Common Decency and Kindness

What happened to kindness??What happened to common decency in interactions with other human beings??Are we beyond repair?

I find myself frustrated with the lack of kindness and common decency that we should share in our interactions.?Language of hate, aggressive statements towards others, and a general lack of understanding seems to be the norm in the news and social media. ?We have become a 10 second sound-bite society that cannot seem to find the humanity in others (admittedly, it is difficult to find the humanity in some world actors these days).?

Last week I had a wonderful phone call with a dear friend who does not always see the world in the same light as I do.?As a matter of fact, politically, he and I don’t find a lot of common ground.?During our dialogue he asked me this question, “what happened to our ability to get along?”?I responded that I believe one of the critical issues is that we have forgotten how to take time to really find out about the other person.?We easily throw labels of ‘conservative, liberal, evangelical, non-believer, environmentalist, hunter, socialist, capitalist,’ onto people that we meet.?These labels (and I’m guessing you immediately thought of many others, and likely when reading my comments thought of someone that “fit” that label) provide an immediate picture/image that potentially keeps one from seeing the other person in any other light but the label.

My dear friend and I continued our call and throughout he would give me a hard time about something that I said, I would give him a difficult time over something he said, but we ultimately signed off the call with how much we cared about one another.?We care about each other because for the last eight years he and I have gotten to know each other better.?We found that we have so much more common ground than we do areas where we disagree.?We found that both of us believe that our communities have a great opportunity to support those that need it the most.?We both love dogs, our wives, our kids, and our grandkids.?We both are proud of what we have done professionally.?We both want peace in the world.?Most importantly, we both seek to understand each other more and more every day.?We listen, we respect, and we care for each other.

So, why am I taking such a risk writing this today??I’m doing so to encourage us all (and by the way, I still find myself struggling with seeing people through the labels that I’ve assigned them, I’m just as guilty as anyone) to get to really know the other person.?I am writing this because it serves as a good reminder for me to spend time getting to know someone through a clear lens, not one distorted by a label.?Find out those areas where we can agree, respect where we disagree, and find ways to learn from those that don’t necessarily think just like me.?It can open the door to amazing friendships with someone that maybe, just maybe, you wouldn’t have thought was someone that was going to be a dear friend like my buddy is to me.