Episode 27: The holiday season is right around the corner and with it comes tempers flaring, being pushed to your limits, being intolerant of others, and being closed-minded. We are seeing more and more intolerance with each other and I believe part of it stems from being shut-in for extended periods of time. My Guest Co-Host and I Raven Waterman take some time to discuss How Social Tolerance or Intolerance is playing out in society and our lives today.
Here’s what you’ll learn in this episode:
Overcoming Low Social Contact Interactions
Tempers are short and patience is thin. What happened to kindness and tolerance? What happened to Social Tolerance? You know, where we took the time to care about those around us, accept their differences, and extended our curiosity to know more about each other. Having the desire to understand more about each other. Have we totally lost the desire to coexist and connect as people?
In today’s episode, my guest co-host Raven Waterman, therapist, leadership coach podcast host of Lead, Inspire, Grow, and CEO of Ravens Wings LLC and I will be discussing how we may have gotten this far and what it could mean moving forward?
How to Deal with the Lack of Social Interactions
Today we are seeing a rise of social intolerance playing out in our lives. With this show of intolerance, we are seeing more and more people caring more about their own individual freedom and not caring about the freedom or the concerns of others.
In many ways, we seem to have lost some of the ability to live with each other. You see, social tolerance is really just the ability to understand and empathize with other people’s beliefs, practices, and lifestyles even if we do not share them. This includes understanding the different ways in which people live and their different perspectives on life.
The Psychology of Tolerance
I was thinking, “how fitting,” as I prepare this post, that we had guests in town last week and they wanted to go to the African American Museum. I hadn’t been there as of yet and felt it was a great opportunity to finally go. It was eye-opening! I realized there is so much that we don’t realize or understand about our own culture yet alone others.
I remember the same feelings of… to be honest, I can’t come up with a word to describe how I felt. But needless to say, I experienced some of the same overwhelm when I visited the Holocaust Museum.
The thing is, there is so much we don’t know or are sheltered from in our own little individual bubbles. So much isn’t understood or is misunderstood or unexplained. If we would just take the time to educate ourselves, even just having open conversations, could open up room for empathy and compassion.
How Social Interactions Improve Resilience and Happiness
Most of us, when we think of boundaries we think of boundaries as they relate to ourselves. How we limit others and stand up for ourselves. How we draw the line. But in this instance, we must also look at boundaries from another perspective. Respecting the boundaries of others.
Look at it this way. When we take the time to get to know and understand others, accepting their right to difference and rights to a different way of thinking we allow them to take ownership and responsibility for their lives and it frees us to focus only on the things we can change. It allows us to let go of the anger and hurt that binds us and frees us to extend tolerance without accepting abuse. It gives us the courage to walk away and not engage. You could almost say boundaries beget boundaries. We are reinforcing the line on both sides.
Five Ways to Connect in a Virtual World
Being isolated and shut-in for many of us over the past year and a half has had a way of shrinking our individual bubbles even smaller. Our need to find ways to deal with constant change and the anxiety it causes has been stressful. In this atmosphere, empathy is often seen as a weakness and the rates of intolerance are on the rise. We find ourselves fighting back with more problems of intolerance, misunderstanding, and lack of empathy.
But it doesn’t have to stay there.
More than ever we need to learn ways to be mentally strong, to seek help when we feel our anxiety rising, and to find ways to cope successfully and healthier on a daily basis. More than ever the need for connection has been prevalent.
Until next time,
Here’s where to find more about Raven Waterman:
Website link: www.ravenswingsllc.com
Podcast Lead, Inspire, Grow
https://www.ravenswingsllc.com/lead-inspire-grow-podcast-with-raven-waterman
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