Beyond Sides: Learning to See Each Other Again
The other morning, Clare and Merit were on the way to the school bus, talking about molecules…how everything is made up of molecules, and molecules are made up of smaller parts. So, Clare said, “That’s how we are the same. We are all part of Momma God.”
Merit looked confused, “That doesn’t make any sense.”
Clare tried again, “Well, we all have Momma God in our hearts.”
Merit shook her head, totally unsatisfied, “But that doesn’t mean we are all Momma God.”
So Clare reached for a metaphor by pointing to Merit’s crystal necklace, “Think of it like this: one side of the crystal can be blue, another side purple, and another side red. They look different, but they’re all part of the same crystal.”
Before she could finish, Merit lit up, “Oh, I get it! We are all just different faces for Momma God. Even the clouds, and the trees, and even other people.”
At six, she named something I didn’t fully grasp until my twenties, when I was searching for God beyond dogma in the painful aftermath of being outed. What pulled me forward wasn’t certainty about who was right and who was wrong. It was realizing that divinity, belonging, and love were far bigger than the categories people tried to fit them into.
That’s the problem with where we are right now in our society…we’re caught in a culture that keeps demanding we choose the “one true face” of the crystal. Meaning, my side, my belief, my politics, and the rest? Invalid, disposable, AND wrong.
But what I am noticing lately isn’t just sides…it’s a LOT of noise and dead silence. Some people shout so loudly their certainty drowns out everything else. Others go quiet, overwhelmed and unsure if their voice even matters. And in the space between the shouting and the silence, the harder work of seeing each other gets lost.
Merit’s insight reminds me that our differences aren’t proof of separation, they’re actually proof of connection. Each of us refracts the light differently, but the source is shared, and when we can see that, the paradox stops being threatening. It then becomes sacred.
We don’t have to erase differences to belong to each other. We just have to stop demanding that only one face counts.
Beneath all that is going on around us, I hear a deeper weariness from everyone. People are tired of outrage, tired of the headlines, tired of feeling like compassion is naïve and nuance is impossible. That weariness matters, because it means we’re hungry for something else…a different way of being with each other.
So here’s my invitation: the next time you feel pulled into an argument that demands you choose sides, imagine the crystal. Ask yourself if you can hold more than one color at once. Ask yourself if you can see the whole without erasing the parts.
Because the world doesn’t need us to simplify each other into categories. It needs us to live into the mystery of being many and one at the same time.
