You know how we get nervous for public speaking commitments, an important sports game, or some other life event? That crazy anxiety where we feel like something is going to happen that will humiliate or hurt us? We don’t have all the facts; we’re filling in the blanks to visualize success instead of failure. Usually, our brain takes this opportunity to think of every potential failure point, mostly using our imagination to dream up irrational fears.
Look in any of the comments sections on the political posts of our feeds. Regular people arguing mercilessly, trying to use strong emotions to sway another person’s opinion. Are we listening to each other? Are we understanding each other? Do we get to explain ourselves? Hell no. We’re left angry and unable to get a word in edge wise. If our honest reality is so unacceptable to another, is there a reason they’re CHOOSING not to listen to us? Are we forcing each other to use our imaginations to explain why people think we’re bad. Maybe this is where conspiracy theories come from?
People on the left AND right feel so unheard they start making up elaborate stories to explain why their good intentions are not worth hearing out. “Why won’t these people listen to me?! I’m not bad. Am I? Why wouldn’t they listen to me?” And off the imagination goes to make sense of why their life is not worth listening to…
The conspiracy theories that you hate so much are the result of your inability to communicate effectively which causes people who’ve lived differently than us to imagine why they’re not worth listening to. It’s a different type of social anxiety where society is anxious because we won’t ask each other what we don’t know. Now, should these unspoken differences be governed by or into law? Is that what causes the Left vs Right war? Do the politicians know this and exploit us to fill an agenda?
Empathy. You don’t get to agree or disagree with someone’s existence, that’s bullshit. Just try to understand how others have existed.
Ryan Branscum 