Let's agree to disagree...

This may be the sharpest and most powerful tool in our toolbox but why don't we use it?  It's entirely possible to agree to disagree.  After all, we're smart enough to know by now that we can't change people, right?  And if we know that, certainly we can deduce from such logic that we can't change someone else's thinking by continually arguing with them, right?  But we don't follow this logic, as a rule.  We think if we fight harder, longer, nastier and in more hurtful ways, eventually we will win.  But when we do this, no one wins.

Is it a better outcome for you or for me or for society if no one wins?  No.  Because the collateral damage, the fighting, the pain, the wars, the manipulation... it hurts everyone.  And I do mean everyone.  Everywhere.

Today is election day in the United States.  It is an apropos time for me to pick up my metaphorical blogging pen once again (after an eight month hiatus) to say a few things about my favorite topics (love, peace and fairness) in relation to this day of great dichotomies.  We are choosing between two extreme choices today - and extreme choices are usually (if not always) polarizing.  Today in particular, we are choosing between...

Fear or excitement about the outcome of the election
Left or right political leanings
Democrat or Republican
Obama or Romney
Fair ballots or corruption
To vote for or vote against
Right or wrong
Fight or give up

....It all seems like too much - and it is.  And it has cost us so much.  Dead trees from all those glossy full-color political mailers...  Voice mail messages we don't want to listen to...  Billions of dollars spent on political advertising while the number of people living in poverty in this country and around the world has grown higher and higher...  And in some cases, it has cost people friendships because love can be lost when two people who otherwise don't interact politically for years suddenly realize they are on opposite sides of a very personal-*feeling* fence.  But it's not as personal as we think.  That's the problem.

We may care about an issue and we may choose to put our energy, focus, voice and money behind it, but we don't *own* the issue.  It does not belong to us.  Not to you, or me, or anyone, no matter how personally we feel we are connected to the issue.  Issues are just that.  They are issues.  They are the stories and discussions and arguments and laws and lawsuits and books and quotes and emotions that have been collected around a thing that we give power to.  Some issues - and the momentum of change they have created - have served us well.  Some issues have built great leaders and given us gifts of freedom, liberty, humanity, equality, movements, change and insight.  Other issues have given us agita, stress, anxiety, worry, fear, hatred, war and death.  But no issue is worth fighting to the death for.  None.  Ever.  Think like Gandhi in relationship to your issue.  In relationship to all issues.   Stand up for it, yes.  Speak up for it, yes.  Make it your reason for breathing if you must but do not turn to hatred or fighting.  Start a movement, motivate others, educate people.  But do not fight.  Fighting only begets more fighting, more fear, more hatred, more war, more death.

And there is something we can do now to end the fighting over issues, over politics.  We can't expect to see a less partisan government, that is clear.  But we can become less partisan ourselves.  We can choose to have conversation and healthy discussion that we can learn from.  We can agree to disagree and put humanity and our respect for each other ahead of "winning."  Because, after all, when one side "wins" in these terrible dichotomies, no one wins, least of all you and me.  Let's lead by example.  Let's show our "leaders" how it's done.