I had an interesting idea this past week during one of my “homeboys” birthday parties (I know… I will explain). Whenever one of the guys has a birthday in here… the rest of the crew gets together and buys ingredients to make a “team meal” and we all get together outside on the basketball court or somewhere communal and break bread together. There is usually burritos, tacos, cheesecake, apple pies, sodas, chips… it is an incredible experience knowing that all of these items were hand made from ingredients not intended to produce such creations… always amazes me. There was a moment… burrito in hand… watching one of the guys cut and pass out slices of Oreo cheesecake to everyone… 2 dudes playing guitar in the background and singing “Happy Birthday” in Spanish… another guy with an accordion playing next to them… I actually laughed out loud to myself because I felt incredibly lucky to be experiencing this moment. I looked around and I had “homeboys” laughing and conversating from Hawaii, Mexico, Russia, China, Armenia, Australia, Venezuela, London, Belize, Jamaica, Egypt and all across the United States… all bringing their own unique perspective, background and experience to this joyous event. All able to have discussions about race, money, family, heartache, triumph, politics, love, loss and everything in between without shutting the other person out because he said something that one of the guys didn’t agree with… and in that moment… I asked myself why can’t we do this in real life? Why is it so hard for us to genuinely listen to others when they do not agree with our beliefs? Why do we immediately shut them out and refuse to open ourselves up to potentially learning something from this person? And most importantly – how can I try to do my part in changing this fact?
I went back “home” after the get together and began thinking about our society as a whole and how we interact with each other on a daily basis. It seems that we are conditioned to find our “tribe”… people that look like us… think like us… believe the things that we believe in regard to the pillars of life… religion… education… politics… and we stick with these folks because it is comfortable. It makes sense… we are constantly seeking a sense of homeostasis… of equilibrium in our lives so that we feel comfortable. But does this need for comfort block us from an even more important need for personal and societal growth? When examining our current state of “affairs” in this country… it is a bleak sight. We are incredibly divided… racially… politically… socio-economically… we live in a world of “us” and “them”. Being one of the “them” in the biggest sense of the word… a federal inmate… I know first hand how it feels to be on the outside of the “community” and this has opened my eyes to be able to step outside my (in reality) little life and take a macro view of it all.
And this led me to my social experiment… I have asked a series of questions to people in my real life… obviously connected to some degree due to their connection to me but also some that do not know each other and certainly come from different backgrounds and upbringings. I have also asked a number of guys inside here to answer the same questions… all coming from different walks of life. Once I receive the answers… I plan to write something about what I find… about what they have to say… how their perspectives on life impacted their interpretation of the questions. I am hoping (and believe I will find) to find that there is a commonality in all of us… there is some sort of “human-ness” that ties us all together… no matter our race, age, heritage, socio-economic upbringing, political views etc….. And through this commonality… I am hoping to start a conversation about knocking down the barriers to communication and growth that we run into in our every day lives. I am hoping to plant a thought seed in your minds to try and expand your “tribe” a bit… step out of your comfort zone… and just see how it feels. I am hoping that this makes one person out there think twice before they tune out the person in front of them that is saying something that they do not believe and instead…dig deeper… try to understand the other person instead of shutting them out.
I’m pumped to explore and dig and learn… and I can’t wait to share what I find…
Stay Healthy. Stay Active. Stay Open-minded. Make someone smile.
🙂