johnmaconline

“Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.”

Matthew 5:7

When you have the upper hand, you have a choice. You can show mercy or not.

If you choose not to, you may be “right,” and no one may blame you. The law may be on your side. The smart people may be on your side. The tribe may be on your side.

Choosing mercy brings risk. It exposes you to emotional danger. It might come back to bite you. It might not work.

But when have you been shown mercy? How did it make you feel? How did it work out for you?

Isn’t that a tradeoff worth making?

I received a compelling advertisement for a new internet service provider, which almost worked. But alas, it failed in step 2 because the friction was too much to overcome. 

I don’t need a new ISP, nor was I actively looking for one. But the advertisement offered more at a much better price. Eyebrow raised.

Step 1 check — advertisement compelling enough to overcome the friction of entertaining a change.

So I called the number provided. Step 2 engaged.

“I’m not interested in the $9/month equipment rental fee. I will provide my own. Can you confirm for me what I need?”

“Oh, sir, we don’t recommend that approach.”

“Is it possible?”

“Yes. You will need to do your own research.”

“OK. Now I want to confirm the details of the offer. My ad says 500 Mbps at an introductory price of $39.99 per month.”

“Hmmm…I’m showing that the cheapest offer to your address is 100 Mbps for $54.99 per month.”

“Can you tell me what is the price of 500 Mbps?”

“I show that as $44.99 per month.”

“OK, thanks for your time. We’re done here.”

Unfortunately, they never got a chance to delight (or annoy) me in step 3 — installation. I was primed and ready to change, but the friction became too much to overcome.  

If you’re trying to compel change, whether a service, habit, or belief, make sure all steps of your process focus on overcoming friction. 

I suspect some people are exhausted.

The World provides almost infinite channels to source and vent your outrage. You can consume and generate outrage from the moment you open your eyes till the moment you close them again. 

Like your checking account, your outrage budget is finite and limited. Unlike your checking account, you have no overdraft protection. 

You have principles, things you care deeply about, and people you love. Spending your limited outrage budget defending these is a righteous investment. You’ll never overdraft that budget if you’re the one deciding how to spend it. 

The tribes, however, require your outrage. Your outrage is the energy that allows them to gain power, grow, and keep power — and that’s all they care about. The tribe doesn’t care about your principles, the things you care deeply about, or the people you love. They care about their own power. 

They use emotionally charged terminology such as anti-democratic and anti-free speech to ignite your outrage. Once you’ve lost control of your own outrage budget, overdrafting is all but assured. 

Just make sure that you know who is setting the agenda for your outrage. Is it you, or is it a tribe?

You will piss someone off…

If you put yourself on the hook. 
If you speak up.
If you make a decision.
If you create something.
If you try something that might not work.

It’s not a question of whether you will piss someone off. Someone will always be pissed off. 

The question is who?

One aspect of freedom is that we can choose who it’s for — our voice, our creation, our intention. Sometimes that’s a hard, fuzzy, or implicit decision. 

But you can easily eliminate one entire group: the spectators. It’s never for the spectators. It’s only ever for those in the ring with the bull, like you. 

When you’re struggling with having upset someone, first decide if they’re a spectator or down in the ring with you. 

I’m normally reasonably proud of where I live.

Not right now. Because right now, I live in a clown state.

Here’s what I get: “What is the deal with Oz and Fetterman? And that Mastriano…Is this the best we can do?” And those words are usually accompanied by appropriately astonished or exasperated body language.

Those of us who live here have the same comments and discussions. Each conversation ended with a slight head shake and baffled look.

Both sides, by the way. Reasonable, thinking, caring people from both sides.

How does this happen?

We allow the teams to set the narrative.
The narrative is always good versus evil.
We vote for the team rather than the person.

Where’s the ringmaster? Send in the clowns.

In eastern Pennsylvania, we’re currently in my favorite season.

For about two weeks each year, my lunchtime outdoor workouts are awash in the multitude of autumn colors. The surrounding hills are dominated by yellow but with just enough orange and red to stand out spectacularly. The air is crisp, but the sun is warm.

It’s coming, though.

Soon the hills will be a dreary brown, the air cold and heavy, and the sun will have lost its warming touch.

Winter is coming.

Mercifully, in a few months, the brown gives way to green, the air lightens, and the sun once again warms the skin. The dreary winter is over, and spring has begun.

One of the best things about eastern Pennsylvania is we can count on all four seasons. Although the timing and intensity may vary slightly from year to year, the arc of each is generally the same. Whichever is your favorite, you’ll get enough of it. Whichever is your least favorite, you’ll get enough of that, also.

These seasons are a metaphor for the seasons in our lives. Maybe they’re not as regular, or one outlasts another, but we’re constantly moving through one to another. However, unlike the earth’s seasons, our personal seasons are internal, intimate, and hidden. One cannot look at another and know their season.

The next time the person across the table makes you angry, confused, or hurt, start by trying to understand their season. Do the same when you look in the mirror.

Christian with MAGA.
Muslim with terrorist.
Democrat with socialist.
Republican with fascist.
Rich with selfish.
Poor with entitled.
Rural with dumb.
City with weak.

We like to label, generalize, and categorize. It helps us make sense of our world. 

It also helps us find our people. Since our people are smart, good, and right, those others must be dumb, bad, and wrong. 

But then The World slides in and conflates the labels. 

A mile from our house is a stoplight at the corner of two country roads. It works strictly on a time-based cycle, 24×7. No controlling sensors.

During the day, it’s no big deal because the intersection sees enough traffic that the cycle doesn’t feel off.  

However, it’s maddening late at night. 

Last night we came home late (for us). As we approached, the green turned yellow and then red. For no reason! Ours was the only car around for miles.

What would you do?

Here’s what I did and what I always do at this intersection late at night: First, I cursed to let the universe know what I thought of this travesty. Then, I stopped, looked both ways, and blew through the light. 

Maybe your parents, like mine, instilled the sense of doing the right thing, even when nobody is watching. We’ve worked to instill this in our kids as well. It’s biblical. 

But what is the right thing?

One way to look at it is that the law says you gotta stop and wait. So do it. Black and white. 

Another way is to look at the intention. The purpose of this law is to regulate the flow of traffic safely. If no traffic exists to regulate, no traffic regulator is necessary.

Now think through this again, but replace “stoplight laws” with any other law. The letter of the law is important, but so is intention. 

Another mega-inspiration behind The250 is Bari Weiss’s Common Sense newsletter and her companion podcast Honestly. Want some plain-ole clear thinking and honest questions about what’s happening in the world today? That’s your place. 

By far, the most entertaining output from Common Sense is each Friday’s TGIF, written by Bari’s wife, Nellie Bowles. 

As I’ve stated before, the purpose of The250 is to encourage empathy through opening new perspectives. I don’t do much overt call-to-action because the whole point is that most of our lives are complex and nuanced.

Except “Turn off the news!!” I am unabashed with that one.

In a recent edition, Nellie published real-world data to fuel the fire of my campaign slogan, “Turn off the news!!”

Here’re some graphs that show the emotional trends of news headlines from 2000 until now. Note the full spectrum of news sources as part of the data.

As I suspected.

I will point out one issue, however: the Y-Axis scales on each chart are not the same (as I’ve pointed out with the red boxes). This is the kind of misinformation trickery that sides use to magnify and hyperbolize their point. It has happened here, but the overall results are not skewed.

Do note that the downward trend of “joy” and “neutral” would not appear as drastic as shown if the scales were identical.  

Regardless, turn off the news. 

You know it’s coming, and you can’t stop it.

Of course, you’re not looking forward to it, but it’s more than an abstract discomfort because you’ve been here before. You’ve already walked this road. You’ve been to this destination. You know how this ends.

And it sucks. Deeply and truly.

On these days, how do you show up in the world?

Do you push it behind a facade or wear your heart on your sleeve? Are you able to function normally? Do you appear largely unaffected but in moments of weakness, the emotions escape (and the regrets pile up)? Do you play the victim, or do you victimize?

Luckily, we don’t experience the existential threat of impending doom every day. The doom moments come and go like seasons.

When you look across the table, aisle, or office, it’s worth considering what season your fellow humans might be experiencing.