“Isms”: Yours and Mine

November 25, 2019

Chances are, if you're reading these words, racism or sexism isn't your disease.

Or, if it is, you're aware that you have it and want to be free of it.

But what about your other isms: those your unaware of or don't think are such a big deal?

Maybe you've got regionalism and aren't too fond of southerners. Maybe you that most people who live in so-called Fly Over states are just ignorant or are at least woefully uniformed.

Or maybe you've got the wokeism disease that says there are two kinds of people, those who get it and those who don't.

The premise behind Saturday's monthly online community exploration is that all of us have "isms". And that all of these are basically the same.

They are symptoms of them-versus-us thinking and feed into the illusion of separation. They see a world with two kinds of people: Us and Other.

This Saturday we'll take gentle look at our isms. their origins, what it means to have them, how they both help and they limit us.

We'll explore -- if we can -- what it's like to release them. We'll see if there's a new territory that exists beyond being woke.

I'll facilitate this Exploration and will be learning alongside with you.

Here are a few random facts about me:

I was a member of one of the US' premiere diversity consulting firms, but quit because I didn't believe in imposing my beliefs on anyone else.

My decision to quit led me in the mid-90s to be co-founder of the Diversity and Spirituality Network

I studied the traditional healing arts in a Japanese dojo, and often snuck out to get junk food to supplement the meager semi-fasting diet.

I am a former member of what-some-people-call the cult of macrobiotics. (I also was a member of the Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness --Google it!)

With the support of a grant from Fellowship In Prayer, I wrote Notes for a New Age

When given the opportunity to check off the box that states ethnicity or religious affiliation, I always check "Other."