I was expecting an email and didn’t see it in my in box, so I opened the spam folder and checked for it. It wasn’t there. But I did notice, half way down the list, a series of emails from someone in my neighborhood. I closed the spam without even looking at the subject lines and wondered what this person was so upset about, again.

A few months back we had a chat about some farming thing (biochar) and the conversation went to Robert Kennedy Jr.. Her ideas about him didn’t seem to match my experience of him. However, she had never even met him or listened to him talk. I had. Frankly his knowledge and dedication to his own health were inspiring to me.

Anyway, as time went on she started sending me political articles. Just forwarding things without any comment. At first I took a look, but it became clear that they were not contributing to me. I also noticed that I could feel the charge of fear and aversion that motivated her to forward them to me. After careful consideration, I choose to mark her email as spam so it would simply avoid my inbox.

Today I am wondering what it would take to change the hate and divisiveness in the world.

Last year I was leading “An evening of Visioning Beyond This Reality” in February. One of the guests shared during the introductory time said she just wanted there to be more love in the world. She was very emphatic about this heart’s desire.

Later, after I showed the 5 minute mind movie “I am Oneness” by Nicola Do (find below), she expressed her feelings. She hated the movie and everything it represented. Where I saw ease, she saw repression. Where I saw healthy people moving their bodies, she saw fake, Hollywood bodies. Where I saw the ease that money creates, she saw greed and filthy dollars. I selected this movie as a contribution and was surprised about how much hate it inspired in her.

The fact that she desired love and was putting out so much hate was ironic. And it was a little tragic that she couldn’t see how allowance and love creates more love. Hate, aversion and rejection doesn’t allow for what she said she wanted. She also disregarded how her lambasting the video might impact me, the person that selected the video.

For me, that evening was the end of the “Wisdom Goddess” series I’d been leading. When someone called them entertainment, I realized that what I was creating as transformation opportunities was not how they were being received. I was wondering why I was feeling a little let down after each event. Now it made sense. This is another example of the same thing being seen differently by different people. I also gave up the weekly Chi Gung classes I was teaching. I desired community devoted to inner growth, so I let go of everything that wasn’t aligned with that to allow for my outside world to change to reflect my inside world.

I’m not sure what will change the hate and divisiveness in the world, but I do know what changes it for me. Realizing that this world is a creation of my mind and choosing to cultivate my mind to weed out everything that stands in the way of peace. At this point my practice is to
1. Notice my internal reaction when people say mean things about others
2. Restraining my impulse to lash out or counter with my brilliant intellect
3. Redirect my mind that is ruminating or continuing to think about my great comeback
4. Reflect on emptiness or the dream like quality of this reality
5. Reaffirm what I am choosing
6. Reflect on any possible actions to take
7. Take action and/or let go