OPINE YOUR HEART

So, I just reread my last blog posting and boy, do I sound like a whiny ass. Are you tired of me yet? I am.

I needed to do it. It felt good at the time. And I don’t regret it. A little tantrum now and again never hurt anybody. I’m still on the job. Still working hard. Most importantly, I’m really heartened by all the comments, suggestions, and support I’ve received from so many people. I feel loved! And I’ve magically lost another two pounds, so I’m now 188, and according to an online BMI calculator, I’m a seven foot tall dude in a normal weight range! Victory!

So what now?

This blog started out about health, diabetes and weight loss, and I feel it morphing into something else. Health, after all, is not an issue restricted to the body, but also the mind, from which, I believe, overall health derives. So I’m going to lose some brain weight by starting to opine on issues that hurt my head. And sometimes my heart.

I avoid watching the news. Not because I don’t care, but because when I watch it, I find it very difficult to be hopeful about humanity. That is too simplistic a statement, of course. The world is full of Kings and Malalas and Mother Theresas. The media just doesn’t waste much time reminding us about them. Instead we hear about the Kim Davises and the interchangeably irritating Kardashians and lunatic pseudo-politicians like The Donald.

These are a few of my least favorite things.

But seriously, folks, it’s hard to stay mentally healthy, especially when you are under a constant barrage of stupidity, ignorance, twisted religious dogma, hate, murder, death, and tragedy. How do you wade through all the detritus and find your way to a sane and healthy shore? Sometimes we want to just rant, and that has its place. But then there’s the genuine desire to face these issues head on, and talk about them, understand them, and maybe start to find things you want to change in your own life, or your way of thinking, or your world view.

So let’s start with Kim Davis. The woman who is being called a ‘Christian martyr’ because she was hired to do a job and refuses to do it. Watch how all those self-serving ‘politicians’ gather round in a protective circle and try to convince us that this is a religious issue. Uh, NOT.

Davis is not a martyr to anything. She is still alive, for one. This particularly egregious use of the term is wrong on so very many levels. Are people aware that there really are Christians martyrs, right now, in the current age? This isn’t some ancient story, there are people dying right now for professing their faith in places where this kind of barbarity still goes on. I do not limit this exclusively to Christianity, either. Describing Davis as a martyr is an unforgiveable use of the term when real people are being beheaded – yes, now, in the twenty-first century – for professing their faith.

She’s just a bigot. Plain and simple. And those politicians and so-called Christians who are cuddling up to her, wearing their "faith" like an invisibility cloak, are bigots as well – make no mistake. I can only hope that my fellow Americans out there watching this spectacle remember that some of these people want to be PRESIDENT. They are bigots, they are OUT as bigots, and they actually think that Americans will still consider them as serious candidates to run this country. I hope and pray that there are more people in this country who do not wish to restrict the freedoms and rights of ANY group of people than there are those who do. I hope and pray.

I could do another twenty paragraphs on this subject, but let me end with this:

“Love thy neighbor as thyself.” I don’t think Kim Davis loves herself at all. And without self-love, I think you are incapable of truly loving others. That’s the battle we fight every day, to love who we are, and to really care for other humans, even when we disagree on important things. I'm an ongoing failure at this, of course. I do not love Kim Davis, or people who think like her. But rather than just hating her, I do truly wish she could come to understand how wrong-headed, and ultimately hypocritical, she is. That this whole thing could actually change her, make her see, give her a more loving heart.

(I struggle with the ‘love thy neighbor’ thing every day – about individuals, though, not about groups of people, unless you consider the overwhelming number of rude, inconsiderate, nasty, pushy, ill-mannered people in the world a ‘group’.)

I'm trying. Really.