True Love

being human is being in love - so, stay human

I’m quoting a very wise man who I read often - just for the general wisdom he imparts. This quote is from today, and it strikes truly and deeply in the things I try to post here. Everything I write about anti-racism and anti-authoritarianism comes to this:

“Authentic love is stranger, slower, more inconvenient, and ultimately more rewarding than any fantasy. It includes moments when we would rather be anywhere else. It also includes shared history and the subtle miracle of being known over time.

“To love well, we have to decolonize our imagination. It’s hard but not at all impossible to shed the sugary myths we inherited and learn to recognize the wilder reality of two imperfect humans choosing each other again and again.”

Rob Brezsny please forgive me for riffing on your post.

When I write about giving up the concept and the abuses of the concept of race, and about the institutionalization of race as an evil dividing line between persons and peoples, this is what I am saying. When I say that there is un upside of cognitive dissonance in nearly everything political, this is what I am saying.

There are those who have made it their bread and butter (or enormous piles of riches) to keep persons and peoples from feeling, becoming and demonstrating - practicing real, undeniable … humanity. They lust for inequitable power, and such a harmonious humanity just doesn’t work for them. Psychologists, sociologists and political scientists write and talk incessantly about dehumanization. The deed of dehumanization is not in our blood, however, it is in our symbolism. We are manipulated and restricted by so-called social constructs. Maybe we should call them social constricts. But we need not be.

It’s all about whether we can distinguish between our healthy, nurturing values and unhealthy ones. Rob also mentioned the Buddhist concept of near enemies today. In American history, and nagging us in our current popular culture, we have those ersatz virtues and values that drag us down into the pit of psychic doomscrolling, pettiness, blaming victims, self-seeking martyrdom and fire-hosing disrespect. We cannot dismiss them as convenient social constructs that we all continue to use, like downing poisonous sugary soft drinks instead of eating fruit. They trap us in a murder-suicide spiral, individually, institutionally and culturally.

We need true love. Happy New Year!