Subtlety, Intimacy, Motivation VI

Where were we? Oh yes: after cataclysm, the laundry. Mindfulness, stewardship. In one of my multiculturalism classes, our prof asked what our ethnic-cultural backgrounds were and what values particularly defined them. One of my ancestors was a Hessian mercenary who fought against American revolutionaries on the side of the British colonizers during the American war of independence. He liked what he saw here, stayed, and started a family. (Sometimes it's nice to lose.) I was mostly raised in a Pennsylvania Dutch sort of town, and during my multiculturalism class I was sort of put off by everyone mentioning their backgrounds and all these "nice" values. When my turn came up, I said I was raised in a German-American setting and the priorities included a sense of professionalism in war and industry--organization and pragmatism. (One of my grandfathers was a foreman at Ingersoll-Rand.) And as also important, I added a third value--taking care of the land. (My other grandfather was a farmer/carpenter/architect/etc.) Well, at least we had one nice value included. The professionalism in war seemed important, too. When I was working at the VA, one of my clients had done all sorts of things during war but he had little or no hatred for the enemies of his country. He had all sorts of stuff going on, issues, but he was able to maintain a consistently impressive character throughout. He impressed me on a regular basis--not an easy thing to accomplish. Very different attitude from racism, communitarian violence, etc. War for annihilation, genocide, was foreign to him even though extreme violence was not.

Anyway, stewardship of the land stood out as unavoidably important, and respect for one's enemies or competitors did as well. In dealing with a few veterans as a mental health intern, it was really obvious to me that taking care of your ideas and feelings towards your enemies was an important part of taking care of your ideas and feelings. Big breakthrough, huh? That whole self-interest thing comes back around again and again. Besides being aware of a responsibility as a steward of the planet, I really learned from these clients what it was like to "take care" of one's enemies. Large-scale death was different from hatred. Hatred made PTSD harder to overcome.

The same is true for anyone who fights social injustices. Hatred makes it initially easier to overcome the aversion towards fighting, but it plants a seed that grows in one's consciousness. It infects one's heart and mind. When we allow or support it in ourselves or those around us, it infects those we fight against, true, but it infects us first and lastingly. (Approximately twice as many American soldiers as were killed in Vietnam have taken their own lives in America since Vietnam. Many civilian Americans in the 1970s liked the righteousness expressed in hating the soldiers--their contribution to the infection was death from an entitled distance; different victims, same hate.) After cataclysm, after war, if there are any survivors, we still have to take out the trash, do the laundry, change the babies' diapers. If hatred is a part of your life, it will remain as an infection of the soul until you address it. There are some ways of winning that are not worth the fight. (Did American civilians who hated soldiers "win" when another vet committed suicide?) I don't want Chemical Ali in a leadership position in my country, but neither do we want hatred going into raising our babies. Same hands, same hearts, same minds. (Did American civilians who hated soldiers also plan on punishing the children of veterans who committed suicide by taking their fathers?)

The bleeding hearts like to focus on the children and victims, and that focus is right and good. But our leaders have a responsibility to focus on the victors as well and which spoils of war are gained by them. Why do I not primarily focus on the oppressed and America's enemies in war? We are all the same. Same hands, same hearts, same minds. When the fighting is over, we still have to take care of our families whether those families have less members due to war or not. When we use the military or social fight as a reason to hate, when we use the losses (or victories) as a justification of hate, we make the legacy of those who've died an infection of the soul. We start with love for those who matter to us and we make that love rot. It doesn't matter whether you've won or lost, whether all of your people have survived or not. A legacy of hatred is infection of the soul. When we allow ourselves to be unmindful of soul, it affects others, it affects ourselves.