Openmindedness The Healthy Cure to Hate

[Music]

[Applause]

no matter

who you are or who you identify with

you have or you will experience a moment

in your life where you feel angry or

hurt

i know how this feels as i have been in

your shoes before

a few years ago i was in a new place to

start a new chapter of my life

and because of this change i found

myself in a room of new people

after a few minutes of conversation one

of the kids i didn’t know turned to me

and said something

something that would change me forever

are you jewish but that’s not how he

said it

are you jewish

i told him i was and asked why he wanted

to know

he looked at me as if i were repulsive

do you know what he said

i wish you and all

the other jews had burnt in the ovens in

the holocaust

so we wouldn’t have to deal with you

anymore

yes those words actually came out

of a kid my age’s mouth

believe me i know that is a lot for you

to take in

and for me this person attacked my faith

but for you

someone could attack your race your

sexual orientation

your religion etc and as you could

imagine

i was shocked why would someone say

something so horrible why would someone

have so much hate and resentment towards

me

why do they hate me and not just

hate me why do they wish me dead

if this wasn’t enough why would they

draw upon

the worst genocide in modern history to

be the cause of my

murder obviously

and for good reason it didn’t take me

long to despise this person

and i didn’t even know him that well but

one thing i did know

is that he definitely was not jewish

as i was trying to process what could

have motivated him to say these

things i struggled with making

assumptions about his religion

just as he had done mine i just could

not wrap my head around

how he a member of a religion that put

such

emphasis on loving thy neighbor could

treat me

his neighbor so poorly after

months and months of this resentment

boiling inside me

a starting realization came to my mind

i too had become hateful

i hated him because he hated me

i fought his anger with my own i began

to counter

all of his assumptions about my religion

by doing the exact same thing about his

because i was put in a situation where i

felt victimized

hate took over my heart and it affected

me deeply

fortunately i realized that my

resentment towards his religion

were not true and the anger i felt

towards him

was not helping me in any way in fact

it was hurting me this is when i decided

i needed to change my way of thinking

he had made it up in his head that i was

his enemy

he decided this without truly getting to

know me

as a person he was close-minded

and i knew in that moment i wanted to

become

open-minded now i do not think being

open-minded means you absolutely have to

love

every person in the world but i do think

it requires you

to respect the views cultures and

differences of your peers

even if you do not agree with them or

practice them yourself

in my opinion people have the common

misconception

that the way they are is the only way to

be

but in reality this is just not true

we are all different and that is an

amazing thing

when i decided to become the better

person i wanted to use this philosophy

of open-mindedness to grow from my

experience

i was not going to let this hateful

person control me i

identified how he made me feel and that

it was wrong

i then decided how i wanted to feel

now of course i am not saying you should

tolerate the hateful actions

or words of an oppressor let me hone in

on this for a second

what that person did to me was

unacceptable

things like these need to be stopped in

our communities

but together as an open-minded community

this is possible we can put it into hate

use their actions and words as an

incentive to

not be that way don’t fight hate with

hate

fight close-minded people with being the

opposite

open-minded and to do that

one thing you’re going to have to do

first is forgive

others ignorance call them on it

challenge them to make a change but

forgive it too

and that is a battle for sure

forgiveness is not

easy but it is in your best interest

forgiveness allows us

to let go of those negative emotions

that hurt us and replace them with

positive ones

all that resentment you bottle up let it

go

send it away when we suppress these

traumatic

experiences they have a tendency to

fester inside

to darken your mindset you have to let

them go

but live in them for a minute first

feel them know them and acknowledge them

because you should really feel these

challenging emotions

instead of repressing them

if everyone would learn to accept and

respect

those around them for who they really

are we can slowly heal

the hate and negativity that affects our

communities

i invite you to reflect on these hateful

moments

did you react to these moments of hatred

thoughtfully

and with empathy so that the situation

did not spiral into something even more

toxic

sometimes it will feel like all you can

do is contemplate

everything that went wrong in the

situation and you might dig yourself

into a hole of frustration

and sadly one of the ways we feel that

we can claw our way out

is by becoming the oppressor too

but if we make a conscious effort to

change how we

think to accept those among ourselves

for their true authentic selves

we can create a more open-minded future

although the sting of his words may

never completely go away

i’ve been able to soothe that pain by

being open-minded

i have grown for my experience in a

healthy way

so the next time you find yourself in a

position

of hurt and anger remember the things

we’ve talked about today

so that you can heal in a way that does

not result in

even more hate because i know

we can all become the better person

thank you