Looking at the man in the mirror

In my manifesto, I wrote that before I would criticize anyone else's behavior, I would want to criticize my own first.

I wanted to say something about some unhealthy-looking behavior I saw around me, so I decided to look for that behavior in myself first.

Here's what I saw:
- Jumping to conclusions about someone's personality and character from only a few observations of what they say and do, without any investigation.
- Anger and alarm continually erupting at the slightest provocation.
- Fear of letting people see the loving, affectionate, sensitive, sentimental, intuitive parts of my personality, and possibly being depreciated and intimidated, keeping me from talking about some of my thoughts and feelings in public.
- Continually being tempted to promote my ideas and interests in ways that depreciate and intimidate others.

There might be some clues for me in all that, about why my progress in learning kindness and humility has been so slow.

Now I'm seeing a long and lonely road ahead, and it's bringing me down out of the clouds.

1. I want to practice finding things to love in some of the people whose ideology is most opposed to mine, and in some of the people who are hardest for me to love; and practice fellowship with them. I also want to practice speaking well of them to others.

2. I want to try to rid myself of all depreciating thoughts about people, and all enduring feelings of ill will.

3. I want to find ways to make all that appealing to other people, so they will want to do it too. Maybe, if I find treasures along the way, I can tell people about them.

4. I want to continue organizing my ideas; about practicing and promoting fellowship across ideological divides; and about freedom from backbiting, not to publish them but to make better use of them.