When Did Anger & Dropping the F-Bomb Become Measures of Caring?

For pride is spiritual cancer; it eats up the very possibility of love, or contentment, or even common sense. -C.S. Lewis

Pride is concerned with who is right. Humility is concerned with what is right. -Ezra T. Benson

Let all that you do be done in love. -1 Corinthians 16:14

 

I don’t know how it got to this point. But it seems that the world is incessantly shouting at us.

YOU’RE NOT PASSIONATE ENOUGH UNLESS YOU’RE ANGRY ABOUT SOMETHING. AND YOU CAN’T JUST BE ANGRY, YOU HAVE TO BE YELLING ABOUT IT.

Everywhere I look there’s another blog post dropping the f-bomb, showing that other blogger who’s boss. Educating someone else.

There’s another blogger or news article yelling at me, shouting at me to care more. Because if I cared more, I would be constantly angry and yelling too.

When did constant anger and yelling ever become the best way to get a point across?

 

I don’t know about you, but when someone is yelling at me, I usually get defensive. I shut-down, stop listening, pull-up my boot straps and start lining up my best remarks for a retaliation.

I get lost in my pride, forget the direction of the conversation, and the value of the person.

I want to win the argument, educate this other person, or make them feel just as crappy as they’re making me feel.

How did it get to this point? I hate it.

 

And maybe that other person is wrong. And maybe we are right, but when did it hurt to just listen?

How do we expect the world to change by yelling? Are we losing sight of who people truly are? Are we losing sight of the value of a person in order to prove a point?

Because if we really took a step back, we’d see that this person is worth more than our tireless words. This person is worth more than the point we are trying to educate them about.

This person is loved by God. And that means something.

 

We may not have the same background, education, family-life, physical or mental abilities, socioeconomic status, political affiliations, religious beliefs, or food preferences.

But if we really care about people, we would show them they are valued, they are loved.

 

I’m not saying there are no points to be made, arguments to be had, or fights to be won. But, what damage are we causing along the way, when we disregard the value of the person in the conversation?

Maybe the world needs a little more humility before it needs another f*** you. Maybe the world needs a little more silence, a little more listening, before it needs another prideful response (myself included).

 

Until we admit we have a heart issue, I don’t think we’ll get very far. I think we’ll carry on like nothing is wrong, and we’ll live on a hill of arrogance, pride, and self-denial.

We’ll fail to see that the problem with the world doesn’t start with another person, it starts with us.