We're coming to the end of a year that has tested most, if not all, of us. For some, it may feel like 2020 has been all about loss. For me, it has been about acceptance.
The work I currently do is very much concerned with how we come to accept the existence of suffering. One thing that often comes up is a potential disparity between how we deal with our own suffering and the suffering of others. If we focus on one of those, at the expense of the other, it will eventually take its toll.
The extra time that many of us have spent alone this year has afforded us an opportunity. It has been an opportunity for something we often neglect. Whether we have done so consciously or not, it has been a chance to reflect, to think about where we are in our lives, what's important to us, and other things. In their absence, the way we relate to others may have been on our minds. It seems that many had the time to learn or practise things they had wanted to learn or practise for some time.
Unfortunately, there have been those who have tried to deepen divisions between people. Tragedy has been used as a catalyst to shame individuals, based on their group identity, in a misguided attempt to change behaviour through an apparently socially-accepted form of bullying. At a time when the focus might have been very much on a feeling of "us", the media and certain organisations fostered a sense of "them".
Here in the UK, the new year will bring a particularly uncertain future. If we believe that the result of the referendum in 2016 was accurate, then a slim majority of those who voted chose an uncertain future. I dare say that, no matter how anyone voted, they had reasons that made sense to them. The fallout from the whole thing, however, deepened any existing sense of "them". Sadly, a lot of the sentiments shared via social media were xenophobic or showed similar intolerance of perceived difference. Little doubt was left that a feeling of "them and us" was pervasive within our society.
Was the opportunity for reflection squandered? Maybe. It could also be that many chose to develop aspects of themselves which were all about a separation from others. Alternatively, a desire for greater connection may have led to a reinforcing of group identity, leading to the somewhat ironic outcome of social exclusion and disconnection from other groups of people.
I don't pretend to possess any great wisdom or insight. These are just thoughts that have come to me. Your mileage may vary, as they say. Coming to terms with our response to such things is very much about understanding who we are and, hopefully, being able accept it. If we recoil from and shut away the things we judge to be our darkness, they will only show themselves in other ways. It's my belief that we've seen a lot of darkness in 2020, but those whose inner darkness most visibly came to the surface tried to tell us they were the only ones to see the light.
