Be Woke!

Woke means awakened to the needs of others.

To be well informed, thoughtful, compassionate, humble and kind.

Eager to make the world a better place for all people.

Be Woke!

It does not matter what term might have been used to open up a discussion about the necessity for many among us to become more concerned about the welfare of others, there would have been a group of folks who would turn it into something that is negative.

Unfortunately, the notions of developing a greater sense of consciousness about the suffering of others and trying to find ways to alleviate some of the pain in the world does not stir the imagination of many of the Creator’s children. The smear campaign that is being waged against the word “woke” has gone far beyond being absurd to being injurious and helping to forge violence in some circles in our land.

The ways in which DeSantis and many of the folks that decided to sing in his choir and the larger choir of disinformation talk about this word, one would think that it was about something very negative instead of being an attempt for someone to make short work out of trying to describe the fairly complicated process of trying to open up one’s mind and find new ways to see the world that is often confusing and quite challenging as we try to make sense of all that we have to navigate as humans on this planet.

I have spent the past fifty plus years of my career working to be more conscious myself and in trying to encourage, teach and talk others into considering that there might be new ways to see old narratives and that the new energy generated from finding a new way to see might be worth the risk of trying to see. The work is difficult, slow and takes many turns in the course of engaging it.

Our narratives undergird our way of being in the world. They matter to us because we have been shaped by them and they help us to make sense of the world that we have to engage throughout our lifetime. We do not find it easy to let go of them and it is important not to let them go too quickly before understanding why they need to go and before carefully investigating what their replacements will be. There is something to be said for the folk comment about, “not throwing the baby out with the bath water.” The stories that we have been told by our parents, teachers, cultural experiences and in other ways as we have observed the world and come to conclusions about what and how to think matter. Even if those stories are laced with lies and bigotry, they still matter and while that type of story needs serious interrogation, it has served a purpose and the believer of it has to find a suitable way to move away from it to a different more life-giving story if health and wellness are to be enjoyed.

But the journey toward awakening is a tedious one that can be treacherous, and it is easier to do what the “anti-Woke choir” is doing than it is to engage in a different set of questions. The noise that this group is creating needs to be reduced and the media could do a lot to assist in that process if we had a more awakened media industry. Unfortunately, too many in our media world are caught in the long night of unconsciousness themselves and all of the trappings that the culture wars bring so the repetitious reporting of the noise from the “anti-woke” echo chamber is made louder. If we could have a few weeks of silence about these folks and their ridiculous ways of thinking and talking that would be a good beginning. People have the freedom to speak. They do not have the freedom to hurt other people and to openly support efforts to do that in the public square and we need to call it by its ugly name and stand against it. This is the challenge before all of us who want to help create a sustainable world. We have to make space for the “anti-woke” voices while naming why those voices are speaking and why they are so loud.

Of course, it is important to remember that the book banning, the attack on LGBTQIA folks and the effort to revise history to their lacking cannot be ignored, nor should any of us allow ourselves to think that. But instead of the continuous concert about what is being said and done, we need to look for counter measures that will begin to take some of the oxygen out of those outrageous acts. So buy and read banned books. Do not fall into any of the bigoted conversation about LGBTQIA folks while making sure to accept that history is a record that needs to be respected even if we don’t like it. We have to make a personal stand against this energy as a first step. While the media could help, we can do a lot. Another important thing for all of us who are committed to trying to be conscious, well informed, compassionate, humble, and kind to do is to remember to VOTE. It matters and this is not the time to play that game about our vote not counting with ourselves.

The powers and principalities are dancing in the street, and they need us to send them back into their houses and to tell them their noise has become overwhelming and cannot continue to be abided by. Let’s be WOKE! Let’s make meanness unsustainable!