The pandemic has inflicted major problems in the physical health, mental health, and economy. In addition to the pandemic, the political landscape has clouded truth and made people draw lines in almost every facet of their lives. It seems like people are fighting about everything nowadays. Early on in the pandemic I found myself doing the same.
I found myself getting into arguments over opinions, and others would seek out confrontation, only to banish, block, and cancel anyone with an opposing viewpoint.
It donned on me after a few months that everyone has opinions that are different from my own. If I can’t accept people who think differently than me, then I may be pretty lonely. No one thinks exactly like me. I came up with a few ideas that are helping me accept people with different opinions and may help you too.
Try to Understand Why Someone Has That Opinion
Before calling someone “stupid” or “ignorant”, try to take a step back and figure out why that person has the opinion they do. Is it cultural, part of their core belief system, or something else? If we choose to ignore the “why” then we should probably take a long look internally.
A Different Opinion Does Not Make Someone Else Wrong
Just because someone else has an opinion different than yours doesn’t mean they are necessarily wrong, just like you are not necessarily wrong either. Your opinions and their opinions are not always fact. Why do we give our opinions? I think we are all trying to make sense of the world we live in.
Try to value diverse thought.
Don’t Persecute Others
It’s popular to “cancel” someone for their opinions nowadays. Who is to say that the angry internet mob won’t cancel you one day? This process of “canceling” someone is wrong on so many levels. Specifically, it provides the notion that a small group of people have moral superiority and think so highly of themselves that they know what’s right and wrong.
We can look throughout history and point out a multitude of errors humans have made when persecuting people because of their ideas, race, gender, etc. It’s wrong. We shouldn’t presume that someone who looks like us should think a certain way or someone who looks different than us should think differently. Accept humans as humans. We are all human beings with different opinions.
Final Thoughts
Thank you for reading my post. We can have friendships with others with diverse ideas and opinions, it makes us that much stronger. It’s important that we step back and try to understand diverse opinions. We should also seek to understand why we are fighting so much in the first place and ignore politicians who seek to divide us for gain. We are stronger together and I’m thankful for my friends with different opinions than myself.
My name is Anthony Bart, I’m the owner of BartX Digital. We operate TherapistX, and Therapybypro. I just started therapist marketing consulting to teach how therapists can grow their private practices. I’ve been an entrepreneur since 2017. I’m a huge small business advocate and enjoy working with mental health professionals.