Civility has become a lost art. . .

By the time you read this the elections will be well over and the newly chosen members of Congress will be cheering the results.  The losers will be licking their wounds, wondering how they could have prevented their losses while the pendulum continues to swing.  And there’s good in that.  It keeps both sides on their toes. Unfortunately, of late, it has made both sides mean and vindictive too.

This blog isn’t intended to be “a for or against” the outcome, but rather a plea for civility as we go forward. There has been far too little of it for the last number of months.  In fact, for the last number of years.  Maybe that’s the common theme in politics.  But it serves no one.  We have serious problems to be solved and if we are unwilling to listen to one another, the electorate isn’t served at all.

What’s the solution?  I think it’s becoming willing to practice some very simple principles, most of which I have written about in numerous books:

1. Listen intently to one another.
2. Pause a moment before responding.
3. Search for a solution that serves the majority.
4. Be aware of the value of kindness in all encounters.
5. Recognize that wherever you are, you have an opportunity to practice peace.
6. Know that the peaceful resolution is the one that benefits the majority.

There are many more suggestions than these, but as a beginning, if only these were to become daily practices, compromise that benefits all the nation would become a reality.  It should not be about who is in power but who is willing to remember the rest of us and the responsibility they have to us every single day of their term.

It’s never too late to try a new tact in government.  Compromise can become honorable again.  Perhaps the rest of us need to add our prayers to this quest for compromise to make it a reality.  I am willing.  Are you?