The Greyter Good

Kermit the Frog coined the phrase, “It ain’t easy being green.”

I hear you, Kermit. It ain’t easy being grey.

In a society designed to pick sides (in a society designed to make you out to be “weak,” “fleeting,” or a “fairweather fan” if you dare to see the both/and), what others deem good can appear relative.

A challenge to write about good deeds to someone like me then does, in fact, become a challenge.

Sure I could talk about the multitude of times I’ve given to the homeless. (My sister’s favorite story that’s always told simultaneously with her eruptions of laughter is the time I had less than $7 to my name and a woman outside asked for change. I said I’d take her inside the store and was happy to buy her something of sustenance. Out of all the options, she wanted cashews… See: Expensive F**king Nuts I wouldn’t have even splurged on for myself at the time!... and I gladly got them. As we walked outside, she was picked up in a black SUV as I walked home, too broke to afford a car, and dumbfounded.)

To many it’d appear I got scammed, but I never took it that way. In fact, I’ve seen that woman since, years and years later, and she’s what people might call a “professional homeless person.” Does that really make her a scammer, or is that simply a reflection of her beliefs about survival? She’s in the same place, and I’ve moved multiple times, maintain more than $7 in my bank account, and can now-- YOU GUESSED IT-- splurge for cashews for myself.

I send her love.

I could reminisce on the time I worked at Loaves and Fishes, a volunteer-based organization providing meals to those who need it, but my intentions weren’t pure when I did so. I enjoyed my time, I felt I made a difference, and I fed hungry people...but it was a part of a role I was playing for one of the many organizations I headed up in high school. The grey in me then asks, so what rules--action or intention?

I could share the recent Starbucks line I encountered in which the person ahead of me paid $10, which not only made me light up in glee, but felt amazing to continue passing on until it reached someone who really needed it. (I’ve been the recipient of that before, and it was a beautiful deliverance of faith.) Heck, I could add the bonus that I realized it didn’t feel fair to simply pass it down the line, so I boosted my tip to $10 to the employees working the line, because why not. Good begets good. But what’s to be said about the person who started that giving chain? What if it was a Proud Boy? What if it was a Capitol Rioter? What if it was Donald Trump, himself? What does that CHANGE about the experience?

That’s when it hit me. The greatest good deed isn’t one I could write about, but one I can create by writing.

When you’re grey in thinking, like me, it can appear to be a heavy burden, when in fact that can’t be farther from the truth.

It’s because of my awareness of the divinity within each of us that I can hold steady in my faith of the good in people and treat each individual with respect. Love carries the load.

Before you mutter your rebuttal to yourself, munching Skinny Pop with a steady supply of white noise from the background tv, go back to the Starbucks line example. So many are quick to brag on their socials of the kindness of human beings and these stories of giving, and equally so quick to forget it as they follow that up by condemning a group of human beings or their actions without a sliver of hesitation to ponder if someone from that group had also just supplied them with their joy.

THAT is mental taxation. Constantly having to evaluate who is your enemy and wavering from one extreme of the pendulum to the other on a neverending global ride is heavy.

George Carlin, the late great comedian, offered: “Have you ever noticed? Anyone going slower than you is an idiot, and anyone going faster than you is a maniac?”

Good deeds are relevant; GOOD <Capital “G” Good/Truth> is not.

My good deed then to you, reader, is to offer this:

To the God-fearing, I say “God created man in his image” and “Love thy neighbor.” If everyone is made in his image, and his image is perfect, there are no exceptions.

To the psychologically, philosophically, and/or scientifically minded, I need only mention Rousseau, Locke, Plato, Aristotle, and the belief that we are inherently good or born with the desire to be good. We continue to study this scientifically and rise to the same conclusion, as can be seen in the 2012 Harvard study and the birthing of The Psychology of Happiness.

To the politically-minded, what’s a thought piece on good deeds without an MLK, Jr. quote: “Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.”

I began this piece by saying “It ain’t easy being grey.” Midway through, I had already shown the error in my own judgement by reiterating true thinking: Only the GOOD is real. The thinking I state is grey is, in fact, the place that allows for the full spectrum of human experience and color, rather than limiting itself to black or white. What a beautiful reflection, then, to be here with you now reader, having you witness the intention of a good deed for you coming back to bless me before you’ve even seen this.

(*That’s some metaphysical/karmic ish right there! ^)

“As within, so without.” It begins with me. It begins with you. It begins within each of us.

It’s said we can’t see in others what doesn’t first exist within ourselves. Fill yourself with love (the truest form of good) the next time you feel hate, vengeance, disdain, or judgement, and watch yourself unfold. THAT is what creates GOOD deeds. THAT is what creates permeating ripples.

Where do you need to be loved?...

Namaste, my friends. (The divine in me bows to the divine in you.)