A line from one of my favorite songs/songwriters popped into my mind today. This from Radney Foster’s tune, Half My Mistakes:
“And if I had it all to do over, I’d prob’ly win and lose just as much. But I’d spend less time on the right and wrong, and a lot more time on love.”
It occurs to me that this line seems to sum up a lot of what is going on these days – we spend more time on being/deciding/judging right and wrong at the expense of listening to, thinking about, considering the opinions and viewpoints of others. Hell, they may be wrong, I may be wrong. And, while I don’t want to minimize being right or doing the right thing, the insistence on seeing things in that binary world, particularly when it prevents us from listening to the other perspective, takes us down a path that does not lead to a good place. Which points me to another Radney Foster song/line (Nobody Wins):
“Before another bitter word gets loose
I was hoping we could call a truce
Cause nobody wins, we both lose
Hearts get broken and love get bruised
When we light that same old fuse
Again and again
Nobody wins slamming doors
We’ve both lost this fight before
And I won’t play that game no more
Cause nobody wins”
It occurs to me... 