What Are You Doing?

Before you ignore this entire blog post thinking it is political, it isn’t, so please keep reading. 

I’m very lucky to have grown up the way I did; safe, first and foremost, but I was also raised to think about others feelings, to always include and accept people no matter what, and to stand up for what’s right. But I also carry a mass amount of empathy, sometimes too much for my own good, and this means standing up for what is right is all consuming. 

Therefore, with all the devastation going on right now, I feel it in the back of my throat. I feel like it’s hard to breathe, I feel helpless not having the necessary power to fix it all. I feel like it’s all or nothing. But for the people who also feel this way, like they can’t share or contribute in other ways, and then still live their own lives, I want to tell you that you still have the right to be happy too. We both do. 

But the two can live hand in hand, and we all have to find our own balance of empathy and self-care, because while our happiness is always important, other people’s lives matter enough for us to spend at least a small portion of our day fighting for. 

Ultimately, it is so important to practice gratitude. To understand all that we have, and be thankful for all of it. The job you hate so much? Someone would trade the world to be making a decent wage and be in decent working conditions. 

Give yourself a new perspective, imagine yourself with nothing, and treat everything with appreciation. There are people longing to be in your position right now, for a simple good night's sleep, for safety, for access to food and drinking water. To family, to friends, to love. To peace. 

This post is not about politics, because what is happening all over the world right now has surpassed politics, and entered basic human rights. It is about innocent death. It is about the state of our entire world, and if you think that ignoring this will make it go away, you’re wrong, and you’re also kidding yourself. We need to all be prepared for this to only get worse, if we all do not make efforts to make it better. 

To be fully transparent, I still get nervous sharing posts, so I understand if you do too. Maybe you don’t want people to judge you, or to think you can’t let anyone live in peace, again, I understand. With that said, to feel nervous or judged about sharing what is happening in real time to people all over the world, is one of the biggest forms of privilege you can have. 

So yes, I feel nervous, but it will never come before sharing what people need to see. We are so lucky to currently live in a place where we can feel safe, where we can go to sleep knowing we will wake up in the same place (if at all), where we know where our mothers and fathers, siblings and cousins, and grandparents are. We are so lucky to walk the streets without risking our lives.

We are lucky to even have access to social media at all! Do this for Iran, do this for Gaza, do this for Sudan, do it for anyone struggling but especially the people who don’t even have the option to BE on social media and ask for help themselves. 

This isn’t a request to spam your story with posts, but it is a request for you to ask yourself what you’re contributing to anything at all? Are you donating, or if you don’t have the means, sharing with others where they can donate? Are you going to protests? Are you signing petitions, speaking to your family members and sharing the word that way, speaking up, or just simply educating yourself?

There are numerous ways to take action, just do something. You don’t want to be sitting with your kid years down the line when they ask you what you were doing when all of this was going on, and say nothing. Let alone, not having any knowledge on it.