Constant suspicion and resentment hurts. Do what you need to get it out of your system

The spirit of our age is intense levels of suspicion about pretty much everything, often from one group directed at another. But we don't have to live this way!

I saw a Facebook post recently from someone who had created a specially designed message - with colored background, and lovely lettering - posted and promoted on social media with one single aim:

Reminding everyone this person knew about another reason this certain institution ought to be held in suspicion and contempt. In sharp contrast to the public pronouncements of this organization, this individual was doing her part to make sure everyone got another dose to persuade them that this organization was really all about money, control and power.

But is that kind of argument even that new anymore? By now, you’ve probably heard hundreds of similar messages directed at hundreds of other individuals and institutions - trying to persuade the rest of us that a particular individual or institution (whether governmental, religious, business, law enforcement, political, national, international) is really all about hurting people around them.

Through some salacious snippet or frightening factoid, the writer pitches how and why the organization in question is really bent on “destroying” democracy or “destroying” health" or “destroying” marginalized folks or “destroying” Christianity.

Destroyers in every direction!

The goodness of God, and the goodness of God’s children

With each passing year, these messages have lost more and more hold over me - and my life has been so much happier and more peaceful as a result. I’ve been pondering lately what jiu-jitsu moves have allowed me to wriggle out of the grip of this insurgent hostility all around us.

A large part of it has definitely been my faith in a God who loves every one of us profoundly, and who “causes his sun to rise” on the Republicans and Democrats alike, while “send(ing) rain” on the believers and nonbelievers too.

Another big part of it are the many wonderful people I’ve met over the last decade who disagree with me - but who clearly have so much goodness and love for humanity overflowing from them. After I kept having that experience with people from widely divergent perspectives, I concluded years ago, “thoughtful, goodhearted people disagree about (almost)¹ everything!”

Some of my longest, dearest dialogue partners, Tracy, Phil, Arthur, John and Heidi - respectively, a lesbian-identifying Unitarian conservative supporter of Trump, an atheist Marxist, a gay libertarian Christian, a queer Episcopalian, and an Evangelical Christian

Suspicious-laden stories

There’s one other factor that’s far less obvious than these other existential realities - and which has made an increasingly large difference in my outlook. Over and over, I see people taking ongoing debates, disagreements and concerns and putting a suspicion-laden story on top of them that makes them oh-so-much-more painful.

In fairness, we’re surrounded by a media environment that frequently provokes us in this direction (see 5 ways to identify grievance journalism). Yet when I hear someone vocalizing these same kinds of grievances, I often come away thinking….”um, I guess you could believe that …if you want? But why would you, when you could instead approach the same question or concern this way.”

The first time I glimpsed this was the impassioned debate around LGBT+ questions that fired up about 20 years ago. So often, the framing would be about “people who love” vs. “bigots” - creating an aching, pulsating (seemingly irreconcilable) divide between the villainous and virtuous almost instantaneously.

It was striking how little considered was another, less dramatic and intense framing: “wait a minute, maybe we all really do (genuinely) care about the well-being of people whose experience of sexuality and gender is different than the norm - but we have different ideas of how to find happiness, peace and nourishing, lasting love?”

Try as I might - and I did try - people seemed strangely disinterested in that kind of conversation and dialogue.

More recently, I’ve been among those seeing similar kinds of divides imposed on Americans with differing political views - as well as among believers and non-believers. Instead of believing far more plausible scenarios, like “hey, most Americans really do care about the country…but they’ve got very different views of what’s best for the nation.”

Or “hey, members of that church may believe some things I no longer believe - but they’re genuinely trying to do good things in the world. Kudos to them for that.”

Instead of saying something like that, I’m still so often struck by how many people run around with horror stories about half the people in America (in the case of politics) or many of the people in someone’s past (in the case of someone who’s gone through a faith crisis).

Why do we cause ourselves so much unnecessary suffering?

Swapping out defective interpretive hardware

My wonderful neighbor, John Bangerter, has a magical ability of being able to swap out something malfunctioning mechanically - with something else that does. I swear it’s a spiritual gift, because watching him work is amazing.

Sometimes I wish I could do the equivalent and reach into people’s interpretive framework - swapping out the dark suspicions for something else. Ideally, I could do this quickly enough that someone can see the immediate impact on their views, like changing lenses at the eye glass store.

In lieu of setting up an Interpretation Repair Shop here in Utah ("We’re not scared of your head”…), here’s my best stab at doing this from a distance: summarizing five interpretation-swapping examples - each representing another concrete way to decrease suspicion-driven pain in our own hearts and homes:

1. Detoxing political suspicions

The first is for those inclined to believe that “those liberals” or “those conservatives” are “really just trying to hurt this country and harm democracy” - insisting: “They don’t actually care about the fact they’re harming people - which is why they lie about it all the time!”

Instead of that, try this lens out sometime: “my political opposite cares just about America and our democracy just as much as I do, but they’ve reached conclusions about how to do that which are wrong and missing the long-term consequences of their actions.”

2. Detoxing health suspicions

Secondly, for those inclined to believe that certain individuals or institutions are inherently designed to undermine health and physical well-being - e.g., “those doctors and institutions are trying to make people sick!”

Try this on for size: “For thousands of years, thoughtful, good-hearted individuals have reached different conclusions about how to prevent sickness and promote health. Period. And that continues today.”

3. Detoxing minority suspicions

For those inclined to believe that certain individuals or institutions are intrinsically oriented towards harming women, or black people or LGBT+ identifying folks - especially those who can hardly look or hear anything from a particular faith organization without finding more evidence….try this on:

This individual or institution may care just as much about increasing happiness and reducing pain, depression and suicidality among this minority group, but they seem to have reached different honest conclusions about how to bring this to pass.

(A similar detox could help in the other direction for those fully committed to the “war on woke” - convinced that any liberal concern about minorities ought to be suspect. Maybe we can just imagine they are wonderful people with different views on how to help minority groups?)

4. Detoxing faith suspicions

It’s also easy to condemn certain individuals or institutions that promote faith (or raise questions about faith) - concluding “they’re just evil…they are definitely hateful.”

If that describes you, consider the possibility that maybe these others have reached different conclusions than you because they’ve had different experiences than you have? (I’ve been realizing this more myself lately, writing about this in the context of influencer Julie Hanks recently).

Thanks for hearing me out! Hoping some of this might be helpful.

1. There are some things that thoughtful, good-hearted people do really agree upon - and cannot disagree upon. Like, the evil of child abuse and rape - or the goodness of nurturing relationships and serving others.