OPINION (AN COLÚN): Resolving to keep the season's true messages going

AMID all the giving and receiving of gifts I often think that the greatest gift of the festive season is not a physical object, but something of the mind – the gift of the attitude that we adopt to others, to our daily interactions with our community.
This state of mind comes from the heart of God and it draws our attention to the importance of peace and goodwill, of being forgiving of others. When we are absorbed in these feelings of peace and goodwill, when we are putting aside hurt and anger and replacing it with forgiveness, then we are in a very desirable space, a blessed and deeply contented space. The mental warmth we feel during this state of being is like a hug from a loved one, it's like being wrapped in a blanket of ease and compassion.
A great problem for the world is that after the holiday season is over, many of us put this blessed state of mind to one side and descend down to a baser level. Our minds become seized once again by greed and lust and we lose sight of our moral compass.
Some of us though try to perpetuate the spirit of Christmas throughout the remainder of the year. This can be very hard, and often it feels like you are swimming against the tide. Sometimes it can feel as if everybody in the room disagrees with you, or everybody in the town disagrees with you, or indeed everybody in the world. Naturally enough many of us crack under this pressure of the tribe and decide to go with the flow. We go with the flow and abandon our feelings, because we don't want the pain of being sneered at or criticised by others in the tribe. Often this works out ok and no major harm is done. However, when the tribe or the Group Think is seriously awry then damage can be done; in these difficult and stressful moments it behoves us to do the right thing, the heroic thing; in these pivotal moments it behoves us to be “nobody-but-yourself”, as the American poet EE Cummings puts it. Cummings believed that, “To be nobody-but-yourself – in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else – means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.” Sometimes during the year we have to take a solitary stand and keep the spirit of Christmas alive.
The world is indeed doing its best to make you fit in and be like everybody else. If you decide to go against this incredibly powerful instinct then you don't necessarily have to do anything terribly dramatic. It could be simple things like disagreeing during conversations with others who are being racist or sectarian, and reminding them of the simple truth that we are all creatures of God; it could be done by choosing to not be judgemental of other people's dress sense, mannerisms or body shape (even when others are sneering and denigrating of them) because you know there is much more to life than outer appearances (there is a whole world of love).
The strategic mind wants to blend into the tribe where the least amount of personal mental suffering can occur. The feeling mind blows that out of the water and stands on the side of individuality and justice. Cummings summed up the strategic, worldly mind versus the feeling, unworldly mind in this way: “Almost anybody can learn to think or believe or know, but now a single human being can be taught to feel. Why? Because whenever you think or you believe or you know, you're a lot of other people: but the moment you feel, you're nobody-but-yourself.”
When we are in a state of being who we really are when we feel anger (because of injustice or evil) our response doesn't descend into belittling others or nastiness. When life's pain and suffering sweeps into our hearts we don't succumb to it to such an extent that we become self-pitying and self-destructive.
In the state of being which is the true spirit of Christmas we don't permit others' sneering, life's cruelties or the harsh realities of existence to bring us down to a level where we think our kindness is somehow inappropriate. On the contrary we maintain the softness, gentleness and decency of our hearts. We maintain our resilience but keep our kindness in play as well.
We turn our just anger into positive energy, an energy which strives for change for the better in spite of the seeming impossibility of the task. therefore some people see the greed and hypocrisy, social issues such as the homeless and poor, and do what they can to call this out or improve it. Even something as humble as a Facebook post or a Letter to the Editor pointing out some malevolence or human rights issue in society (usuch as homelessness) should not be scoffed at, because it is revealing your soul. Every revelation of a soul is a beautiful thing.