Stop Arguing Politics on Social Media: The Buddhist Parable of the Empty Vessel
I jumped back on Twitter this week after being off the platform for a few years. I’m just over a week into a challenge that I set out for myself when I launched this website. My goal is to write thirty articles in thirty days, a minimum of five-hundred published words per day. With all the work I’ve been putting into this website I figured it’s probably a good idea to begin to build a social presence and hopefully get people reading this stuff. My intent was to only follow people and organizations on Twitter that aren’t going to complain 24/7 about the state of politics in this country, left, right or center. I realize that Twitter has always been inherently political due to the fact that it’s so easy to share your opinion with anyone, but I can’t believe how unavoidable and pervasive the vitriol is.
On the Twittersphere you simply can’t avoid the politics, no matter who you follow. My goal is to follow positive people, entrepreneurs, thought leaders, etc; people that are working to build businesses and help people improve their lives, and there are a lot of really positive people. Unfortunately the political angst is an epidemic. There isn’t a day that goes by where someone tweets a positive article or shares their thoughts on subjects such as being a better father, or developing a better mindset and the subsequent comments inevitably turn into a bunch of people pointlessly arguing politics, gender and religion.
My effort to avoid politics is on purpose. A year ago I made the decision to completely avoid the political debate. This doesn’t mean that I stopped voting or educating myself on the key issues leading up to elections. What I stopped doing was endlessly obsessing about factors that are beyond my control. It’s amazing what avoiding Fox/CNN/MSNBC can do for your state of mind. Instituting a personal news blackout is incredibly fulfilling. The news is inherently negative. Stop watching the major networks for a week and you’ll be amazed at how your mood changes. if something major happens, like the recent wildfires in Southern California, you’ll find out about it and tune in. Avoid the outrage. Make a decision to distance yourself from people that are constantly complaining about politics and forever trying to prove their point with the accompanied air of intellectual superiority.
The Twitter and Facebook comments remind me of the Buddhist parable of the empty vessel. In the story a man is riding down a river in a boat when he strikes another boat. This sends him into a rage. His anger subsides when he realizes that it was an empty boat that came loose of its moorings. With no one to get mad at or pay for the damage to his boat, he simply goes about his day and completes his journey. The lesson in the parable is better managing your anger and how you react to things beyond your control. People who spend hours angrily debating their political views with complete strangers are essentially arguing with empty vessels. There are fewer pursuits more pointless than wasting energy and brainpower trying to change the mind of a faceless stranger on social media. It’s no different than constantly getting angry with others on the freeway. I used to find myself critiquing the speed others are driving, the lane changes they are making and the turn signal they aren’t using until I came to the realization that it’s a useless endeavor. I can’t control how others are going to drive. The worst thing I can do it let it affect my mood. The same goes for strangers on Twitter. Even if through incredible logic and use of facts you somehow make someone change their point of view (extremely unlikely) what does it even mean in the grant scheme of things? It doesn’t change anything.
You have to ask yourself whether or not expending the energy arguing with a stranger on social media helps your day in any way, no matter how passionate you are on the subject. Does it distract you from engaging with those around you? Does it make you more productive?Perhaps the answer is yes, but in most cases I’m guessing it’s a no. I realize the political debate is so pervasive in America these days that its impossible to go through your day and avoid encountering opinions on politics. The key is to avoid engaging if the outcome only results in negativity and wasted energy. For me mindfulness plays a big factor. Through the practice of meditation I’ve become adept at recognizing when negative thoughts enter my mind and not letting them take over my mind.
In the end it all comes down to where you want to invest your time. I’m a busy professional with a full-time job, a wife, and three very busy kids. I have an active social life and a household to help maintain. These are my priorities in life. Why inject meaningless political debates with strangers into that? Be attentive to what is directly in front of you and stop getting riled up about the opinion of a someone you’ll likely never meet that lives five states away. Time is finite, we only have so much of it in a day. Don’t waste it things that don’t matter.