Celebrating Our Differences – Part 2

I had so much fun celebrating our differences in yesterday’s post that I thought today’s post would be similar – just going a bit deeper with it. 
This writing prompt from Journaling Further Within: 50 More Prompts for Self Exploration is perfect to help us begin to embrace our differences and celebrate how we are all unique.
Think of someone on the opposite side ideologically from you – really try to see their viewpoint. Write about how and why they see things this way (e.g., their past experiences, their upbringing, their religious views, etc.).
When we start to see how similar we all are and try to understand why someone would have a belief that differs from our own, we can begin the process of supporting each other. We can begin the process of being sympathetic instead of judgmental. We can begin to understand that being different isn’t bad. If we were all the same the world would be a very boring place. Our differences add so much color to our lives. And this is such a great part of living! 
So spend some time today thinking about someone in your life that differs in many ways from you. By putting yourself into their world and practicing compassion and understanding, you can begin to see that they are just doing the best they can with the tools that are available to them. This is true for each of us. We are each good at our core, and our differences are there to help us learn empathy and compassion. They are also great simply to show us another path – another option available to us. There are so many ways to spend our time on this planet – let’s celebrate our differences instead of seeing them as threatening. Let’s enjoy how unique we all are. They do say that variety is the spice of life. 🙂

Celebrating Our Differences

I absolutely love Haagen-Dazs Mango Sorbet. Seriously – I am in love with it. 
 They were on sale the last time we went to the grocery store, so we bought two. 
Dan and I thought it would be fun to each have our own and see who finished first. 
And in doing so, we learned something about each other – even after almost 10 years of being together: 
we eat our ice cream completely differently!

My container had one hole in it that went deep down. I stuck with what worked and didn’t venture off of that course. 
His container was evenly smoothed over – so he when he got to the bottom, it would be completely finished – nothing left behind.
And this really didn’t surprise either of us at all – both ways seemed to fit with each personality.
While we each wanted the same result (to finish the ice cream), we went about it in completely different ways.
And one way wasn’t better than the other – they were just different.
I think this is a really great metaphor for life – we are all living our lives and striving to do our best. We are all learning to love ourselves, our friends, and our family. We are each following our dreams and living our ideal lives.
And we each get to that place in a different way, which is the magical part – the beautiful part.
I love this – we can each learn so much from each other because we are each so different yet also so much the same.
See, I told you it was good sorbet! 😉