I saw a documentary about terrorism. It showed the best and the worst of the human spirit. Feeling like you belong to a group can help a person not feel alone in a time of despair and sorrow, but that same feeling of belonging can result in people committing the worst atrocities against their brothers and sisters simply because they are different.
I often joke with my husband that I feel like I am an alien. I don’t feel a strong sense of belonging to any particular group. There’s a social phenomenon that I don’t get. When a large group of people all do something together like “The Wave” at a stadium or the clapping and stomping to that Queen song “We Will Rock You”, most people enjoy participating because they feel like they are a part of something greater than themselves. They enjoy feeling like they belong. When I am presented with those situations, I not only don’t want to participate, I actively resist it.
I guess maybe I feel like it is a mind control thing. I don’t want to act just because everyone else is doing it. I don’t want to give up control of the one thing I have control over. So, if everyone else is having fun and acting the same, I don’t want to do it because I want to assert my independent thought. I’d probably be horrible in the military because I would always be out of step from everyone else. I’ve been out of step my entire life, but I’m starting to see that it isn’t a bad thing at all.
When I approach life with no affiliations and no strong feelings about one group or another, I find myself seeing the world as just one. We are the ones who distinguish ourselves by sex, race, ethnicity, and nationality. God doesn’t. He sees each one of us as His children. He doesn’t love anyone of us more than another regardless of race, religion, or sins. I truly believe that’s how He wants us to see each other. It’s a struggle. Some people are so easy to love, but some people are truly difficult to love. Yet, I know God wants me to love them not based on who they are, but because I have love with in my heart. So, I struggle and I try to be loving. Hopefully, somedays I find the love that God knows I have in my heart.
My faith saved me. May God’s peace reside in all of our hearts.
