Why I Write

Promoting kindness in a world of chaos

Why I Write

I write because I believe that even the smallest change in direction changes the destination of a ship. Even if that ship is being tossed about in a storm.

And I am not blind to the crashing waves, the roaring gales, the tossing about that fills us with that fear and dread.

You know that feeling. It’s hard to avoid. It’s the moment you see some screaming chyron rolling across the bottom of cable news. Or open the endless feed of your social media of choice.

The DOOMSCROLL.

War. Disasters. Every issue a constant fight, the “good” side decided by whichever team you’ve aligned your allegiance to. A steady stream of rage inducing headlines. Everything is worse today than it was before. And guess what, somehow tomorrow is going to find a way to be worse.

And there is nothing you can do about it. It feel like the only sane choice is to look away until the darkness cannot be ignored, and it takes you too.

I’m sitting here writing about complimenting a stranger’s earrings in an elevator.

What the F---?!

What’s the point?

It’s rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. No, it’s even less than that. It’s turning on a flashlight on the deck of the Titanic as the ship and everyone on it are swallowed by the icy North Atlantic.

A faint point of light amongst a sea of darkness.

I know that.

I am no stranger to the doomscroll. I see the masses of people treated as subhuman while people argue back and forth about if those people are subhuman. I see the flames and the floods and the winds smashing our neighbors and friends, as if the planet were showing its contempt for the idea that humans ever felt like we had dominion over it. And I see what seems like everyone giving in to either hatred, anger, or nihilism.

And still, I am writing about acknowledging the dignity of one unhoused man while millions sleep on the streets.

What, pray tell, is the point?

I think, and correct me if you disagree, but I think that most people see the world as crumbling into chaos. And the idea of that, it generates wrath, and fear, and kills hope.

The chaos is too big. The chaos is growing too fast. The chaos is too powerful. So much so that we cannot even imagine where to start with hope.

Hope for improvement. Hope that we are on the right track. Hope in the future.

Hope in each other. Hope in Humanity.

It’s too big. It’s too much.

And it is. I 100% agree with almost all of that.

Almost.

Except I haven’t lost my hope.

I recognize that I cannot save the world from itself. Nearly everything is beyond my control.

But I can control myself. And in controlling myself, I am aware of how everything I do, every thought, every idea, every opinion, everything I say, even the smallest actions I take, they are arranging of the bricks and girders and supports of this thing I call “me”.

I am the architect. And my project is always under construction. I can build with intention, making a solid structure, or I can ignore the materials accumulating and let it all heap into a pile.

I choose to build with intention. I choose responsibility for what is being built.

There is where I start. I let someone merge in the traffic jam. I understand the truth of my capacity, and I apply where it can help. I share a smile and a kind word. I let others be seen and valued. I take the materials the world gives me, and I arrange them in the best way I can.

Brick by brick, I try to structure myself into the kind of person I want to see in the world. And I am aware that the things around me, my community, my environment, the culture I consume, are providing the bricks. And the mortar. And cement, and lumber, and shingles, and glass, and tiles, and all the things I arrange into me.

Part of the structure I am building is a factory… a factory that provides construction materials to those around me. Because I know I am not a structure on my own, a lone tower on a desolate empty plain.

No, I am building on my plot in the society that surrounds me.

While I am guiding my own construction, I am also aware that I am building the society around me. Because like me, it too is always under construction. There is no finish line where civilization is done developing. So long as there are people, we are all working on this larger project of humanity. It has greater scope than any individual, and many more levels. The plumbing is infinitely more complicated. But we are building it together, just the same.

If we want a world better than the one on the doomscroll, we must build with intention. We must be aware of the materials we are supplying the people around us. And we must understand how our structure supports the larger ones.

Our families and communities. The systems and organizations that bind us and set the rules and boundaries of our worlds. We can’t control our histories, we can’t control the material conditions we are working with directly. But we can recognize them for what they are, and not what we wish them to be. And starting from there, we take the responsibility to build together.

How have you built yourself? Do you have windows clear and open for empathy and grace? Or have you shuttered them with fear and suspicion of what you see outside? Are open? Or barred from the inside?

If we are locked away in bunkers of malevolence and anger? Or are we building with trust and faith, structures that are individually designed but also support one another?

I choose to build with large windows and supports for my roof… and my neighbor’s. I start with small kindnesses for the people I interact with. I understand the materials I give them to build with for our individual structures.

And I recognize the larger structure we are building connected, together. If I want to make sure I have adequate health, I need to build towards adequate health for everyone. If I want to be treated with respect and dignity, I must make sure everyone is treated with respect and dignity. If I want forgiveness and grace, I must make sure all are afforded forgiveness and grace.

And if the structures around and above me aren’t built to these standards? Well, I’m the architect. And so are you. We need to get to work.

We need to witness the good and the harm in our world. Understand the good, read its blueprints, and strive to build more. Advocate for the rights of someone different than you. Support causes that do for all what you want done for you. Do not allow harms to accrue while standing by, consigned to fate.

Apathy is fertile ground for evil. When we look away, we are committing an evil of indifference, and it must be accounted for.

We must address with those harms we allow through our inaction, our disregard. But also those harms that are created by our choices, our opinions, our thoughts. We know that punching a neighbor is harmful.

But what about when you share a meme online built on malice and half-truths that make “them” look bad and “us” look good? When you choose horde instead of share, because you are afraid of being in the same situation as those “moochers” and “deadbeats”? Or vote to deny a protection or benefit for someone you see as unworthy?

We all have the right to do those things. But just like you cannot ignore your neighbor’s bloody nose, we cannot ignore the consequences of the totality of how we build the world around us. And just like our knuckles swell and bleed when we throw that punch, so too are we harmed by the harm we build into the world.

I know what I am saying here is simple, but not easy. There is risk. A kindness may be taken advantage of. A program to lift those in need may be manipulated by those with plenty. We have to let go of something we think we control and allow others determine our outcomes.

To that I say, “look around”. Not just at the metaphorical structure that are being built around you. But at the real world we live in. Without the courage to trust others, this planet could not support 8 billion people as we do today. Without trusting the laws and traditions and infrastructure we inherit, we’d still be huddled around fires fighting one another and the world for the tiniest morsel of subsistence.

Without hope, we’d merely be living to survive. With hope, we have built a society that can thrive.

Together, we built the doomscroll. But just like us, it is not final and unchanging. We can build something better. We begin with ourselves. Decide to build more good. Reckon with the bad. Witness the effect our building has on others. And with them, build something better. Together.