The world stands on the cusp of falling into wars against each other due to skin color or ideology, poverty and disease; or it will recover and humanity will truly become one with itself, differing ideas will not lead to disagreements but to discussions, poverty will become a thing of the past, and disease and pandemics become the entire world’s problem to solve. The discovery that the real world is destroying my view of living in a world where love and happiness are key to our lives has created stress in my life.
I have seen riots in my lifetime due to racial problems. The latest story that led to riots in the United States has reached across the world, making race and racism major themes for humanity. We must find a way to teach everyone how to behave towards one another. When I taught, I had one rule: Respect yourself, respect others and respect property. I think simple rules are needed for these times as we begin again to heal from tragic circumstances.
Respect yourself means take care of yourself and your world. You are to be the best you can be. Your life is of utmost importance to you and it should be treated that way.
Respect others. Give other people the respect to be themselves. Listen to their ideas even if you disagree. If you hate someone walk away and leave them alone. Make sure you treat people with fairness.
When dealing with people err on the side of love. Respect property. Keep your hands, feet, and objects to yourself. This means hands off everyone. No hurting of anyone else. If something does not belong to you leave it alone. This includes everything around you. If it’s yours, then it belongs to you and other people should respect your ownership of it. This means if you are going to take part in a protest, make sure it does not turn into a riot with property damage and fire. Everyone needs to remember to respect property and keep their hands, feet, and objects to themselves.
I know that the problems of racism and the racial problems that we live with on our world will not be solved by such simple solutions. We face a long, hard road to becoming one people on this Earth. We must begin the process, or we might find ourselves pushing those red buttons across the world and make the mistake of eradicating the world.
I think it comes down to RESPECT.
Respect Yourself.
Respect Others.
Respect Property.
Keep your hands feet and object to yourself.
When making a decision in how to treat another person, decide to err on the side of love.
Build a bridge not a wall.