We Are All in This Together

We need to find our capacity for compassion and calm

Photo by Jude Beck on Unsplash

Humankind has become a very dangerous species. We need people who can sit still and be able to smile, who can walk peacefully. We need people like that in order to save us. — Thich Nhat Hanh

Troubled times can bring out the worst in us. When we are afraid, when we feel control slipping from our fingers, we revert to our primitive behaviors. Our bodies, still holding onto the traumas, fears and anxiety of being a little child with no control, take over for us and send us into fight mode. We make our energy as big as we can to ward off the danger.

Thus, we fight in the grocery stores over toilet paper. We buy out the gun and ammo stores. We cast blame on others. Our panic, ready and waiting in our primitive brain, shuts down the logic and calm stored in our frontal lobe.

We spin off into behaviors that not only do no protect us, they have the potential to harm us and others. Our primal instincts have taken charge and we are helpless to stop the spiral.

When I read this morning that there are people in Oregon flooding the 911 lines because they are out of toilet paper, I wanted to take the world in my arms and cry. We have created for others the very thing we feared for ourselves. By protecting ourselves, we…