Have you ever wondered why there are so many people being born with mixed heritage these days? In today’s video, I explain the energetic reasons for and benefits of being multi-cultural.
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Awesome Dudette’s Burning Question
“Hi Melody, what does the Law of Attraction say about people of mixed heritage? My parents are from two very different countries/cultures (opposite sides of the world, one is Western the other East Asian). Is there a reason for more people now choosing to come in as multicultural or of mixed backgrounds? I’ve never felt like I totally belonged with either group and do feel that this caused me a lot of contrast in my early years. Now I believe these circumstances have given me a stronger affinity to connect with humanity on a larger scale without needing to belong to a national or cultural group.”
Transcript
Well you’ve put your finger right on it, Awesome Dudette because that is exactly what’s happening and that’s exactly why it’s happening. Are there more people mixing races now than ever before? Yes there are! Are there more people than ever growing up with differing cultural backgrounds, with two or even more differing cultural backgrounds in their family? Yes there are. You could blame that on increased mobility and more communication because it really isn’t that big of a deal these days to travel to Asia, Africa, South America, or Europe, like it was 100 years ago. Now you hop on a plane and a few hours later you’re there, making it much easier for us to meet people from other cultures and therefore have babies together.
Why would we choose to come in as a multi-cultural being?
I have some experience with this myself; I am the product of a German Mother and an American Father and I grew up on two different continents. I’ve spent more time outside of the United States than I have in it and, like you, I also felt that I never really belonged to either; I still don’t. I’ve come, like you, to the place where I see that as a positive rather than a negative. I really think that what’s happening now is that people are coming in so that they are able to experience more than one culture, and not be locked into any one culture.
Culture is nothing but a set of perspectives, and when you grow up experiencing more than one culture, or experience them by travelling extensively and immersing yourself in different cultures and also living in different countries, you are able to get access to a completely different set of perspectives that you otherwise would not have been able to see. I think that gives us a broader perspective, and it gives us a chance to connect more with each other. It’s really easy to hate somebody from across the pond and ascribe all kinds of negative qualities to them if you don’t know them and you’ve never met them. If they are actually in your reality, if you’ve met them, or they are actually in your family, then you are going to have a much harder time ascribing all kinds of negative things to them, and making all kinds of assumptions about them. It’s much harder to do that when you know them and you have an awareness of that culture. Having this awareness will open you up to realising that any assumption you have about other cultures could also be completely made up and arbitrary, because you don’t really know somebody if you haven’t met them. You cannot just assume that people from that culture are like this, this and this!
Once you’ve opened yourself up to more than one culture, it becomes much easier for you to be aware of the connectedness between all of us. You are more aware of the connection that you have, and that they are people too. Just because other cultures do things differently, doesn’t necessarily mean it is worse than how we do it; it could even be better or it could just be different.
I think a lot of people who are coming in now, already right off the bat, are getting a broader perspective by having different cultures in their family to begin with. They have that jumping off point where they now don’t have to push against the – lets be fair – ignorance that basically states “us against them” or “you are the outsiders and we are the insiders”. When we already grow up being an insider, or an outsider (we often feel like outsiders in both cultures), having some understanding of two or more cultures gives us a better chance of not ascribing, of not having such an ignorant point of view (let’s put it that way), that other people are different from us, fundamentally speaking at a soul level, and that they are somehow bad or worse than us. We see the sameness in ourselves and we are able to find the common ground. Once you can do that with two different cultures it becomes much easier to do it with other cultures as well.
The awakening of humanity
It’s all part of the grand awakening that is happening at the moment. The vibration is rising and people are becoming more tolerant. I know that it seems there is more violence in the world but this is happening because of these kinds of cultural clashes that I’ve already talked about, where people see it as us against them rather than having an understanding that we are all the same.
I don’t want you to despair about this because it’s actually a really hopeful message, even with all the conflict that’s going on right now. The conflict is happening because we have been holding onto a very ignorant point of view for a very long time and now we’re finally waking up and realising how painful that is; we are fighting against it. Once we are through that, a large number of people around the globe will have a much broader view, a much more compassionate view towards other races, other cultures, other countries and other (insert label here). People who they have formally seen as very different from them and who they have viewed in a judgemental way, these people will then be able to get rid of their judgement.
You are one of the people who have come through to take that jumping off point of multi-culturalism right from the start. You don’t have as far to go; you can go further than someone, for example, who has come into a very homogeneous existence where they are never ever confronted with any other cultures whatsoever.
I hope I’ve answered your question. If you found this content helpful please consider sharing it with somebody who would also find it beneficial as well. And if you want to join in the discussion please leave a comment below. If you have something to say about this subject, and just about everyone does, I do want to remind you to be respectful; this can be a very touchy subject for some people. I ask only that you add to the conversation and keep the conversation going, rather than leaving a comment and shutting it down because you don’t agree with something that has been said by me or another reader.
Huge happy shiny puppy hugs to all of you, and see you next time.
Bye!
Thanks for your awesome book. It cost more in postage than the actual book (which is so invaluable you couldn’t put a price on it) but I’m glad to have it in a hard copy because it’s going to be our family bible. Something I will pass down to my children. Infact it’s the first smaller item I’ve decided to pass along. I’m just wondering if I should have bought two, one for each child?
Today I’m excited as I’m deliberately creating and receiving!!! Yeah!!!!!!!!!
Oh wow Sweetish, thanks so much. And yes. You should buy two, hahahaha.
I’m kidding, of course.
You should buy three.
Ha.
Hugs!!
Melody
You’re a cheeky chica Melody and you make me laugh. What a great start to my day.
I have to ask you, how does it feel, if words can even describe it, knowing you help us create magic in our lives by helping us come out of the fog. What’s it feel like knowing you’ve guided us? What’s it feel like knowing the universe uses you to make lives much much better. Is it the only time you like being used? hahahaha
How do you know I’m not shamelessly using all of you to help me express my own awesomeness, eh?
Honestly, that is a bit how it is… I’m just doing what I’m inspired to do and this happens to align me with other people’s journey of awakening. But I don’t, for one second, take credit for that journey (I can’t manifest for you. That’s all on you).
Isn’t it just fabulous that we all get to have fun together?
Happy dance!
m
Thanks again Cindy.
The suburb and city I live in has one of the largest inflows of wealthy Chinese anywhere in the world. This means that real estate prices are going crazy with enormous mansions being built on every block. And I am renting. At the current rate I’ll be forced into a less desirable suburb. So the idea that no one can take anything away from you without your consent…. ?? Maybe I’ll be ok if the property market crashes. There are a few signs of that actually.
I take point about having similar fears, but it’s a bit different when you have this great country and lifestyle and everything is changing for the worse because of the huge infulx of migrants. On a city scale, most of the societal issues are to do with overpopulation and lack of integration.
When I travel, I try to integrate with the locals (when in Rome, do as the Romans). I try to leave a small footprint. I don’t go abroad, buy up all the best real estate, build cultural and religious centres aggrandizing my own stupid beliefs, invite my cousins and cousins and cousins of cousins and take over the whole place without any respect for the locals.
Thanks to everyone who commented on my post.
So comforting to see intelligent and considered responses. I’m going to give each response some time to sink in.
You know once upon a time, any website or forum with new age material was only frequented by dimwits telling us that they manifested a new car by looking in the classifieds, finding what they wanted and buying it.
I was asked a few questions about what I feel. My issue of course is based in fear. How could it be otherwise? All problems are fear based. I fear losing identity, I fear being swamped and overwhelmed by others’ cultures, I fear feeling like a foriegner in my own country, I fear not being able to communicate with others because they don’t speak English. The fears are not unfounded, but they are still fears, and in that sense I can work on them.
The do-gooders and left-wingers have to realize something VERY important. If you go up to someone in fear and say “you’re bad for fearing, stop fearing!” guess what happens?
No problem, CJ. It’s interesting you how articulated your fears. Guess who else has those same exact fears, arguably to an even greater extent? Immigrants to your country. Especially new immigrants. The biggest fears that immigrant parents have is that their children will lose the identities that have been assigned to their families for generations, often millennia. They fear losing an important part of themselves as well. And they, too, feel swamped, overwhelmed by other people’s cultures, and not being able to communicate because they don’t speak others’ languages. It sounds like you have much more in common with these people than you give yourself credit for. You’re all mirroring each other’s fears back to each other.
Ignore the people who force you to be more accepting at a faster pace than you’re ready. Obviously they’re not helpful to your expansion right now, so don’t involve them.
I don’t have any easy, quick answers for you at this moment. But here are a few things I want to say that may or may not be of help. First of all, you can’t possibly be eclipsed by other people’s cultures. I am 100% American, and I am of 100% Chinese descent, having been born in the PRC. I can tell you right now that none of the cultural influences I’ve received have ever eclipsed or replaced another. They co-exist side by side in my life, and I draw on multiple experiences as it suits me. I grew up in the northern part of the South, but I moved away from home and attended college in New England. Those two regions are like night and day, despite being on the East Coast of the U.S. I identify with both regions, call both my home, all the while continuing to have deep love for my country of birth.
NO ONE can take anything away from you without your consent. No one can even threaten your very identity if your vibration doesn’t allow it. You are not losing anything. You are not less Australian (however you want to define that) because of immigrant groups coming in and dwarfing you in numbers. Some of the most vibrant, strongest, and proudest groups in the world are extreme minorities. Numbers have nothing to do with it. Find all the things that you love about your identity, where your ancestors came from, what values you inherited that you’re so proud of, and generally the things you hold dearly that you’re so afraid of other people snatching away. Dwell on those long enough, and no one will threaten your identity.
Wow, this post is amazing! It’s funny how I (like everyone?) got into LOA teachings because I just wanted specific elements of my life to be better – I wanted more control – and it has really taken me into some deep Alan Watts “we are all one” places I didn’t see coming.
I’m a Third Culture Kid myself, which is something I’ve found challenging. Because of not being from anywhere in particular, I went through a long phase of trying to put things into boxes so I could know finally and for certain what was the right way to do things! When I first came to LOA stuff, I really struggled with the idea that there was no one right answer. It’s funny where life takes you, just recently I’ve been having short little visions of the world as parallel universes where every single human (and probably all other points of consciousness, but I can’t conceive of that yet) is in their own universe of rightness, and we overlap at specific points where we’ve agreed through our vibration to cooperate. So I just can’t really understand or judge someone else’s rightness. (I don’t always understand this, but when I meditate I can see it, sometimes.) And I am starting to get real with not wanting to push against other people – but of course, it’s so much easier in some ways than in other ways. Life!
Call me ignorant but before I came to the US((I’m of Indian origin), I thought all the hate only existed in India (between the Hindus and Muslims, North Indians and South Indians) People who spoke a dialect would ‘clump together’ like in CJ’s world and gang up on other groups or hide in shame and fear. I would think to myself, why can’t they just stop being so mean to each other? The North Indians would be overly critical of the South Indians — the way they dressed, talked and ate and vice versa. And the gender and color discrimination. OMG, it was like living in hell. I thought wow, I’m going to escape all of this and run away to a free country–America. Little did I know that for me, another cell was waiting in another faraway land where I would be an ‘immigrant’ and would face immigrant issues. I realized, wow, it’s like an epidemic disease, it’s everywhere (because of my beliefs which I’m trying very hard to change.) But I feel like a FOOL to think I was going to escape all of this nonsense. The biggest fool on earth. Not a victim but a FOOL.
As much as I love the whole LOA “thing” & apply it (successfully) to just about everything in my life, I find there are times we try too hard. I think we are becoming more multi-cultural on this planet because we can. Travel and information have become universal & readily available over the past 50 years and people are intermarrying (for instance) because people of different races & cultures are able to meet each other & marry. I don’t think it’s some cosmic scheme, I don’t think it’s some complex Hive Mind. It’s technology and science. Many of you will tell me technology & science are just the mediums through which we are attaining some Universal Stepping Stone in Our Cosmic Development, but I simply don’t buy that. Cultures have been blending, colliding, merging, adapting, marrying & waging war since mankind stepped down out of the trees, and probably before that. The rapid rate with which it’s happening now is simply a product of the ease of attainable travel.
It’s how the human race works. It’s frightening, alarming, disconcerting, uncomfortable, frustrating, annoying, enfuriating, wonderful, enriching, fulfilling. ALL reactions are valid. No one is right or wrong. It just is. The more time I spend immersed in the workings & principles of LOA the more I think we as a species complicate everything by over-thinking it. We don’t *have* to understand everything. Sometimes the key to happiness — and all those Good Vibrations we all want so badly — is just relaxing, accepting what is, working on our own stuff & letting go of any thought, attitude, habit or belief that doesn’t make us feel great. And that includes the need we seem to have to understand the workings of every tiny cog in the machine.
“Multi-culturalism” doesn’t even exist to my way of thinking. We’re all human beings. There is no difference amongst any of us on any level that counts. “Multi-culturalism” is a mind-set, a way of seeing & defining “us” and “them”. It can be positive [a way to expand our horizons & experiences] or negative [fear of losing our individual voice or identity or “stuff”], but both are simply beliefs, not realities. Want a different reality? Change your thinking. That’s all it ever comes down to.
That’s precisely what I was thinking too. Race is a social construct. If you go to India or China, there are a million “races.” So is “culture,” not to mention “ethnicity.” We use these terms because they are convenient. Therefore “multiculturalism” doesn’t really exist because as Melody says, a “culture” is just a systemic way of thinking. A convenient way to talk about people and ideas. But that’s all they are – tools. Once we see people for who they are, we dispel the tools.
Cool post and thanks to Awesome Dudette for asking the question. 🙂 I’m mixed race myself, my mum is English with a bit of Scottish heritage and my dad is West African (Cameroonian). I was born in Swaziland in Southern Africa and also lived in Lesotho in Southern Africa and Fiji. I’ve lived in the UK since I was 4. I like having different heritages and I’m glad that I got the chance to experience different cultures, it’s just a shame I don’t remember Africa because I was too young! lol. I think being mixed gives me a different perspective on thing, e.g. I try to see both ways when it comes to racial issues. Things aren’t always simple.
I find it really interesting to learn about other countries and cultures, I like things that are “different, like foreign languages. And I like the fact that the world is becoming more multicultural. I do get depressed sometimes because there still seems to be so much negativity in the world, especially with all the stories about racism and violence going on in America lately. But I try not to focus too much on the negative side. People are mixing more these days and becoming more open minded in general.
My mom is white and my father was 1/2 black & 1/2 white. I’m not sure what that makes me. 1/4 black? Heh! But I used to HATE it. In school kids told me they could tell because of my hair and they would make fun of me, so I spent most of my life hating my hair (as most black women do I guess). Nothing makes you learn to love and accept yourself just the way you are like kinky, coiled, coarse ethnic hair in a world dominated by people will straight silky hair.
I used to use harsh chemical relaxers to straighten it so that it would look like “everyone else” but I guess it was still obvious that my hair isn’t “white”. It wasn’t until in the last year that I started embracing my natural hair. Now I get compliments on my hair all the time. There are occasional naysayers in my family, but I don’t listen to them anymore. I just tell them they are more than welcome to come to my house and flat iron it if they are that offended by it. That shuts them down pretty fast. 🙂
I should have done this a long time ago. I don’t have to freak out every time it rains and I can actually ENJOY going swimming without worrying what I’ll do with my hair when I’m done. Actually, my hair looks exactly the same when I swim as it does when I’m not swimming. All of my “normal” haired friends are jealous now. 😉
I didn’t mean to go on and on about my hair. LOL! I guess my hair has been my main source of experience with being bi-racial.
I love natural hair! I sometimes read natural hair blogs (I am white) because I find it really uplifting to see people who’ve been told “your hair is wrong” decide “my hair is GREAT”, it’s like a spiritual journey to witness. And it’s what I want for myself in so many areas, to decide that what I think is literally the only thing that matters.
Hi Cordy! It really is a spiritual journey of sorts. There are a lot of things I never would have experienced or learned from had I not been blessed with a unique head of hair. It’s still a bit of a process for me because it’s short. I want it to be long and BIG so bad! LOL! I know it will eventually get there if I continue to take care of it.
I’m biracial and I love my natural hair 😀 I used to have my hair relaxed and never really got to see the actual texture, until one day I started trimming off the damaged ends and out came all of these waves, curls and coils. I was in awe. Now, I don’t quite love trying to manage it, but when I see it, for example, after I’ve washed it, because I keep it braided most of the time, my frustration kind of subsides because I remember how beautiful it is to me. I actually admire all hair types… Straight, curly, wavy, it’s all pretty to me.
Yeah I love all types of hair. It’s always the first thing I notice on people. 🙂
I still can’t believe that I went through so much pain and torment just to have straight hair. Remember having to put your head between your knees because the relaxer burned so bad? OMG! It was awful! It’s so funny how reality changes a long with you on things. I remember saying “to hell with it” on relaxing my hair and it wasn’t long after that, I started hearing about the natural movement. Then more and more of the black women I work with started wearing their natural hair. It was really cool to watch that shift within myself and then pretty much everyone around me.
The grand awakening is slow as shit.
Touchy subject, huh? I find it a sad that you had to ask people to be considerate, and some didn’t listen anyway. There are plenty of places I would expect that, but not here.
Ah well, I guess it is a good place to try and change beliefs- that is why they are here. It is why we are all here.
So keep leading from the front Melody. Even if some of your troops are slackers, they aren’t deserters. 😉
Hi, just wanted to jump on the multicultural bandwagon too… 🙂
Being born and raised in Singapore, which is on the tip of the Malay Penisula in Southeast Asia, culture (and religion) is definitely a tremendous hot topic here. The native population is 70% Chinese with about 10% indigenous Malays and 10% Indians, with an official secular stance towards religion. It’s surrounded by majority Malay/Indonesian Muslim countries which are less economically well off, with the result being the dominant national discourse emphasizing the need to maintain racial and religious harmony and defend the country. This is used to justify conscription of the able bodied male population. Needless to say, it’s a worldview based on fear, and more and more young people (including yours truly!) are questioning this worldview and choosing to reject the legacy of their ancestors. I think the same is probably happening in the world all over, kind of like what the hippies did in US in the past.
Also, the really interesting part is how this waking up plays out on a national level as well. There have recently been significant numbers of new immigrants from mainland China (PRCs) and India into Singapore. They are ethnically similar but culturally very different to the native Chinese and Indians, who view themselves as Singaporeans first and X ethnicity second. This conflicts with the largely ethnocentric perspective of the new immigrants and has resulted in misunderstandings and several ugly incidents. For example, many PRCs assume local Chinese speak Mandarin, when in fact some can’t and would rather speak English, and look down on those who can’t as “banana people!” (yellow outside, white inside). I think we’re here as a nation to wake these people up, to reflect to the great civilizations of China and India that ethnocentricism simply doesn’t work anymore. So as the world moves closer into alignment with oneness, the basic categories of thinking which have been entrenched for millennia – race, religion, tribe – are going to become less and less of a point of conflict between individuals, until we create Heaven on Earth.
I am not Singaporean, but I’ve had a long-standing interest in Singapore. Having parents who are originally from the PRC, I can certainly attest to the Sino-centric views of many of these newcomers. Their attitude doesn’t surprise me, as they would not only assume, but demand, that anyone who identifies even remotely as “Chinese” to speak Mandarin. Given the history of Singapore and its origins as a British colony (if they had only bothered to read up on it before moving there), there should no reasonable expectation that this would be the case. Even if the Peranakan Chinese did not prefer English as their native language, their second or even third choice of language wouldn’t be Mandarin, let alone “standardized Mandarin.” It’d either be a dialect such as Hokkien, or a hybrid of Hokkien and Malay, as many Peranakans also have Malay ancestry in them, no? Mandarin, on the other hand, would be a far less popular choice, as they’d only have gained fluency in it through government-imposed schooling, unlike the other languages, which they would have inherited organically.
Wow Cindy, from reading your comments, you seem to be a very knowledgeable person! And what you said about how race is a social construct is very likely true for biology. I vaguely remember taking a class once on race, which presented biologists’ views on the question of whether race is actually biological or not. The consensus seemed to be that depending on how you defined the basic unit of analysis, race either is or isn’t inherently a biological trait. So it seems like the fundamental question of what counts as race is essentially arbitrary! This seems like one of those LOA things where biological “reality” is in fact an artefact of your beliefs, rather than “out there” in the objective world.
Absolutely. I’m not too well-read on biology, or science in general, so I can’t reply in-depth right now from that perspective. Hopefully one day I will. From a social sciences perspective, though, I’ve always believed this to be the case. I was lucky enough to go to a liberal arts college that emphasized identifying social constructs left and right, almost to the point where it got super annoying. But that sort of teaching resonated with me easily. From growing up having to fill in “race” bubbles on forms and standardized tests, it always bothered me having to identify as “Asian,” as that is one of the biggest constructs imposed by the western world. (No one living in Asia self-identifies as Asian).
And I meant what I said earlier as well. Due to increased exposure with the rest of the world, people in mainland China are finally waking up to the notion that there is no such thing as a monolithic Chinese culture. It simply doesn’t exist, especially amongst a demographic that big. As for the social tensions you mentioned occurring in Singapore (of which I have no personal exposure since I’ve never set foot in Singapore), that all sounds very sad and unnecessary to me. It boggles my mind as to how someone can pick up their belongings and move to another country without gaining an elementary understanding of country’s history. Simply reading a Wikipedia article about Singapore’s history would have obviated the need to wonder why there are Chinese Singaporeans who don’t speak Mandarin in the exact same manner that they would. Ack…the ignorance! Um….hello? All this info is free as long as you internet connection?
Even my own older relatives, who were born and raised in the PRC and came of age during the Cultural Revolution, get these facts mixed up about Chinese diasporas. And they’re supposedly intellectuals! Years of state-controlled PRC education does that to you. I had to sit down and explain basic facts to them about Singapore’s demographics, as they were wondering about the “weird” ways in which the members of Parliament were speaking Mandarin on TV in the wake of LKY’s passing. Sigh. It was infuriating, but we finally sorted it out. It takes long, time-consuming corrections like these to wipe out only a little bit of the monolithic Chinese identity B.S. that the Communist Party propagated for decades.
Yup, I think there was some ancient Greek guy who said that everything is ultimately political. But regardless, more and more people like us are starting to see that culture need not be a point of contention but something interesting to learn about and appreciate.
By the way, lest someone accuses me of being anti-Chinese, I’m of Chinese ethnicity myself and a fan of Taoist philosophy and Chinese history (specifically the Three Kingdoms period). 🙂
Yep, I love Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Zhuge Liang was brilliant. ????
I see we are on the same wavelength. How do I get in touch with you so that we can correspond further via email?
If you leave a comment on my blog and fill in the email box, I’ll email you.
https://bodmadetorun.wordpress.com/
Hey Melody
I really enjoyed this article. As someone who travels frequently and has spent long periods of time in other countries, it does broaden your perspective so much, and helps you understand better why people do what they do and believe what they believe. It also opens your eyes to the fact there really is no one set way to do things or ‘right’ way. What I have learned from my travels has helped me a lot in interacting more effectively with people and being more tolerant and less judgmental. I also liked what you said about how while it seems things are getting ‘worse’ that is actually not true. I see all the volatility as some sort of ‘purge’ that will make way for better things and big changes. Great stuff as always!
Hi Melody
I totally agree and in my own life I can see correlation; growing up in a catholic family in northern Ireland, and going to a catholic school but with protestant neighbours, I started to question the supposed differences very early on, and looking back I can see like awesome Dudette that this gave me the opportunity to have a broader perspective and also pushed me to do the work to let go of these and many more labels, that I picked up along the way as I moved to England and then Scotland. Realising that we are of course all the same, all part of the universal puzzle. I completely agree that when you actually get to know someone the labels become defunt.. even A recent trip for the first time to Croatia has expanded this even more, and I love having those realisations and shifts, as I let go of older baggage. love and light to you and great job!! Bernie xx
It’s aborigines, not aboriginals. They would have been completely stunned, I’m sure. The English had completed an industrial revolution whilst the Australian aborigines were still hunting for food and wearing animal skins. The explorers of the time were given the directive to engage and befiend the locals, which they did for the most part (excluding the stolen generation, which of course was terrible, though well intentioned).
We’re talking about another time – 17th century. Back then, the done thing was discovering new lands and colonize them. Nowadays, we have two cultures (aboriginal and Australian) which are totally fractured. There’s just no communication whatsoever between the two. What does that say about trying to push two vastly different cultures to mix? It HAD to fail. And we’re seeing it all over again with new cultures pushing their cause.
Proper mixing and cross breeding will happen when people relax into non-judgment of others. My problem is that this has to happen naturally and not be forced by the do-gooder, left wingers. If it’s forced it will just cause more fracturing and division.
Hey there CJ,
Thanks for contributing your perspective. I know it’s one that many people share and struggle with.
No, you don’t have to pretend to love anything that you don’t love. That’s the whole point of this work – to become aware of your emotions and if they are negative, do something about them. As Toby stated, it’s all good. But, this situation clearly bothers you, and that’s something you may want to take a look at (if you want to feel better). The idea is not to ignore how this makes you feel, but to engage with the emotions it brings up.
What about this situation, the people “breeding like rabbits” and the “do-gooders” bothers you so much? How do you feel this is affecting you personally (because it’s all personal)? What emotions come up within you? What are you projecting onto others? In other words, what is this REALLY about for you? If you sit with those emotions and see where they take you, you may be very surprised by what they’re actually telling you.
I’ve been a foreigner living in another country pretty much all my life. I never fully integrated in Spain (although I did have a fabulous and incredibly valuable experience there). Part of that was the fact that I hung out with other international people – we had the bond of being fish out of water and had a lot in common because of that. I totally understand how people who move to different countries seek out those of their birth country and band together. It can be stressful to be in a place where you feel so different and hanging out with “your own” can offer safety, security and comfort. But part of it was the the locals had no need or desire to integrate with us. They had their lives established, their childhood friends, and really only sought out people like me to practice their English. There was no real desire to connect. I, personally, had a wonderful experience, but I saw enough to understand how different cultures can stay so divided. This speaks to the point I made in the video – if you don’t actually know someone, it can be easy to ascribe all kinds of qualities to them and assume you know what their experience is and the motivation behind their actions and behavior (that they don’t WANT to integrate, for example. Many people do want to, but don’t know how, or are afraid to…)
I agree that this kind of interaction cannot be forced (although it can be facilitated). Tolerance cannot be enforced either, but we each, within ourselves, can make the decision to try and find a different perspective, to reach out and actually get to know people, to gather more data, if you will, and come to different conclusions. This is a choice and this has to be a choice. And if it’s a choice, then it has to also be ok not to do this, if one chooses not to.
I look forward to the day when we just see each others as human, as individuals, when we realize that someone’s culture has nothing to do with the person they are (but then we have to get to know each person before we can understand anything about them). And for each of us, that day can come as soon as we choose to engage that way. And I think that’s beautiful. 🙂
Again, thanks for being brave enough to contribute your valuable perspective.
Huge hugs,
Melody
I second Melody’s view on this issue.
I would like to add some gravy.
– Language is a group creation and group agreement.
– Rules and regulations are group creations and group agreements.
– Culture is a combination of group creations and group agreements that survived the test of time for those groups.
as you can imagine, there are hundreds of languages.
There are millions of rules.
There are many cultures.
they all work.
none of them are perfect
we don’t have to settle for just one.
There is always a choice.
It sounds to me like what you’re really against is disingenuousness. You don’t like being forced to do or feel anything, or to watch other people being forced to do or feel anything either, for that matter. Judging from the fact that you read this blog, it’s fair to assume that you’re pretty idealistic, to a large extent. Being manipulated to hold certain views about events happening around you doesn’t sit well with you. It feels forced, manufactured, fake…and every part of you wants to rebel against that. You’d rather see people forge alliances based on genuine affection for each other, rather than being bullied into it by the “do-gooder, left wingers.” Indeed it is those people who are stealing the very opportunity for these things to occur naturally, no? Malcolm X said something similar once.
The example you used between the Aborigines and the English colonizers was not an apt one, unfortunately. Like Native American groups in the Americas and African exported enslaved individuals, they never once chose to be confronted with European settlers. The exact opposite is true of modern-day immigrant groups to your country. They voluntarily chose to move from their home countries and to live under a new system of government, agreeing to abide by whatever social contract exists between the two parties. The fact that they self-segregate from the predominant Australian population (at least in the way you’re observing it) is NOT comparable to the clashing that occurred between the Aborigines and earlier English colonizers. This is not a social experiment that’s destined to fail or scathe your country. As far as I’m concerned, the energy with which the Aborigines faced their white counterparts is nowhere near the energy that modern day Australian immigrants face their white counterparts. Many of these people work desperately hard to adopt mainstream values and “assets” in order to gain acceptance in your system of valuing people. After all, do their children not adopt Australian accents when they speak English, in the hopes that it’ll make them sound more intelligent or employable? Or to adopt your mannerisms and ways of thinking, all for the purpose of getting a leg up in your world? Just because they might prefer the company of kids hailing from their own backgrounds doesn’t mean they’re spitting on your culture. They’re already continents away from some of their most loved relatives, all to seek a “better” life in your country, and all by trying to do it your way, even if it’s “imperfect.” Think about that for a second. That ought to mean something, even if they’re doing it “badly” in your book.
Am I allowed to be honest here?… (serious question).
I’m fed up with most non-western cultures. Not all, but most. Here in Australia we get absolutely swamped by any and every Asian, Indian and Arab culture. None of them makes the slightest effort to assimilate to our culture. They speak their own language, clump together in ghettos, do their own thing and it causes a massive fracturing of society. The other thing that happens is that they drain the public purse by breeding like rabbits and claiming any/every benefit made available by our generous taxpayers. And then the do-gooders say how wonderful it is having multiculturalism. All that’s happened is that instead of one country, we now have 10 divided nations squashed into one, with none of them communicating or interacting with the other.
Is speaking this way allowed or do I have to pretend to love this crap?
Hi CJ,
it may that the Asian, Indian and Arab communities in Australia actually do try to integrate with the local Australians, but your focusing on their not assimilating (for whatever reason) creates evidence in your reality that they are not assimilating. Remember, in LOA the evidence follows the beliefs, not the other way around. So if you make an effort to move up the emotional ladder on this topic, by not pretending to love this crap and moving up into anger and beyond, you might shift your focus and manifest more evidence of these communities trying to assimilate.
Also technically speaking “Asian” includes Indians too. But anyway in practice Asia usually refers to East Asians from China Japan Korea the Vietnamese – who are all very distinct ethnic peoples. So simplified labels like “Asian” trade accuracy for the sake of convenience.
No, you don’t ever have to pretend to like anything. That doesn’t solve problems; it just creates more. Even as an East Asian woman whose family immigrated to the U.S. in the 1980s, I have to admit I’ve had similar thoughts at times about “non-western” cultures, especially since I’ve been on the receiving end of much of the “unenlightened” parts of these schools of thoughts from relatives. Keep in mind, though, that a lot of these groups of which you speak (and you left out a lot more than just people of color), stay together because of a massive amount of fear. It’s not out of arrogance, laziness, or heaven forbid, because they’re trying to piss you off. It is love that keeps them close to their families, but FEAR that keeps them clinging to other people of their own backgrounds, regardless of whether or not they actually like each other. I’m lucky in that my parents raised me to NOT be like this, so a lot the similar thoughts I have to yours are born out of privilege, and that doesn’t make it okay either. But if you’ve never emigrated to another country, it’s hard to imagine the fear and anxiety that accompanies not being proficient in a language, not understanding the social and cultural norms there, and coming from a place where you believe that people are fundamentally belligerent, not benevolent. It all adds to up to a giant amount of fear, so much so that they shut down into pain-minimizing mode. And eliminating pain is accomplished by sticking with people whose speech and thought patterns are similar to their own, for fear that those who don’t will disrupt their sense of safety and order. That partially explains a lot of the fracturing you see. My question to you is this though: why does this fracturing bother you? Yes, it sucks for them if they don’t expand their horizons, but why exactly does it trigger you? How does it dampen the quality of YOUR life if other people are behaving out of fear and missing? How you feel about these specific groups is irrelevant. It’s only what their “annoying” behavior is reflecting back to you that matters.
I’m a big believer that people shouldn’t have children unless they have the means to raise them. It is indeed irresponsible to depend on the government and drain other people’s hard-earned tax dollars. Nonetheless people from non-immigrant backgrounds do this as well, and it’s not a direct by-product of “multiculturalism.” Even if it is, the government is to blame for enabling this. In any type of manipulative behavior, there is always an enabler involved. After all, if your elected officials flat-out refused to leak your tax dollars to these people, they’d either get away because they’d stop being a vibrational match to them, or stop “breeding like rabbits” altogether, as you describe it. It sounds like your beef is more with the crack dealer than with the addict. Again, how does this affect you and what are you going to do about it? You can’t control how and when other people breed (unless you start policing their unprotected sex lives), but you can control something else, and you can air your dissatisfaction to those who have the power to change things, coming from a place of powerful energy yourself.
I live in Australia too and in my pre-LOA days I was quite alarmed by the number of immigrants coming here who don’t attempt to assimilate and worse, cause problems due to their religion and beliefs. But now that I am an LOA girl, I released that resistance and I don’t focus on that anymore, I just send love to everyone and remember that deep down we are all people and focus on things in my life that feel good. After all, I am creating everything in my reality, it’s my hologram and I can choose not to have that in it. And I actually don’t see it so much anymore and I noticed my vibration rise because of it. I feel more tolerant and loving towards all people. It’s a really nice feeling.
Nice post Melody. I also believe that globalisation means that one day there will be no race, and therefore no racism because we will all be a mix of everything.