Assuming There Is No Right Or Wrong Makes Us Intolerant

Hike with Cassia yesterday

I helps me to write I'm a little hurt. Maybe because I want to defend myself.  Or maybe because my feelings are closer to the surface so I'm more transparent and writing is easier.

I mentioned before that wanting to "be thought well of" is a weakness of mine, so I think I get easily hurt when it seems like people see me in a different way than I know myself to be. Especially if I think they know me. Sometimes this leads me to see some flaws in myself that I hadn't noticed, but in this instance (and others like it) it happened because I am judged due to preconceived notions about who I am because of labels placed upon me (being conservative and religious means I am intolerant, narrow-minded,  and judgemental) Yet, I feel so much love for people all around me. I really believe I am a very loving and accepting person. I think I've been blessed with the gift of being able to genuinely love people without trying all that hard.

Also in my defense, I really think I am very open minded. I love entertaining new ideas. If that's what is meant by "progressive," than I'd say I'm a progressive conservative ;-) I want to progress out of false limiting beliefs and conserve the ones that bring me joy. I wouldn't say I'm a "go with the flow" sort of person for the most part. I love to question the culture around me when I see negative outcomes,  and to learn and do counter-cultural things that bring more joy into my life (ie. homeschooling, studying creationism, having a large family, living simply in an RV, home-births, natural remedies, nature studies, writing stuff like this...)

Isn't being open-minded basically being a truth seeker?  You realize how much you don't know so you open your mind to learn more... if I was close-minded I don't think I would be so thirsty for learning.

Noticing how unfairly I am sometimes judged makes me think that we humans are very quick to "fill in the blanks" with people - to judge them based on our assumptions from our experience with "people like them." How very wrong we must be about each other most of the time! Each person is so unique and so deep... we misunderstand each other so easily.

I'm not sure how to counter that tendency in our human nature. I think we often try to counter it by saying that there is no right or wrong. If there is no right or wrong than there is no measuring stick to judge others with and we can be content to just love them. But it is my experience that this belief of "no right, no wrong" has the opposite effect. Instead of loving  one another more, we judge each other very harshly for having an opinion about a "right or wrong."

I think the answer lies more on realizing that there is a right and a truth we are all trying to discover. Each of us has unique experiences that have helped us see certain aspects of truth more clearly than those without the same experiences. If we were more able to listen to one another  with love, we could discover that beautiful, joyful, peaceful truth more willingly along side of each other.  We all have something to contribute towards others in clarifying their perspective. Do we realize that every person we meet understands something more clearly than we do? Are we willing to listen? Or do we think we have nothing to learn from "people like them?"

I hope to listen better. I hope my readers will see this blog as my own journey in truth discovery and not as a judgement on them. I'm sure you all know stuff I don't know and if we'd just lovingly listen to each other when we're being sincere, we'd all come away better people with a more clear perspective. Anyway,  thanks for reading this introspective post and taking the time to listen ❤

Some of the latest:
Yes, we are still living in an RV on our friends' driveway. We talked about tender mercies as a family on Friday - we listed this opportunity as a very tender mercy from God. I think we'd be feeling very lonely if we had to go through this transition period alone, but getting to be with our good friends every day has made it a fun adventure. We are so grateful to them.

Following are the only pictures I got of Halloween:

We got ice cream after William's orthodontist appointment. And then went to science class. Then everyone picked out a favorite treat and we watched "scary" movies in our friends' basement.  Earlier in the week we did go to a couple of parties where they dressed up,   but can you believe I forgot to take any pictures of their costumes or the festivities?
I think Bill got some... I will go ask him...
He just got one of Jess:

And I did find this one of Joy asleep in a park pavillion in her BB8 costume:

James was a Obi-Wan and Joshua was Kylo Ren.

Thursday night we got to go to a beautiful presentation about science and how our scientific assumptions directly affect our freedoms. I wrote a few of my thoughts here.  Things have been so busy with the move and the adjustment that I haven't been taking many pictures, but hopefully we are a bit more adjusted now and I will have more time to enjoy the moments and think to take some pictures of them :)