Politics for Personal Growth
Right now, in June 2022, politics is horrible. And that’s putting it mildly. This statement likely applies regardless of where you are right now. I don’t think it matters if you are a socialist, a progressive, a liberal, a centrist, a conservative – more likely than not, you are not feeling awesome about the current state of things. And you are right not to feel awesome, because to most of us on the outside of the political world, it seems like our elected representatives aren’t doing much to justify their power. One of my favorite philosophers once wrote that hopelessness and despair come only when we’re unable to imagine an image of how things could progress further. It’s exactly the place where many of us are right now. And reading this, you may wonder: what on Earth are you talking about, Vladimir, how can that mess help my personal growth? And you’d be right to wonder that.
I am not going to talk about how we need to speak up, send strongly worded letters, tweet, change your profile pics or protest – this post is not about creating social change or pretending to create social change. There’s a time and place for that too, and my blog (for now, at least) is not that place. My idea here is to write about something else: even though politics seems to be useless for anything or anyone (except for the politicians themselves), we can put it to some use for our own growth. We are used and abused by politicians all the time, so let’s use them for our benefit, at least in some small ways that we can.
Specifically, I think politics and bad news can be a wonderful opportunity to practice being non-reactive, being mindful of (negative) emotions, as well to become more aware of what your values are and what’s the best way to live and communicate them. It’s an excellent way to develop equanimity, and to practice seeing the world from other people’s shoes. It’s easy enough when we agree, but looking at the world through the lens you hate is where real growth takes place.
Here’s an exercise for you. Begin by trying to position yourself somewhere on the left – right political spectrum. That’s not the best description of anyone’s politics and one can argue that the division means very little these days, but it is useful for the purposes of this exercise for one reason and one only: the mainstream media use this division to position themselves, they choose their content based on it, and try to shoehorn their audiences in the box they choose for themselves. As you will see below, you will need the media for this. Yes, I am encouraging (intentional) TV usage for personal growth. Don’t hold it against me!
If you’re having a hard time deciding where you are, choose a topic that really matters to you – covid? Abortion rights? Guns? Immigration? What fires you up? If you’re passionate about something, it means that it will be easy to place yourself on one side of the debate.
Now that you have your topic of choice, find the channel that has the exact opposite views of yours, at least on that particular topic. Or just use YouTube as most of us do these days. If you’re a conservative, find the most flamingly progressive channel, if you’re on the opposite side of the spectrum, do the same thing. If you’re on the center, go both extreme left and right. Expose yourself to opinions you vehemently disagree with and, even better, opinions that deeply offend you. Considering how polarized politics is these days, it shouldn’t be too hard to find something like that.
To do this exercise, turn off your phone, get everyone out of your house, do a grounding or a breathing exercise first and then turn on the TV or play the YouTube clip you found.
As you’re listening, pay attention to how you react to the words you’re hearing:
What’s happening in your body? Do your shoulders tense up? What’s going on in your chest?
How is your breathing changing?
What thoughts come to your mind?
What labels do you attach to the person holding the beliefs you dislike?
Remember, the goal of this exercise is not to shout at the screen, but to be mindful of your own thoughts and emotions. Everything that you think, feel or say is to be understood as a reflection of who you are – that’s where the difficulty lies. If there is a point that you feel you must get across, do that in a non-judgmental way. This is quite a challenge but be brave and take it on!
Another goal of an exercise like this is to get to know your shadow, putting it in Jungian terms. In all honesty, I am not the greatest fan of C. G. Jung, but I do like his idea of shadow work. From my constructivist point of view, it makes perfect sense. If we say that being compassionate is our value, than compassion must have cruelty as its dark side. Both of these live inside of us and we’re fully capable of both. Here’s a political example to illustrate that – nation building through wars and coups. According to some estimates, the US and NATO intervention in Afghanistan displaced about 38 million people, killing almost 2 million civilians, although the estimate for the latter varies very much. Compare that with what you hear on the news. That’s the shadow, the side we don’t like so we shove it deep down. The trouble with that is that we tend to repeat the same thing over and over again. To quote the late George Carlin, „bombing for peace is like fucking for virginity.“ Just so that I don’t sound too one-sided ideologically, think about the Bolshevik revolution or the Cuban revolution of 1959, and how the legitimate desire to bring freedom from oppression quickly falls down into that very same or similar pit of oppression. That’s what happens when we’re not aware of our own shadow!
Listening to people you disagree with on those topics that trigger you is a wonderful opportunity to get to know your own shadow, and rest assured you have one.
What would you do to your enemies in the fit of rage?
What’s the most aggressive fantasy you have about people you disagree with?
What are the nastiest words you’ve actually said to someone who you disagree with?
What labels do you attach to people you disagree with?
The idea behind this exercise is not to convince you of this or that. You’re not supposed to change your mind about a political issue, although perhaps you could do that too. I don’t know, I’m not psychic. The idea is to learn to listen to others and to be mindful of yourself, to allow your feelings to exist and to befriend them, even if they are unpleasant feelings like anger, resentment, disgust etc. The best way to neutralize the destructive power of your shadow is to face it directly.
Once you master being with those feelings and observing them, you can find different communication strategies to express your disagreement without allowing your emotions to dictate the conversation. You can learn when to stop the conversation, or how to redirect it, to express your disagreement in a way that emphasizes your belief rather than judgment of someone else’s.
In 2017, I did a workshop with a handful of participants that dealt with politics and emotions specifically. In the beginning of the workshop, we all wrote down difficult topics on pieces of paper and put them all in one bowl. At random, we would pull a topic, and someone would relate their own opinion and how their personal experiences help shape that opinion. Participants were encouraged give emotional feedback. Emotional being the keyword. No debating or arguing was allowed because the idea was to explore how we react emotionally and not to prove that we are right.
When a safe space is created for an experiment like that, it’s quite fascinating how quickly people were not only able to express feelings such as anger or disgust, but they were also able to share their violent fantasies or offensive opinions. Because we had worked hard to establish a mindful atmosphere, the communication strategy is what made it possible: it was made crystal clear that my feeling about someone’s opinion is my problem and vice versa. We didn’t ask how was right or wrong but what do your feelings say about us and the labels we put on other people. We asked some of the following:
How did your life story lead you to have that specific opinion?
What action are your feelings propelling you to undertake?
What do your feelings say about you?
What can you do with those feelings?
How do you respectfully handle being around people who are so drastically different?
One of the key takeaways from that workshop was that sometimes our differences can’t be reconciled no matter what we do. The gap is simply too big. But we can develop compassion and understanding for the person standing in front of us even when they hold abhorrent beliefs, and this compassion usually stops any radical political action because political violence starts when we become blind to the suffering of others. In fact, I believe every therapist must have that ability if they are going to be able to do their job – I speak with people who have deeply offensive views from my point of view, and I do so daily. Without being able to treat them with compassion and understanding, I wouldn’t be able to do my job. To do just that – have compassion for them – I must explore my dark corners and be able to sit with them, look at them, understand how they act. Sometimes, I can see my shadow creeping in, I say hi to it, and continue my work. But if I weren’t aware of its presence, it would take me over. And then I would fail my clients and myself.
Even though our political system sucks and even though I don’t have much hope that this will change any time soon, listening to these awful, corrupt people can be a cure of sorts. We still won’t like them; we don’t have to vote for them – but we can use their presence in our lives to develop compassion and to develop a greater understanding of what we want our lives to stand for. Most of all, we can learn to be with the shadowy corners of our psyche and neutralize their power by shedding light on them.
When we’re able to listen to provocative opinions but communicate without judgment and feel at ease with ourselves, we’ve truly grown, both emotionally and intellectually, since more and more we close ourselves off in our own little bubble where everyone thinks the same. That may be a pleasant bubble, but it’s not a healthy one.
