Things don\u2019t appear to be much better this year as all indications are that we remain a hopelessly divided nation when it comes to politics. In fact, according to one commentator, we could be \u201csitting on a powder keg and the fuse has been lit,\u201d and \u201c[t]he protective shield that all democracies and social orders rely on\u2014legitimacy of the governing body, some level of elite responsibility, the willingness of citizens to view their neighbors in a civic way\u2014is in an advanced stage of decline or collapse.\u201d It\u2019s this tension between citizens<\/i> on a day-to-day basis that is arguably the most pernicious type of stress that I see.<\/p>\n
I, of course, would be happy if my chosen candidate wins, but the fact that so many people on \u201cthe other side\u201d might want to set me on fire for my choice\u2014a sentiment I may or may not have reciprocated in the past\u2014is extremely unsettling. That\u2019s why I took some comfort and guidance from a discussion I heard on NPR\u2019s Hidden Brain<\/i> program recently. According to the expert on the show, we massively overestimate how much people on the other side of the political fence dislike us, by anything between 50-300 percent(!)\u2014the more partisan we are, the more inflated our belief is that the other side hates us.<\/p>\n
We also incorrectly tend to assume that people on the other side are irrational or dumb or morally depraved, and then we treat these assumptions as facts (I may or may not have done this, too), whereas we are all basically striving for the same goals but for different and understandable reasons.3<\/sup> Apparently, our minds want simplicity, particularly with moral issues, because if we were to concede that morality is complicated, we may need to acknowledge that our own moral beliefs might be wrong sometimes (I am unlikely to have engaged in this type of acknowledgement).<\/p>\n So, it\u2019s fair to say that at least some of the election stress we feel is self-inflicted, based on misperceptions, unsupported suppositions, a lack of introspection, and\/or a reluctance to engage in political debate based on the other person\u2019s life experiences. Once we understand this, we can lessen our stress by focusing on what we can control, rather than feeling helpless about what we can\u2019t. One thing we can do is \u201creframe\u201d how we view and interact with each other.3 <\/sup>That is, get to know each other on a human level first to gain an understanding of the reasons why the other person votes in a particular way. Only then can we try to engage in a debate about why they should vote differently, not based on our<\/i> reasons, but theirs<\/i>. One thing is true, if we all yell at each other, particularly on social media, we all become tone-deaf.<\/p>\n 1- https:\/\/www.apa.org\/news\/press\/releases\/2020\/10\/election-stress<\/span> Election Year Stress With the presidential elections hurtling towards us in nightmarish d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu fashion, I am trying not to turn into a ball of stress. I know it\u2019s not just me. The American Psychological Association reported that the historically divisive nature of the 2020 presidential election increased individuals\u2019 stress by 16 percent from the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3899,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"two_page_speed":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-editorial"],"yoast_head":"\n
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\n2- https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/2023\/dec\/27\/politics-2024-trump-biden-election-democracy-authoritarian<\/span>
\n3- https:\/\/hiddenbrain.org\/podcast\/us-2-0-win-hearts-then-minds\/<\/span><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/peykmagazine.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/Flower4.jpg\")
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