Thoughtful Thursday: Remembering History and Watching it Being Made Now

This has been a week full of interesting events - not happening to me personally, but happening around me. As you know, the presidential debate happened and was immediately followed by the 23rd anniversary of the 9/11 events in my country. I was struck with the thought that the 25th anniversary will happen after I retire from my current job - it really made the idea of my own future a bit more real. Strange how much history can put your own life into perspective, if you let it.

In my life, I have lived through many historical events, and it is always interesting to me what I remember about them and what I have forgotten. As I get older, I find that I search for causes and effects of the historical events that occured around me. I am always interested in how thoughts and attitudes are shaped by outside influences, so I analyze different ideas.

Let me share a bit more about me than I usually share. I am not registered with any political party - mainly because I hate the propaganda that comes with being registered. As a non-affiliated voter, I get propaganda from everyone trying to gain my vote. I do my research and vote based on the information that I can find. I have never experienced a situation where a debate has changed my mind about who I want to vote for, so I don't waste my time watching them. The one that happened two nights ago was no exception. I was sleeping before the debate started, and the only information that I have about what happened came to me from social media. That's the way I prefer to hear about political things - in short bytes of information. As I said, my mind was made up a long time ago about who I am voting for - the things that I have seen about the debate just solidified my resolve to cast my vote for my selected candidate for president.

When it comes to politics, my attitude is "if you don't participate by voting, then you can't complain about what happens." I vote via mail-in ballot because I have to work on election day and cannot always make it to the polls. It is easier to fill out my ballot and drop it in the ballot box near my house, so I take advantage of that process. The last time I voted in person, I experienced some mild bullying by an election worker, so it really doesn't make me want to go back! Mail-in ballots are my preferred way of making my voice heard.

In 2001, I was working at my current job and going to school part-time. One of the courses that I was taking was about Curriculum and Instruction (one of my passions and something that I continue to study). We had people in that class from all over the world, including a man from Saudi Arabia who presented to the class on September 12th. He started talking about how much we all engaged in stereotyped responses and spent his 2.5 hours accusing us all of being prejudiced about him due to the events the day before. I became very defensive in my mind - he was accusing us of being biased but he was demonstrating the same sort of bias towards us. He didn't know me, my ideas, my values, my ways of interacting with people, but he was telling me that I prejudiced about him and how he engaged with the world. I felt very angry about that, and I still do - to some extent - but I also recognized that he needed to share his experiences with others in those moments of fear, of hatred, of violence. I have no idea what he had experienced outside of the class time, but I am sure that it was not calm or collected. I learned that evening that the only person I could ever control was myself, and that all I could do in times of hatred was to demonstrate love as much as possible.

As a person, I try to be an example of love for others. I like to think that my main philosophy for life is that of a Jedi (at least, of the Jedi as represented in the original trilogy - if you know, you know) - seeking to do the best for others and love for all life. This idea has helped me as a therapist. 

The situation that I found myself in on September 12, 2001 illustrated that we all carry biases and prejudices that are applied without knowledge of individuals we encounter in real life. I think I firmly slipped into a humanistic perspective on that evening 23 years ago. After hearing someone on the defensive about what he thought I thought about him, I try my best to reserve my ideas about others until I get to know those others personally. My biases and prejudices still occur, but I try my best to acknowledge them and then figure out where those thoughts came from and what applies and what doesn't apply to the people in front of me. We all carry thoughts and beliefs that are based on things that we have experienced. What is detrimental to us is when we believe that there is no other experience than our own.

This is turning into a rant about things that are not music therapy based, but there is a link in my head, I promise.

I am the product of my lived experiences. You are a product of your own. My thoughts, responses, beliefs, biases, prejudices, and actions are all part of what I have done, seen, felt, been exposed to, and had to do to survive. I am not someone who tolerates opinions declared as factual, but I am someone who will defend your right to hold an opinion that is different from my own (even when I think you are wrong). I do not talk to many people about my votes. I do not engage in attempts to persuade me (or others) to my opinion about different topics. I prefer to find out why people believe what they believe so I can understand why they act the way they do. I wish everyone could do this a bit more, but that is not the life I live.

I think that this election will be a historical event - whether my choice of candidate wins or loses. I think that we will look back at this year as a turning point in our country's survival in the long-term. I hope that you will vote for your candidates of choice - participation is essential. I am going to watch history happen.