Jim Morrison was right, people are strange! What is it about humans that we seem to “want” to attract drama into our lives?! Feelings of animosity are never enjoyable so why on earth do we so often not only entertain them but willingly attract them into our sphere of being?!
So often - and plenty on social media - I am witness to people in one single breath stating that they don’t want to be a part of any ugliness towards another but simultaneously shunning “whoever” was mean or ugly in the first place. They are doing the same thing, just in a different manner, which ultimately makes them no different.
Our little village has a community whatsapp group as many do, no doubt. It is a place where all sorts of important and not so important stuff gets discussed and whilst for the most part it is relatively pleasant banter compared to some previous groups I have been a part of… there are always those days when “all the feathers seemed to get ruffled”.
Yesterday appeared to be one of those days and though I did not spend too much of my time reading into all the back and forth, a quick skimming through the messages gave me the gist. Someone had said something which clearly ticked a lot of people off. Some people simply gave their angry reactions, others had their say in return and then there were the handful of people who got quite ugly in their responses.
It always leaves a bad taste in ones mouth to see adults behaving like petulant children, and it never really leaves a very good feeling on the group chat either. I had sat down to do some work at my laptop and opened the whatsapp chat which is when I discovered all of this. Nothing had been said for a few hours because clearly the conversation had left a large portion of people seething.
I decided to diffuse the tension and break the chain of conversation by posting some of my photos of the sunset from a few minutes earlier. Within seconds, another photo of the sunset from someone else landed, then another and another - then someone shared an article about a whale giving birth in the bay and some dolphins protecting it from a shark, then another lady shared a flower arrangement she had made from some of the local fynbos and lagoon debris.
It was an absolute visual avalanche of positive vibes and it was so obvious (without anything actually being said) that many people had just had enough of all the negative drama for the day and decided to join my bandwagon of positivity.
Then… about five minutes into it, there was that ONE person… there is always one, isnt there haha! In the middle of all these beautiful photos and shares, she suddenly decides to interrupt with a full on little rant and moan at this guy from earlier… she was nothing short of UGLY and I just sat there thinking to myself… WHY!!!!???!!! Why would you step in now and F it all up?!
Well, clearly I was not the only person who shared that sentiment as people basically just started dropping more and more pictures of our beautiful little village, dropping messages of how blessed we are to live in such a beautiful place etc etc… and within minutes her message was long gone and lost in a pile of positivity. She said nothing further and neither did anyone else… so I think she got the message - and hopefully a few others did too.
There is nothing wrong with speaking your mind, but if you are going to return a wrong with another wrong then really speaking, you are a part of the problem yourself and I see no sense in that. It certainly does not make you a better person than the one you are giving the character assassination to.
Life is fleeting and we waste so much precious time on petty nonsense that really does not matter in the grand scheme of things. If humans put as much focus into positive action and engagement as they do into negativity and drama, the world would probably be a much nicer place!
Ps. The pics above are of this mornings sunrise out on our walk... the below pic is last nights sunset which I shared on the group chat...
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Until next time...
Much Love from Country Bumpkinland, South Africa xxx
Jaynielea
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