Tolerance is trusting that others know what is best for them...

Adopt an attitude of non-judgment. Tolerance is trusting that others know what is best for them...

"Look at all those young girls, with their bellies hanging out. What a disgrace!" says a woman with an equally protruding abdomen, simply one that is covered up. What is at work here? Two elements come to mind. The first is intolerance of what is socially acceptable. The second, is we dislike in others what we dislike in ourselves.

For the first part, we are culturalized from birth to conform to a set of standards. Each of us, however, has a different culturalizing experience, so these "standards" are actually OUR developed opinions. A child raised by immigrant parents for instance, is going to absorb some of the parents' native culture, which will be different than that of the children of natve born parents. Depending on your religion, geographic area, military or non-military background, how often you moved, your gender, economic class, birth order, and right down to who your friends were, etc., your version of what is socially acceptable is unique to you, although it is likely you imagine your "opinions" are held universally. Your Ego, needing to be important, aligns itself with groups it concludes are superior. As a member of the IN group, we imagine we will be endowed with this "superior" status. Derision and ridicule of non-members, the OUT group, is a way of showing allegiance to the IN group, and typically we continually re-state our allegiance in this fashion. This method is especially important to, and utilized by the members who show no other outward signs of membership. An example is when extremely poor, white racists, need to openly show bigotry, to separate themselves from the equally poor minority groups, of which they imagine themselves to be superior. This is all an illusion. We are all ONE, and our similarities far out weigh our differences.

The second part is conceptually difficult for some. One way of looking at this is when we see traits in others that we didn't like in ourselves, traits we have worked hard to fix or improve, we are irritated that the others in question have not done the hard work we have. The above quoted woman has tried to dress in a manner which hid her imagined flaws, and she is put off by those who apparently don't care to. Another example would be, the proverbial "reformed smoker." Quitting smoking is very hard work. Reformed smokers are very irked by those who those who continue smoking, apparently oblivious to the multitude of reasons that caused the reformer to quit. Another way this dislike manifests itself is as a method of self-preservation. There are parts of ourselves that we dislike, and we are afraid these disliked traits might come out. We police ourselves by openly commenting negatively, and then are forced to keep our own disliked traits supressed, so that we don't appear to be hypocrits. Ah, the games people play...

Since you are operating entirely from within the constructs of your own experience, your set of standards, are just that, YOUR set of standards. When operating in a group setting, YOU act as you believe the groups wants, all in an attempt to maintain membership. However, your set of standards, including the adopted standards of any group you are aligned with, are NOT universal, nor are they correct. They are what YOU have decided are correct. They don't apply to others. This is very difficult for most people to conceptualize, and even harder to accept...

Today, when you have a derisive or judgmental thought, stop and ask yourself why it is YOU believe you have the right to decide for others, what is in their best interest. It is said, "You don't see others as they are, you see them as you are." Acknowledge this and BEgin to allow and accept others as they are. Allow them the same liberty you have allowed yourself. BE tolerant. Tolerance is trusting that others know what is best for them...

Duffy