Rose Gold Love
5x5 watercolor
This is the second attempt at writing this post. My intention is to love and forgive. Was it last year when I wrote about someone stopping me at the mall to thank me and encourage me to keep posting what I post? She said that with all of the negativity on the internet it is so refreshing to see my posts in her feed. She ended with, "you never know what someone has been going through and how your post may lift them up."
Sweet Love
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After 2 incidents where friends, (maybe they are not really friends) in a 4 week time period said in my presence and directly to me awful, ugly ethnic comments, I am prompted to doing my part in letting the world know it is not okay. In both incidents comments were directed to me and also other ethnic/minority groups unrelated to me. I can't tell you how intense the ugliness of those comments feel. It first goes into my heart, like a big wide blunt knife and then down to the pit of my stomach and stays there.
How can I be in 2018 and around people who would say such comments. Ethnic comments are ugly, disgusting and without social grace. It is the opposite of love. One person said that she thought she and her husband knew me well enough to joke with me about my ethnic background and my husband's religious background. There is nothing funny about degrading another ethnic group or religion that is not yours. She said something else must have happened to me to make me so sensitive about their jokes. No, I thought it was the ugliest of ugly. Is that what is coming from your heart? How can I be in your presence with such ugliness? And, yes, I have experienced something that makes me sensitive to degrading ethnic comments. I have experienced it since I was in 3rd grade and I am tired of it.
Big Love
22x22
A friend from a Scandanavian country didn't understand why would they even think of these things. She said, "why do they have to tie it back to your ethnicity? It is completely unrelated." I don't know. In an unrelated conversation, a friend recently told me, "you are so loved." And she is right! I am so blessed to have all of the true friends that I have from all over the world with different backgrounds. When I think of my friends, I am mostly connected by how they make me feel. I don't see color, ethnicity, religion, how much money they make, the things they own, I really am attracted to how I feel when I am with them. I will admit, I am a sucker for accents! I have been known to make friends with someone because I love their accent!
Peace, Joy, Love
5x5 watercolor
Back to the subject. Love, Brothers and Sisters, Love one Another. I looked this up, but, cannot find this exact quote online. I have had to hear it from somewhere. This is what the girl in the mall was saying. Love each other. If we all love each other, we will be able to forgive, overlook, tolerate, who knows, we may even brighten someone's day. Love, love, love. Without giving a lecture or scolding of any kind, if each of us always starts and comes from love, then we will avoid causing negativity to our brother. This is what I have learned from Dr. George Burriss. If we stay in love, then we will experience joy and peace. What more could you want? Everything else will follow.
love, love, love
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No matter where you are in the world, no matter what your religious or ethnic background is, we are all connected some way in this thing we call life. We all affect (impact) one another. Starting small, right here in your neighborhood, love your brother. Your brother is that person that does not look like you or may not even have your same religion. Embrace this and love him. I promise, good will come from it. You will be spreading goodness and love. You will feel good.
So I say to you, don't judge, love. Love. A man is a man is a man. My mom is a mom like all other moms, loving and wants the best for her children. That person across the street from you, wants the same as you for his children. Love them.
Come from a place of love in all that you do and say.
As Dr. Michael J. Sorrell said in his address at the St. Mark's Commencement, "it is your time to be special, go into the world and make a difference... be special by helping a community that needs you... have dinner with someone that doesn't look like you."
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