What I Learned This Year = Activism
Over the past year or so, I've been slowly focusing on getting more of my actions to line up with my beliefs. I have so many ideals...but the way I behave doesn't always align well with these ideals.
I've come to believe that a person with true and complete integrity is a person whose behavior, words, and moral ideals are aligned as one. As I continue to work towards this elevated level of integrity, I can't help but become more active for the things I care about and believe in...which means I am slowing becoming...an activist. Here are some of the ways in which I've cultivated more integrity this year:
1) I don't actually believe in slaughtering animals for pleasure. I mean, I'm the girl who just lets the spider or wasp stay in the house because I'm just not into killing animals. And yet, I eat meat. So, I'm slowing working my way towards vegetarianism. I'm not a vegetarian yet, but I've begun the journey.
2) I don't actually believe in just talking about volunteering. I believe in ACTUALLY volunteering for causes you believe in. So finally, after living in Seattle for 4 years, I finally put my actions where my mouth was and started volunteering. I love giving the sacred gift of my time to an organization that is doing work I believe in
3) I don't actually believe in destroying the planet. I'll have lots more to say about this later when Annie and I get to our Sustainability theme, but suffice it to say that I've done a lot of internet reading about how my behavior might be contributing to the destruction of the planet. And while I'm keenly aware that my behavior alone will do nothing to save the world, that's not really the point. The point is growing the integrity within myself between my beliefs and my behavior. So...I now walk for just about everything. I walk to the grocery store, the bank, my volunteer place, the post office, the coffee shop. I've also begun to learn other ways that I can reduce my negative impact on the world around me. More on that later.
4) I don't actually believe in ignorance. As I already mentioned, I've been trying to increase my reading this year. And not just novel reading, but reading about things that matter. In order to problem-solve well, you have to have knowledge about the subject. I've been working to get better at this. I started to subscribe to newspapers (I'm an adult!) and read more non-fiction books.
As you can see, this year has been a fight to create more integrity within myself. This might be the best activism one can possibly do.
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