Judgement & Helplessness

This past week we have watched a few friends and even ourselves being judged by the public. I totally understand that when you put yourself out there, you should expect the backlash. Chaz and I learned that lesson a very long time ago. We always say anytime you walk out front be ready for the hits, because they will be coming. We always just pray it's a low number. And we pray for the strength to let the hits roll off our backs easily.

I have to admit I would rather us take the beating any day than to watch our friends go through it again. This week we had to just stand by and watch car loads of crazy come at our friends from a never ending train of stupid. And oh my word, it got ridiculous.

I understand everyone gets a little bit braver behind a keyboard. What I don't understand is why can't we combine the keyboard with the mouse and get a lot more educated?

Can you imagine what could happen if we combined that little bit of bravery with a lot more education? We could really change the world.

But no instead we choose to take what the media or hearsay gives us, which are always just snips and sound bites of things, and we let the partial truths determine our judgements. We can do better.

We have all learned the hard way at some point that the snips and sound bites only give you the cover to the book.We have to read the entire book before truly making our judgement. It amazes me that we have all learned that lesson again and again, but somehow we forget it so quickly and cast our judgement as easily as we breathe.

I have had the honor of meeting hundreds of families that need help healing from war. This help comes in all forms. Some are like us, they need safe homes built for them. Some need financial assistance. Some need mental health. The list of needs is very long. When I am dealing with these families I always remember there are at least three sides to every story and one of those is hopefully the truth. I usually have to take the different stories and analyze them before making my judgement and determine how to help them. And sometimes I cannot help them enough and I have to sit back and somehow find contentment in my helplessness. I have fully accepted that one of my weaknesses is that I cannot help everyone, no matter how much I want to, as my mom says it, "Heal the world."

It's the helplessness that haunts me. It's the helplessness that keeps me up at night. I know I cannot help everyone. I know I cannot solve everyone's problems. I feel I just cannot stand by helpless and watching people we know be judged by others who only know the cover of the story, but this is where I sit for now. I sit in the valley of judgement and helplessness. I sit and I pray that time passes and our friends will find healing from the harsh words of those who choose to not get the full story.

I know that engaging in cyber word warfare will not win any battles. I can't tell you how many times I walk away from the computer to keep myself from a word war. These are such a waste of our time. We are all humans and we are all full of flaws. We all have our minds made up about the things we read or watch.

I believe we can do better. I believe we must all try to educate ourselves on the differences of others. And most importantly we have to remember that all of these people are people. They are reading and hearing all of the nasty comments that are being made about them. We need to all just take a moment and think about their feelings. We also need to take a minute and think about what their families have been through thanks to what our country has asked of them. Our friends have served and sacrificed so much and they deserve our compassion and caring, not our quick judgements on the snips of information we have been presented. This doesn't just apply to our wounded, ill and injured friends, I think we all can identify with being in the valley of helplessness and judgement at some point.

I truly think we all need to take time to remember what Thumper said, "If you can't say nothing nice, don't say nothing at all."