Uniters, Not Dividers

Divisive:(adjective) tending to cause disagreement or hostility between people

I don’t have to say it. We all know. The climate in our country (world?) right now is incredibly divisive. We are warring factions all day long and it’s sad and exhausting. Even my 76-year-old dad, who has lived through the Civil Rights Movement in Tennessee, the Vietnam War and the Cold War, says it may be the worst it’s ever been.

We can argue about why that is until we are blue in the face. Whose fault it is. But then, we’d just be adding to the divisiveness. What if, as moms, we chose instead to be uniters?

I think we mothers are in a unique position to do this- to be the uniters. We are, after all, raising the next generation of humans who will, for better or worse, step in to run things very shortly. The choices we make everyday influence them in powerful ways. We are also influencers in other ways- our workplaces, our communities, our schools. What if we chose to intentionally be uniters instead of dividers?  

What would that look like?

Maybe it would look like me, homeschooling mom of 3, having a night out with a working mom whose days look completely different from mine. Perhaps it looks like the happily married mom having the single mom from down the street over for coffee. Or vice versa.

I think it would look like us crossing the lines of the mommy-divide and saying, we are more alike than we are different. It won’t always be easy, but the best things usually aren’t.

Breastfeeding moms having play dates with bottle-feeding moms. Granola moms meeting fast food moms at the park. Public school moms having nights out with homeschooling moms. Because when we get to know people who aren’t in our tribe, the “they” we were so angry at online becomes a real person, with wants and needs, sorrows and joys. She stops being a “bottle-feeding mom” and becomes “my friend, Paula”. Maybe her budget, her schedule, her political views are different. But she loves her kids just like we do. She falls into bed exhausted just like we do. She gets up the next morning, hugs her kiddos, and does it all over again. Just like we do. We are all on the same team.

So let’s be uniters, not dividers. It’s what the world could use more of right now.