The Scam of an International Women's Day

If you've been on social media today, you likely have been made aware that today is International Women's Day.  I have to be honest - I don't know if I quite remember it much before last year, although it is reported to have an origin in New York City organized by the Socialist Party of America in 1909. 

On social media today, I saw women that I respect and enjoy hanging out with display links to women that they think are killing it in the realm of business or breaking barriers or whatever else is out there that ought to be celebrated.  They highlighted pictures of their best friends, their mothers, their sisters, and women in business.  They brought attention to the fact that women are out there and they are making things happen.

While I am glad that they are associating strength and success and potentially even a desire to emulate these women, (are you ready for a shock?) I find myself disagreeing with the whole premise.

I actually find it insulting and off-putting.

I think that highlighting the achievements of women because they are women is the equivalent of posting extra thirsty cleavage shots and pretending that you're asking for feedback on your necklace.  It's desperate and it debases those highlighted.

Hear me out.  If you are female and you truly believe that you are able to compete in every way with a man (within physical reason - and yes, I said it.  I'm 103 pounds.  I'm not going to be able to beat my dudes benching 270 - yet, anyway.  Will I give it a chance based on percentage and bench more than my weight?  You know it.  Will I try to do more pull ups than them?  Absolutely.  Which, by the way, I'm at 12 and still climbing.), why would you point out achievements only because you are female?  Shouldn't you rather be pointing out achievements and amazing accomplishments and humans of note because of those very things and not because they were born without the coveted blessing of a peepee (does this very idea not readily and obviously admit that you view yourself as less when you chase after it?)?  Do you secretly and subconsciously cling to the belief that men are better than you, and that in order for you to fight the social injustice of it all, you must stand on your soapbox for one day each year and loudly declare and demand attention for yourself - attention that you suppose you would not otherwise get without having a special day dedicated to you because you can't figure a way to compete on your own of your own merit?

Perhaps at this point you would argue that society is male-centered and is set up to benefit men, and that they are creating the narrative and it is unfair.

Do you know what I hear in that?  An excuse.

Do you believe that you are able to do things or not?  This makes it difficult to truly decipher between what you are saying and how you are behaving.

Most women are not leveling up because they don't actually believe that they are even in the game in the first place.  As I mention "the game", I want to be clear that this is not a game of two teams, in particular, the boys vs. the girls.  This is the game of life, being played by everyone on the planet.  I don't need to prove to you, some man, or anyone else that I am worthy of being deemed successful or anything else because I am female.  That is insulting.  That is petty and quite frankly, feels beneath me.

When I was growing up, I was always the shortest and smallest person in my class.  I was the shortest and smallest person on my sports teams.  I was the shortest and smallest person everywhere.  Even though I knew that was the case, I was very blessed to grow up in a family that never made that an excuse as to why I couldn't beat someone else.  In fact, I didn't know that there were some people out there who thought that because you were bigger and stronger that you would probably win.  I didn't even have this concept in my head.  Instead, the concept I had in my head was, "Do you want this?  Do you want it more than the next person?  What must be done to get it?  What are you willing to do to get it?"  

I remember my mom recounting a story of me in high school.  It was my senior year and I was at a home swim meet.  I competed in breaststroke and the 100 was about to start.  I walked over to my lane, flanked on both sides by girls from the other team.  I walked up to the starting blocks and did what I always did - stretched myself out and got myself pumped up by stretching my arms and then my legs, grabbing the blocks and frog jumping a few times, staring down the lane and imagining my race.  My parents were in the stands and my mom tells the story that two girls who were almost a foot taller than me and 50-60 pounds more were watching me instead of getting their own minds ready for the race.  She watched their faces as they became increasingly unsteady and lost confidence.  I didn't even know that they existed and didn't even look at them.  I was there for the race.  I won.  I thought nothing of that win outside of the fact that I knew I had done what I needed to do to achieve that outcome.

In business and achievement, I'm not competing with imaginary men (or women).  I'm out there doing my thing, with my eyes on my race.  I can assure you, however, that on race day - whatever that may mean literally or figuratively depending on the circumstance - I am going to level it up and I don't care if you are male or female or an elephant or a unicorn, I am going to give it what I have because of who I am as an individual - not because I am a woman.

Let us all ask those questions - Do you want this?  Do you want it more than the next person?  What must be done to get it?  What are you willing to do to get it?  

Let us not denigrate ourselves as individuals by too much associating and identifying as what society tells us we are as a group. 

Go out and get what you want because you want it and you will work for it.  Use the smart brain that you have to figure out how to do that.  Do not emulate someone solely because of their gender - instead, admire the tenacity of their character.  Be inspired by their drive.  Let the fire of what you want be torched higher because you have chosen to surround yourself by people who tirelessly seek excellence.

Don't be put in a box, lovelies.  You're so much bigger than that.

Peace, love, and don't freaking quit,
Ms. Daisy

Lament for Liberty

Lament for Liberty
14 July 2020

Liberty, I remember you well

When I was a girl in this land

Freedom to go as we pleased

You took us by the hand

We played outside and went to school

To God we bent our knees

We dreamed of what we would become

As grownups, as we pleased

To open a business or to pursue our dreams

And nothing stand in the way

We stood united, proud and undivided

And had freedom in what to say

In our chest, you paved the way

For innovation and design

In our hearts, our minds, and souls

We knew the way divine

With freedom we knew we could go

As far as we should will

And marching shoulder to shoulder

We advanced up every hill

Our teams – the best –

we proved it year by year

our open streets and flourishing businesses

we were safe from fear

what has happened that we have let

our land now slide away?

Where once stood men,

Girls now blaze a violent way

With purple hair and screaming fists

They taunt those who made them free

The men like girls and girls like men

Who mock your liberty

They use the freedom given them

To burn this to the ground

And good men stand back and watch it happen,

With not a fight, nor even a sound

The Witch declares your freedoms gone

You’re muzzled and bow your knees

And crawl along empty grocery store shelves

Without care for liberty

You slink along inside your homes

Afraid to go outside

Small, pathetic creatures,

Full of Netflix in our eyes

They told us to be afraid,

And so afraid we are

That we cannot drive somewhere

A masked lone person in a car

The air is scary, and people worse

We cannot get too near

A hug will kill us, six feet will save us

Conditioning perpetual in our ears

What kind of life are you living?

What could you stand to gain?

Is this a life you want to live?

Are we really sane?

“There are some lines I will not cross,”

You say as you muzzle your face,

Your gloved hand bleaching groceries

Seems normal, not insanity or disgrace

The men who founded this country

Are rolling over in their graves

This land they fought so hard to gain

Is being willingly turned to slaves

Women and children are looking up

To find someone to lead

None are there that can be found

We are pitiful, indeed

So turn it over to the powers that be

Who test your shackled strength

The slippery slope moves very quickly

Who knows how far its length

We shall care when it’s too late

And we’ve lost all liberty

Lament aloud, and say a prayer

for the once great land of the brave and free

The Facebook Divorce

Hello lovelies!

As humans, we have a shared existence at times.  The feelings that well up within us and crash over us are not unique to us as individuals - there are not many among us who have not felt the pangs for the summer sunset in the middle of dreary grey, cold winters, nor those who are foreign to the way that sweat forms upon our brows as we labor beneath the blazing sun.  Many of us know the feelings of longing, of hunger, of thirst, and of satisfaction.  But above all of these things, I believe that we all share something even more basic to the human condition - a question, one that looms deep within our very souls, and the tremendous wonder at moments in our lives - why on all of God's green earth do we have a facebook account?

This question, although it seems ancient for all of the times this river of thought has driven a path by coursing through our very souls, is relatively new on the planet in the scheme of things.  Perhaps you have wondered it yourself recently.

What makes us wrestle over it?  What holds us back from a clean break?  Why do we cling?  Why do we wish it gone?  Why are we tugged in both directions?

I cannot answer that for you, but what I know I will offer for your consideration.

But before I do, I want to tell you of my relationship with facebook.

It started out really early.  I was one of the early adopters.  I have a younger sister and younger family members who joined when it was advertised as a college yearbook.  As soon as it was open to non-college students at the end of 2006, I jumped in.  I was fascinated with being able to have a page that I could make and post whatever status I wanted while also being able to hop around and visit people I knew virtually.  What a novelty!  What a genius and fun idea!  I was excited to check in on a regular basis to see how everyone was doing, to look at their pictures, and to have a view into a corner of their lives - I was exploring that interesting new balance of socializing through a screen.

I loved seeing new people finally come aboard, people that I had known from high school or college that I hadn't seen in a long time and didn't have contact information for.  I loved seeing that they had children and that they were happy and that some of them looked exactly the same as they did when I knew them.  It was fun to be able to see how the teenage person I knew grew into a mature adult (for most of them, anyway) with jobs and adventures.  It was nice to see that they had made it and what they had made of themselves.

Years and years later, more and more people joined the party.  And then one day, The Thing happened.  I got a friend request from my mother.  My mom was on facebook?  My mom?  For real?  And then my dad joined.  And then my grandmother-in-law.  The community was looking very different and my "audience" was spread from friends out to family and over to people I worked with and everyone else I had ever known on earth.

It was fine for a few years and then the arguments started.  Some people were really political and it seemed that this was the place to try to further your political party with your undying support.  It was a forum for discussion, and for the most part in the beginning, it was fairly civil, although I am sure people felt some heat in their bellies when they were arguing their cause.

I'm not sure exactly what the line was, but I watched it happen right in front of my eyes.  I watched people behave differently to others because they were behind a screen and then removed the person from the information that they were connecting to on the monitor.  It was as if all social rules were off of the table and you could just open up and say whatever you wanted to because it wasn't in real time, and it wasn't in your voice, it was only text, and that isn't a big deal.  I watched people remove personhood from those who were called their friends so that they could argue perpetually about different things.

At some point, I decided to delete my account.  I wasn't happy with all of the crazy and it really just didn't feel worth it.  After all, if I was looking for connection, this certainly wasn't it.

After a few more years went by, I decided that I missed seeing people and I would just jump in and keep it fun, check in only occasionally, and use it as a way to help others with health coaching and my business.  It was okay, but it wasn't how it used to be.  I didn't get the kind of personal interactions that I was looking for, but that was because I wasn't putting it out there on my side.  It was boring, but also kind of mean out there.  It was a place where I used to scroll through and make sure I was caught up on everyone, but it became a place where I couldn't be bothered to even read more than a few updates.  I would only comment on something if it seemed like something that was impossible for me to personally neglect.  I checked on it less and less until I deactivated it for a few months at a time.

I loved Facebook for the advertisement of my book and for a place I could share myself being silly in videos or peeking in on long lost friends, but it was really losing its luster.  I wanted to have a place to share my writing, but even that seemed like it couldn't possibly be worth the garbage I had to dig through to get it out there, not to mention the way that we are being mined for data, violated on privacy, and advertised to in order to line the pockets of Zuck and his homies.

Finally, I decided - it was time.  What it was taking was more than what it was giving, and it had run its course.  

Last month, I clicked "Delete Account".  If you have done this before, you know that it isn't a swift process.  They send you a message letting you know that for the next 30 days, your account will be in limbo.  It will hover between heaven and earth, accessible for you if you will just simply log in and ask for forgiveness and get back to it.  This time, I counted down the days until it would come true and everything would be really gone for good.

Today the sun sets on the last day of me being part of a facebook world.  It was fun while it lasted, and that era had some good things, but it is over now.  It is not worth feeling angst and revulsion over people that I think I really like in real life.  It is not worth the data mining.  It is not worth feeling like I'm making my stress level go to 100 from looking at people's opinions and arguments.  It is not worth being part of a place that censors information.  It is just not worth it.  Life is better without it.

I'm glad to be on the other side.  Maybe you would like it, too?

Peace, love, and freedom,
Ms. Daisy

The Fear Factory

'Ello lovelies!  (Go back and try again in a British accent if you didn't do that the first time around.)

What a year so far, amirite?

It's been enough of a wild ride on the free-flowing, wavy scrolls of hoarded toilet paper, diving deep into the deepest depths of oceans of hand sanitizer for any of us to likely want to climb aboard the crazy train again any time soon.

I am sure that many of us have had significant time to ponder and reflect on many new things (including - but not limited to - what you might trade toilet paper for and if you were going to be adventurous enough to make your own hand sanitizer from your liquor cabinet).  There are a few things that I have been rolling over in my head and I thought to share one with you today.  Are you ready for a ride into my brain?  It's wilder than the life of a Costco toilet paper roll.

I think that if there was one emotion that could be collected and weighed across all of humanity starting somewhere in late winter, fear would come in first place.  In many of our lifetimes, we have never had to deal with something that had such a wide span, affecting so many all at once.  One day we woke up and schools were closed.  And then the next day, they were closed for the year (three months out).  The next day, people were afraid of airports.  The next day, people were working from home.  The next day, we watched Italy singing from balconies, locked in their homes.  The next day, we were locked in our homes and high fives and hugs were essentially declared illegal.  The next, they took away baseball.  The next, people started wearing hazmat suits and disinfecting their groceries.

There is absolutely no reason that you could have ever gotten to a hazmat suit and a pile of $37 N95 masks that you burn inside out in your driveway on the way in and tossing your Rice Krispies into a bathtub of bleach without being completely terrified of something.  Three and half months ago, if you would have done that, they would have called 911 and put you into a mental institution.  Today, you're asked for your bleach concentration recipe and stared at for your tremendously stylish hazmat outfit.

How did it get that way?  It was that a lot of people truly believed the worst of what they were seeing in the media, and not only that - they believed it was probably going to happen to them and to their loved ones.  Imagining dangerous things happening to you and your loved ones is probably one of the strongest catalysts for change and wild unnatural behavior that you could ever find on the spectrum of humanity.

As people dove in headfirst, the media felt the exhilarating rush of clicks.  They upped the coverage.  The clicks went exponential.  The media stood in their quarantined offices with their fingers spread out to the sky, eyeballs flickering, purple-blue electricity pouring out of their wrinkled fingertips,  voices suddenly strengthening, and erupting with, "No, no!  YOU WILL DIE! Unlimited power!" while launching Samuel L. Jackson into the sky.  In a few short moments of our life, all news turned into coronanews.  In fact, in the first few weeks, I saw an infographic that showed the amount of times a word had been mentioned in the news.  Ebola was in the millions over the course of the entire epidemic.  According to Sprinklr, a company that tracks language and trends and helps manage social media images and brands, just on one single day - February 28 - 6.7 million people mentioned the rona on Twitter and on social media platforms.

 Personally, I am not one who likes to submerge myself into the news machine.  I don't want to support the media getting ad revenue for their hysterical hype, leveraging the novelty of a pandemic to benefit themselves financially. As they play on people's vulnerability and panic, they push others into a downhill spiral, scouring the world to shock them daily with more terrors and horrors, digging up the most random one-off experience you wouldn't find unless you were on page 19 of a google search, and then making it front page news.

I don't know if you noticed this, but it seemed that all of the media everywhere only had about six stories to pick from to broadcast on any given day. No matter what news outlet it was, they were all saying the same thing.  It was like it was either completely lazy journalism (and I use that term very loosely) or otherwise a very united front to decide what stories were going to make it to your homepage.  Those headlines would sit on top, ready to be gobbled up by the eager clicking masses who had barely just opened their eyes for the day, and then re-spread in various degrees across social media, infiltrating every crack and corner of life, giving people the Next New Thing To Freak Out About.

(And then their cortisol levels from stress tanked their immune systems, and they worried more into a perpetual spiral, making themselves more vulnerable to the thing that they were most worried about. SLOW CLAP.  Awesome job.)

You can get people to do anything if you work up enough panic.  Rational, thinking, level-headed people will turn to bleaching their cereal boxes, turning their masked faces 180 degrees away from other's in terror, afraid to pick up a box of pasta without a gloved hand.  These small things are the proof that you can get them to do big things.

This is the place that we stand and wonder at society.  Where are you?  Is it possible that the media may have their own interest in mind?  Do you believe everything that you're told?  How much do you question?  What if you weren't afraid?  Wouldn't you like to feel that way again?  (I ask that knowing that there are some people who totally get off on panic, so even though it could be rhetorical, it isn't.)

You know what?  You don't have to watch the news.  You don't have to read the headlines.  You don't have to know every gory detail of what someone is putting out for you.  You don't have to wake up and throw yourself into panic and depression.  You can just do your thing.  You can avoid any scrolling through facebook.  You don't have to open it up at all.  You don't have to argue with those who disagree with you.  You don't have to read the news before you go to the grocery store.  You can just go.  You can go outside.  You can call your friends.  You can smile at people at the grocery store and interact like they are a human being instead of the Black Plague personified.  You can refuse to drown in it.

Do you know what happens when you do?  You feel a lot better.  You're not fueling people who don't have your best interest in mind.  You're not giving them power over your day and your emotions, creeping into your subconscious, prying one thing after another away from your once much happier life.  When something wild happens, you will be clearheaded enough to react appropriately to it, and not with a knee-jerk survival mode.

I just thought that you should know that you're not obligated.  Maybe you could try it for a day and see how you feel.  Or don't.  Whatever.  It's a free country.  Kinda.

Peace, love, and take back your brain,

Ms. Daisy

Watch Your Language: "Social Distancing"

Hello lovelies!

Have you heard the term "social distancing" before?  If you haven't, it is likely because you've been in a coma for a couple months or have just flown down from another planet.  Welcome, by the way!  You've landed in the middle of a story nobody could have believed even six months ago.

The first time I heard that phrase, I immediately thought, "That isn't the intention at all.  They've missed it completely!"  Isolation, yes.  Physical distance, yes.  But social distancing?  No.  Absolutely not.

We are social beings and thrive in community with one another.  That is why it is so harsh and repugnant in our souls to hear of those who have to live out a term of their life in solitary confinement (even though it may be warranted, we still furrow our brow at the thought of the experience).  That is why when we watch movies and see the hero in a dungeon, our guts wish him or her out of there as quickly as possible.  It is why the phrase "fomo" is a thing.  It is why we do so much of what we do (yes, like shave - the poor razor companies never saw this coming, either).  It is how new parents get through those first weeks without completely losing it.  It is why when researchers study "blue zones" (areas of the world that have a population that lives significantly longer than the average), they find that they one of the main components of longevity and quality of life is connectedness to others. 

Language is a very powerful thing.  As some of you know, I have a Finnish heritage.  Finland is a unique place - for many reasons.  The history of Finland is rife with attempted takeovers from Russia and Sweden, both of those countries battling to absorb little Finland into their empires, nearly taking turns to do so at every opportunity.

How did Finland withstand and persist in their own independence and freedom in spite of being attacked perpetually by much larger countries with much larger armies?

There are two reasons, and both are practical lessons for us today.

The first is sisu.  Sisu is a Finnish word with no exact English equivalent.  It embodies the philosophy and idea of persisting through what would have otherwise have been thought to be impossible, tenacity, grit, resilience, digging deep and defying the odds, and hitting the wall of what is thought to be possible, moving through it, and continuing to move forward, despite the physical and mental cries against doing so.  It is often referred to as a "second wind" - when one is certain that they cannot go one step further or endure one second more, and gritting their teeth and sustaining it anyway at whatever cost. 

Simo Häyhä

One of the most famous Finnish warriors was Simo Häyhä.  In the Winter War against giant Russia (the Soviet Union at that time) that started in 1939, Finland began with ten working tanks against Russia's 6500+, 114 aircraft (100 of which were unfit for war), and 300,000 soldiers against Russia's 760,000.  The soviets hoped to mop up Finland in a week or less, and with these numbers, they seemed that they had a good chance to do just that.

What the soviets did not have, however, was sisu.  When the Finns realized the odds that they were up against, they did not back down.  Instead, they dug deeper than ever to fight for their homes, for their families, and for the country and culture they deeply loved.  Dressed all in white, Finnish daredevils on skis would deliver Molotov cocktails - glass bottles filled with incendiaries, covered in tar, lit on fire and launched - shattering against soviet tanks and destroying them one by one.

Simo Häyhä was a one-of-a-kind warrior, however.  Instead of launching Molotov cocktails, he was a sniper.  He preferred not to even employ the use of a scope on his bolt-action rifle (as the light from the glass may have given away his position), he shoved snow in his mouth so that his breath in the cold would not be noticed, buried himself behind a mound of snow, and earned himself the nickname "The White Death" from the soviets.  In the four hours of Finnish winter daylight, he totaled more than 259 kills in just over 3 months.  He was awarded a medal for his sniper kills (which lasted from November 30 to March 7 - when he was injured by being shot in the face and having half of it blown off.  Spoiler: he lived - he regained consciousness a week later and lived until he was 96 years old.).  In his personal diary found in 2017, he admits a much higher number of kills, counting over 500 on his self-titled "sin list".

Besides possessing immense amounts of sisu, Finland won those wars and preserved their independence and freedom by guarding their language.  The Finns knew that any country that tried to overtake them would try to absorb their culture.  When your culture is absorbed, you may as well consider yourself truly annihilated.  In one generation, you can clear the whole of history - imagine traditions eradicated (like the sauna and ice swimming), and entire ways of life ceasing to be, only to be read about in history books and wondered over.

Finland knew that one of the strongest ways to preserve their culture was to tightly hang on to their language.  Minority societies can be much more easily overtaken if they give up their language and allow for it to be lost to a majority primary language in the area in which they live.  Language parallels power.  We see examples even today - Norway and Sweden are (rightly!) fighting to push back on English as it has begun to overtake academia and business.

Language is the construct of our communication and shapes our thoughts.  For this reason, we need to be careful and intentional in saying what we truly mean. 

Do you truly want to discourage the aspect of socialization?  Do you want to live in a way that is disconnected from your friends and loved ones?  Do you intend to socially isolate yourself?  That is what we imply as we regurgitate the phrase "social distancing".  I know that it seems like a small thing, but perpetuating that rhetoric is having a tremendous impact on our mental state, our culture, and our way of life. 

Have you ever seen so many people outside in the history of your life?  What are they doing?  What are they looking for? 

They are looking for others.  They are looking for connection.  They do not want to be alone, isolated, and cut off from their tribe.  They are looking for a smile, for eye contact. 

I would encourage you to deeply consider your language as we navigate this strange event.  We need others more than ever.  We need help, we need connection, we need to feel support, we need to feel that we are cared for.  Perhaps instead of using the term "social" distancing, we call it "physical distancing" or "physical isolation" or "separation".

You are not alone and you are not intended to be alone.  You have your community, those who love you, and those who are on your "ride or die" inner circle list.  Disconnecting from the human social fabric is not the new normal and it never will be.  Reach out to your people.  Even if you are physically separated, you are not socially removed.  We are not going out like this.  Hang on tight!  Have sisu!

Peace, love, sisu, and sending ridiculous amounts of double-armed, tight squeezing illegal hugs,
Ms. Daisy

on volatile dehumanization

We stand at the junction of two paths.  Floods of people are going to the left, floods are pouring off to the right.  They are convinced they are going the right way.

They try to prove how right they are and they start by yelling at the other side, telling them how stupid they are.  This (remarkably) doesn't seem to convince them, so they dehumanize them, writing them off as less than human (maybe like 3/5?) and suggesting that they are a scourge on humanity and need to be disposed of.

Then strangely - I'm sure it's not at all connected - there is an uprising of violence.  This isn't a time to connect and see why or what caused it, it is a time to shift more blame, stand taller on the soapbox, and to yell louder.  This is advanced and successful communication.

The horrors of the past are filed under the fact that those old timers were ignorant.  They were slave traders, not seeing others as human.  They were greedy little pigs, seeking gain for themselves, running others over, letting nothing get in their path.   They were awful in their push for more land, dehumanizing the native people, raking them over the coals into a trail of tears.   They were influenced by old ideals and they do not resonate with us.

But we are faced with it now - it's not just relegated to our history.  It's here, saturated in lust as people are bought through the sex trade and human trafficking.  It is saturated in a hunger for power and land conquest.  (Does this story seem new to you?)

The ship is sinking and we're arguing about the curtains.

Do you remember how to have a conversation?  Do you remember how to listen?  Do you remember how to disagree without hate?  Can you keep your passion without losing your mind?  Can you hold an idea in your hand and turn it over intelligently?  Can you respectfully return it?  Can you use social media and remember that there are humans on the other side of your flippant words?

The people on the "other side" are people.  When you treat them otherwise, you are the slave trader, you are the one standing behind the Cherokee mother, swaddling her baby, poking her to keep moving west, you are the one buying a half hour with someone's daughter, chained to the bed.  

Every atrocity could only be committed because the psychology allowed for another group to be seen as less than human, as idiots, as maniacs, as ones to be subdued, as worthless, as a waste of space, as disposable trash.

You stand on the dark side of history when you participate this way.

You were made with intelligence.  You were made with compassion.  You were made for connection.  You were made to use your talents to love and serve others, not to amass a tiny, temporal kingdom. 

It does not mean that you must bow out of the conversation.  You have a voice that ought to be heard.  In order to hear, you really ought to listen.  

Every idea that isn't yours isn't a personal attack.  

Every belief someone holds that isn't reflective of your own is not a pointed insult.

There is so much poison out there.  You can drink it.  You can make more of it.  You can spray it all over your house, your land, your children, and bathe in it.

Or you can retain your intelligence with magnanimous poise and nobility, genuinely listening and seeking to understand.  

You will be written into the tapestry of our history for future generations.  Which side will you be standing on?

Peace, love, and get it together,

Ms. Daisy