Forever 21

The world has no need to be represented: there it is, all around us, all the time. What it needs is to be loved better. Or maybe, what we need is to be reminded to love it and to be shown how, because sometimes, busy as we get trying to stay alive, loving the world slips our mind.
George Saunders

I listened to Heather Cox Richardson talk about the murder of Alex Pretti right after it happened. She was, in her words, “incensed” and “furious beyond articulation.” She explained that was why her voice sounded flat. She was so choked up by the end of the video that she simply asked that we carry the torch forward, then abruptly cut off. She never does that – it is a measure of her grief and humanity.

I’ve called a bunch of republican senators and left messages, blaming them for the murder of both Alex Pretti and Rene Good. It’s not enough. It felt like nothing because to shame someone, they have to be capable of feeling shame. I am devastated by this. I listen to HCR at least twice a week because while on the one hand she reminds us this is going to get much worse, on the other, she offers the facts of any given situation and she holds steady. We need people like her.

And we need to listen to all the sane politicians who are telling us not to get violent. That is what Trump and his regime want. They want to goad people until they lose their shit and that will give them an excuse to send in the military and create police states across the country. We can’t let this happen.

This is a tall ask not only because of the regime’s actions, but because they then rush to the nearest microphone to tell us what we saw is not what we saw and that what is so, is not. Suddenly the country is filled with “domestic terrorists” as a pretext for the Insurrection Act. Unfortunately, this is true. It’s just that the terrorists are inside the White House. 

I’ve read 1984 many times. During each reading my anxiety was palpable. To imagine having to live that – I thought it a really well-written fantasy. But it is here, it is now.

Like many, I feel helpless. We must continue to protest, to call, to write letters, to stay informed….but what else? This morning I thought that I needed to get my mind right. We all need to get our minds right. We need to protest what is happening and protect our neighbors without doing Trump’s work for him.

I’ve been thinking to do more than dabble in Buddhism. Yes, I meditate daily, read – or half-read – a book here and there, listen to the occasional Dharma talk. But I want more structure and I want it on a sustained basis. I want more than to meditate and to remind myself to be present as I go about my day. I want teaching.

I decided to start with an IMS (Insight Meditation Society) audio program which I’m listening to on the Buddhist retreat I’m currently at. I know enough about Buddhism to know that we are to love, no matter what. And one of the reasons I’ve avoided more serious inquiry into Buddhism is just that. Because that means facing what is happening in this country and the people who are causing it and what? Love them? Cos-player Kristi Noem? Evil white nationalist Stephen Miller? Blowhard J.D. Vance? Degenerate Trump? And the feckless, cowardly, sycophantic republicans supporting them?

You see my problem.

I know full well that any bitter feelings I have are felt by me and therefore I am the one who suffers them. One of my favorite sayings is “Being angry is like drinking poison and hoping the other person dies.” And nothing about Buddhism is stupid – it is not a philosophy of sit home and say “om” and do nothing. It’s about the mind that you do it with. Can I be angry in a skillful way?

This is no easy ask but it’s worth the work of practicing it. The people in Minneapolis are living this. Their response has been to assemble peacefully, protest loudly, help their friends and neighbors. I am in awe with the way they are handling the murderers – aka ICE – that have been sent into their community.

The nation watches this and we seethe. We know what it is to hate. Hate is what rises when I have even a passing thought of Trump and sycophantic regime. But I am the one who suffers that. And I wouldn’t want to act in that state of mind because no good will come for anyone if I do.

That doesn’t mean not to act. The question is what works to free the mind from suffering, from hate. Then we can act skillfully. Metta meditation, also known as loving-kindness, is practice rooted in cultivating compassion, love and goodwill. It involves saying a set of phrases to oneself, to a loved one, to a neutral person, to a difficult person and then to all beings. It is the most difficult form of meditation for me and I mostly avoid it. I’ve got my phrases: May you be happy, may you be free from suffering, may you know peace, joy and prosperity, may you know love.

The point is not that I am going to magically alter anyone’s life by saying these things. I’m not going to make anyone happy or rich or peaceful. What I’m trying to do is open my heart and clear my mind. If I truly feel compassion, I will do no harm. Kindness will be felt not only by whoever I’m directing it to but also by me. I know this because I’ve felt kindness rise and flow. It is not something I can control, but the by-product of practice. Would that I feel it all the time, but such is the nature of impermanence. Even a preferred state of being will pass.

This has been a really long way of writing what I’m about to write, as offensive as it might sound. I do not mean it that way. When I think of a “difficult” person, it’s someone I’m having a hard time, someone that brings up rage, disgust, resentment. There is no one who does that more than Trump and his devotees. Am I to sit and wish them…well, anything other than living whatever their very own version of hell would be? Because wishing them dead seems an easy out for them.

But think about this. If any of those miscreants were happy or joyful or peaceful or free from suffering, would they act as they do? So maybe the words are something like, “May you be free from rage, from evil, from greed, from racism, from degeneracy.”  Because again – the goal is to ease these things in our own minds so we can can see clearly enough to take right action and not make any of this worse.

We must overcome Trump, and in the process, not become him.

© 2026 Denise Smyth