very glad this worked to defuse the situation in FL and I hope things stay that way! We do need to acknowledge however that fundamentalists' core theology will never allow them to view US as "valued partners" and that any attempts at "friendship" on their part will be fueled by a desire to convert us, or to gather information about us that will be used against us (I read a LOT of these folks' literature). There may continue to be times where being sweethearts doesn't work and we have move on to fighting back.
Excellent advice and useful in many aspects of life
This reminds me of Aikido philosophy - not that I'm expert, but from what little I've read. And even if we had to fight one day: an Aikido master fights in order to keep the other person from hurting themselves, and to decrease the overall amount of harm being done. I'm not there by any means, but much to ponder.
Letting go of relationships that no longer serve them is a phrase used in clinical interventions, usually referring to something that is harmful.
Interesting but not really relevant to the subject of this post. Thanks for the comment.
Can you expand on your point then. I must not understand.
Context is important. While I agree that sometimes we may be overly sensitive and disagreement is not necessarily offensive, there are certain situations and words said to people - especially oppressed peoples - that they should be and/or are entitled to be offended about. It takes a certain amount of privilege to tell them not to be. We don't get to decide what is offensive to others.
Sure it goes to the pattern in our community of becoming 'Offended" and then "unfriending" or in a personal way "othering" those with whom disagreements occur, thereby shutting down communication and the possibility of insight and growth. The many people I see taking this stance essentially are taking an ego first attitude towards their friendships, i.e., if it does not serve my ego, agenda or beliefs it can be "othered". Mainly I view this evidence as supporting the proposition that being offended is a personal choice that has negative consequences on effective communication by blocking our ability to engage in compassion and divine inspired dialogue.
Hope that makes the point more clear, Thanks for the question.
My argument here is not to tell others when to be offended, but to point out that when choosing to not be offended, I have found the opportunity to be more effective in compassion based communication. In the example of this meeting, I was clearly part of a group being oppressed, yet in choosing to not be offended my connection to the divine was maintained and my speech was compassion based and I believe more effective.
Thanks for the comment.
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