“We have that argument while recognizing our common humanity and dignity.” Bruce Springsteen
July 4, 2026
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DSNn3_qEQnz/?igsh=MXB1aXk2MGh6MXdzeQ==
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“We have been poisoned in our views of each other and it is our responsibility to find commonality.” Irene’s Entropy
Sept 2025
I believe in us, and I’m willing to dig in and do the work of creating experiences where we can remember what it’s like to have differences, but still feel like we’re in this together. We cannot continue this division, and the work starts with a handshake and vulnerability, which we often find in music.
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOy1VORCXqO/?igsh=MjFxdHl1emZ4cnpk
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“When we listen we find that we have common ground….”
Sept 2025
Even on one of the most politicized topics – abortion – Republican Gov. Spencer Cox and Democrat Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham of New Mexico found common ground.
“Abortion is an issue on which we disagree passionately. And yet, even though we have these very strong – it looks like a chasm between us – I think we would both agree that we should be doing more to take care of single moms,” says Cox.
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DPL5TJAkVSA/?igsh=NmRhYXJmMGdhZ2Np
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“We’ve never felt more divided, and we’re too fixated on our differences….”
Sept 2025
Gov Wes Moore (D-MD) And Gov Spencer Cox (R-UT)
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOpIWDYjsL9/?igsh=cjVxczE1MXh6eGFo
In America today, the very fabric of our nation is being torn apart.
We’ve never felt more divided, and we’re too fixated on our differences.
He’s black, and he’s white.
He grew up in the city, and he’s a farm boy from Utah.
He’s a Democrat, and he’s a Republican.
On paper, we couldn’t be more different, and yet, we’re both dads.
We both love college basketball.
We both have really stylish haircuts, and we’re both proud Americans.
We disagree passionately on lots of issues, but we’re friends, and we respect each other.
Politics is important, but it shouldn’t define us or destroy our relationships.
His name is Spencer Cox, and his name is Wes Moore, and we approve this message.
“They want us focused on how we’re different instead of on how we’re the same….”
Sept 2025
Texas Rep James Talerico (36 year old Dem candidate for U.S. Senate)
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOj0PIFEVO_/?igsh=MXVpaGRiazk3YmE0dA==
Our political system is broken.
Even our relationships with each other feel broken….
My faith teaches me to love my neighbor as myself.
Not just my neighbor who looks like me or prays like me or votes like me.
I am called to love all of my neighbors like I love myself because despite our differences we all want the same and the ability to see a doctor when we need one.
But the billionaires who own the social media algorithms, who own the cable news networks, who own the politicians fighting on our screens, they want us at each other’s throats.
They want us focused on how we’re different instead of on how we’re the same.
I am tired of being pitted against my neighbor.
I am tired of being told to hate my neighbor….
There is a deep hunger in this state and in this country for a different kind of politics.
Not a politics of hate.
Not a politics of tribes.
Not a politics of division.
But a politics of love.
A love that can heal what’s broken in America.
“Develop sense of oneness with seven billion human beings.”
August 2025
Dalai Lama
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DJcC5lRBmss/?igsh=MTRyaHZocW9udjFuNg==
Small community, my country, my religion, different race or different class.
These are secondary.
Number one, we are human being.
We need sense of oneness of entire human being.
Reality also now teach us everything interconnected.
For example, global economy.
And then also now, global warming.
So now, such sort of period, no longer thinking my nation, my continent, no.
Now we have to think humanity, about world.
We should have sense of universal responsibility and work together.
….So, this is remedy, we should develop sense of oneness of seven billion human being.
And we have to live together.
“All we need to see is the commonality…”
August 2025
Dr. Vandama Shiva
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DNHITU3NM4R/?igsh=MXJudXF1aTJoZG50Yw==
….And our planet is an interconnected, beautiful living planet, …. and all we need to see is the commonality, rather than South, North, Black, White, Hindu, Muslim.
All of these are constructed divisions of one common humanity, one planet.
“Sit with an open heart and empathy…If we deny their humanity, then in a way we are not much different than they are.”
August 2025
Deeyah Khan – Filmmaker – Empathy can disarm hate
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DNvo5KaRN2h/?igsh=MTN1b2N2NzVmYmxhbQ%3D%3D
I’ve gone to so many anti-fascist, anti-racist protests and none of that provided any kind of solutions.
To me, it’s not a matter of feeling good about myself and feeling self-righteous about winning an argument against a racist.
I want there to be fewer racists.
What I’ve come to see is that empathy, if you’re truly able to sit with someone with an open heart and with empathy, it’s hard for them to hold on to their hatred because you are showing up as a full human being, not just as somebody who’s there to point and shout and curse them out.
….And the reality is we have to find a way to coexist.
We have to, even with people that we dislike and disagree with, doesn’t mean that we excuse away or normalize or accept any of the views that they hold.
But if we deny their humanity, then in a way we are not much different than they are.
And it’s not just about them.
I think our own humanity is at stake.
How we choose to engage with hate, how we choose to react to it and respond to it says something about us as a society and less about them.
‘Deep Connection changes our gene expression…”
June 2025
Dr. Mark Hyman who disusses how when we reduce division we actually make the world physically more healthy.
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DK99lN7JsJ1/?igsh=aWI3Z2FhY2FiYTly
Love is medicine.
It’s the same reason that community is, the same reason that belonging is, is because when we have a deep connection and relation with someone, it literally changes our gene expression.
So if you’re in a loving connection with someone, yes, it’s this whole scientific field of sociogenomics, right, how our social relationships affect our genes.
And we know if you’re in a conflictual relationship, you will turn on genes of inflammation which cause disease and aging.
If you are in a loving, connected, heart-centered relationship, you are activating all the repair genes.
You literally, through cuddling, can change your epigenome.
“We are building communities of love and belonging and dignity for all….”
June 2025
Valarie Kaur
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DKqXW5axvHn/?igsh=MXYxdXg0bXM1NzdzNw==
And LA is standing in our humanity and in our love….
I was leaning against the railing, watching the action, documenting it, when we saw agents uniformed with shields, with guns, march down the center of the highway.
And one of them looked up at all of us, standing and looking down into the highway, and raised his gun and pointed it at us…..
Right before we stepped back, there was a woman behind me who said, look at them, they’re evil.
And I turned around and I said, no, do not give them that power.
Do not let them take your humanity.
And she looked at them and she’s like, they’re not even human.
And I’m like, no, there are no such thing as monsters.
There are only frail and wounded human beings in this world, people who are scared.
And then she started yelling, look at how scared they are.
We will not let them take our humanity.
….We are lifting up a vision of a world where we are building communities of love and belonging and dignity for all.
And so our resistance is more than resistance.
It’s a vision of a world that could be.
And we’re going to embody that in our protests, the way that we protest.
We’re not going to fall into the us and them.
We’re going to build a bigger we.
“In seeing their Humanity we find our own….”
June 2025.
Yurong “Luanna” Jiang, the first Chinese woman chosen to be the student speaker at a Harvard graduation ceremony and speaks to our collective humanity.
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DKaJKQQylTO/?igsh=MXJienk2bmUxdDN3Mw%3D%3D
“If there’s a woman anywhere in the world who cannot afford a period pad, it makes me poor.
If a girl who skips school out of fear of harassment, that threatens my dignity.
If a little boy dies in a war that he didn’t start and never understood, part of me dies with him.
But today, that promise of a connected world is giving way to division, fear, and conflict.
We’re starting to believe those who think differently, vote differently, or pray differently, whether they’re across the ocean or sitting right next to us, are not just wrong.
We mistakenly see them as evil.
But it doesn’t have to be this way.
What I’ve gained most from Harvard isn’t just calculus or regression analysis.
It’s to sit with discomfort, listen deeply, and stay soft in hard times.
Because if we still believe in a shared future, let us not forget that those who we label as enemies, they too are human. In seeing their humanity, we find our own.
Don’t let them wear down your humanity.”
May 2025
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DJWf7dnC1dP/?igsh=Y3R6amdmdW40M3c=
A man stood outside the White House with a single protest candle every night during the Vietnam War.
A reporter came to him one night and said, Sir, do you really believe your little protest will change anything?
And he said, Oh, I don’t come here to change them.
I come here so they don’t change me.
I will not allow the steady maddening onslaught of insanity to wear down my humanity.
I will keep knowing the truth and telling the truth.
I will do my part every damn day to stay human, to stay awake and tender, so that the world does not wear away at my humanity.