We Are Not Afraid

“We are not afraid” is the best lyrics to the song “We Shall Overcome.

Dr. Martin Luther King added those lyrics.

Living in fear is no way to live.

The only people who want you to live in fear are bullies.

That’s how they keep their psychological power over you.

What might be?

Always what might be and not what it is.

The opposition to fear and hate did not go away on November 5th.

You and I are here.

The truth…

The truth is on our side.

History is on our side.

Reality is on our side.

Fear has always concocted bizarre fantasies to keep people afraid.

“There be monsters here” was written on the edge of maps to keep people from wandering away from the control of kings.

Freedom from predetermination created by the will of a self-appointed monarchy…

That’s what America is.

Again, there have always been people who prefer to be taken care of instead of living free of fear.

That’s part of the fabric of humanity.

It has always been up to the adults in the world to help those who can only see darkness.

How?

By holding up the truth of love.

It’s a difficult light for many of our brothers and sisters to see.

Love is not understood, or we wouldn’t have to keep fighting the good fight.

In a world of limited resources, the natural thing to do is not to share.

But it ain’t the 8th Century anymore.

We live in a land of abundance.

But we still have that monster on the back of too many telling them not to share.

Not to trust.

Keep to yourself.

Mind your business.

Love tells us our business is the welfare of our fellow man.

It’s a heavy lift.

I know this.

You know this.

But we are not afraid.

The foundation of this nation is based upon the proportion that all people are created equal.

Too many Americans have had a hard time believing in equality.

They are trapped in a vicious cycle of hate created by the bullies who have their ears and hearts.

We all just lived through a plague that took the lives of millions.

We all just lived through an economy that collapsed.

We all didn’t see that we had come through it, and the world got better.

Some see the world as half-empty.

Some see the world half full.

We who see the world full of light are now obliged to reach back and let that light shine into the dark places.

Let us reach out and touch the hearts and minds of our fellow Americans and let them see there is a better way to live than in fear.

Demonstrating we are not afraid, this light will kindle curiosity.

Curiosity has always broken the chains of fear.

What if.

What if my life could be better?

We are not afraid.

Peace

Daniel J. Frey aka Toby

Precious Ignorance

When a person is willing to ignore the truth and accept fiction, they are afraid.

They will not respond to facts because they will have to face what keeps them trapped; they are more afraid of it than being wrong.

One of the craziest things the white race had persuaded itself to be true is that it is the majority.

At no time ever on this planet did the white race constitute the majority population.

The white race has always been a minority.

The reason behind the myth of their dominance, both mentally and in population size, is rooted in fear.

Fear of the unknown.

“There be monsters here,” at the edges of their maps.

Not rainbows and flowers or peace.

Monsters.

To the white European explorers, everyone they met was an animal… no soul… not human.

The people they found were good enough to take their wealth and have sex with but could not sit at the same table with for a meal.

They were to be pitied the non-white races.

That’s what purgatory was for.

All the non-white races would be told the truth of the son of God dying for them; they would be baptized, told wealth was a sin, their gold, silver, and jewels taken, and then executed, after which God would sort them out, each to their own worth.

Precious ignorance.

It’s a terrible thing, always living in fear.

It will make you paranoid.

But fear is a wall that you can hide behind.

You don’t have to participate.

Fear means you don’t have to deal with those people on the other side of your wall.

You don’t have to hear their cry.

You don’t have to see their pain.

You don’t have to feel.

Staying ignorant of what this world is all about is what humans do.

This is not a new story.

It repeats over and over.

The story is more important than the truth.

We all share the same boat in this world, but some passengers believe they have a golden ticket because of their race.

There is a lifeboat for them.

The rest of us in steerage will find it tough when the ship goes down.

Damn.

Damn us, they believe for not believing God has appointed them to rule the world.

That’s what Trump represents.

The last great white hope for them.

Appointed by God… not making that up, people.

Please take a look at what his supporters are saying to each other on social media.

He’ll make America great again because he will make it “White again.”

They believe the myth he peddles.

The truth is that’s not going to happen.

When the first white European explorer left to find what lay beyond the map's borders, it was the beginning of the world's uniting.

As the centuries passed, borders merged, and languages consolidated.

In the future, humanity will be one.

The bell of Freedom rings, calling for the past to go away and heralding the future's entrance.

The only monster left on the map is ignorance.

I write this as an invitation to gather together to walk boldly into that light of truth where all are equal.

If you can walk around your wall…

Let it go and be hope.

Peace

Toby aka Daniel J Frey

Fear of Freedom

Fear of Freedom

A great number of our decisions are not really our own but are suggested to us from the outside; we have succeeded in persuading ourselves that it is we who have made the decision, whereas we have actually conformed with expectations of others, driven by the fear of isolation and by more direct threats to our life, freedom, and comfort.”

                                             – Erich Fromm, Escape From Freedom

Freedom is a burden to some folk.

Freedom means participation.

Participation means doing the work of freedom.

Many want the reward but are too busy with themselves to cultivate freedom.

This fear of freedom goes by another name.

The Silent Majority.

Have you wondered why there have been no voices condemning the hate that is propagated by Trump and his associates?

The voices that used to tell the anarchists to stay at the back of the room and not talk.

That sound of silence is manifested by those who erected a neon god.

That neon god tells them their fear is justified.

That neon god feeds their bias, which perpetuates the hate, that grows the paranoia that others are responsible for the life they have.

That neon god wants to be the next president.

He promises a narrow definition of freedom.

Only to those that worship at his feet telling him he is a man of consequence.

There are many kinds of people of consequence.

It is an absurd ego that says there is only one path to greatness.

Freedom is a burden.

Freedom it turns out is not free.

You can’t expect strawberries if you never plant them.

You can’t expect freedom if don’t speak up.

How can I speak up?

Vote.

Freedom’s ally is each of us who takes that trip to the voting booth and lets our voice be heard by making our mark next to the person we want to represent us.

Silence is not golden.

That’s a lie.

Silence is the cruel dictator who silences the voices of freedom.

Silences them one by one till there is none.

Freedom needs you.

Let freedom ring.

Toby aka Daniel J Frey

Meeting Disney

Dreams can come true, but almost always in unexpected ways.

As far back as I can remember, through my broken memory, I have drawn.

As a child, my grandfather gave me shelve paper to draw on.

I would draw the characters I loved from Saturday morning TV and hang these drawings on my bedroom wall.

Each Sunday evening, there were two TV shows on back to back in Cleveland, Ohio.

First, there was Lassie.

The second is The Wonderful World of Color, hosted by Walt Disney.

Somewhere lost to me in time, as a child, I dreamed of working for Walt.

Time would take me on a journey to be the best artist I could be.

After getting married, having two children, and being a house husband, I went back to school and got my degree.

I came so close, but fate would wash away my lifelong dream.

Other people made decisions that ended 2D animation at Disney, leaving many artists out in the cold.

My dream was broken, and I pieced together the idea of pursuing work in Hollywood.

It was there I met an actor, a magician named Steve Valentine.

We became friends, worked together, ate together, laughed and cried.

Steve would have get-togethers with many of the people he would come in contact with.

One early get-together I attended, I was standing and talking with two older gentlemen.

We talked about this and that, and I asked what do you do?

They both said they were musicians.

“You either love us or hate us.”

I said what have you composed?

Richard said, “It’s a Small World.”

I laughed and said are you crazy? Really! You are loved. You are loved.

The two gentlemen were Richard and Robert Sherman.

They composed all the music we associate with Disney.

Chim Chim Cher-ee, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Feed the Birds, Heffalumps and Woozles, I Wanna Be Like You, Jolly Holiday, Let’s Go Fly A Kite, Little Black Rain Cloud, The Parent Trap, The Rain Rain Rain Came Down Down Down, A Spoonful of Sugar, Step In Time, Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, There’s A Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow, The Tiki Tiki Tiki Room, Winnie the Pooh, just to name the tip of the iceberg of their music.

This meeting wasn’t once or twice, but over the course of many years, we would stand and sit together, tell each other stories, and eat cake.

Today, as I walked down Main Street at Disneyland, I stopped by their window in the Music Shop window.

I thought about my dream of working for Disney…

I shook the hands that shook the hand of Walt.

I looked into the eyes that looked at Walt.

I laughed and ate cake with the brothers, who laughed and ate cake with Walt.

I was struck…

The universe has a strange way of making dreams come true.

Peace.

Toby aka Daniel J Frey

Learning Love

Wanting love is inborn; giving love must be learned and practiced daily.

Self-interest, hunger, sex, and desire are not love.

Yet beyond personal desire, all of us know that we need love.

We want love but we are not born with the knowledge of how to get love.

Love is taught.

Since love is taught it is fraught with the immense problem of who is doing the teaching.

Was your teacher strict?

Tough?

Generous?

Confused?

Distracted?

A narcissist?

A sociopath?

A psychopath?

Your first teacher was most likely your parent or a relative.

However, their experience and their syllabus were determined by who taught them.

It is a miracle of life that we have gotten as far as we have as a species.

The bulk of love is passed on and learned at a very basic vanilla level of flavor.

It doesn’t ask much, it doesn’t give much, it doesn’t comfort, it doesn’t annoy.

It exists this vanilla love as a loose binding.

But even the most basic of love has to be practiced.

If love is not practiced in our daily lives, it loses its flavor.

It loses its purpose.

Without practice, love turns into indifference.

It blooms into paranoia.

It descends into fear.

Practice love by first loving yourself.

Forgiving yourself so you can forgive.

True love, love that is higher than self-interest, the kind of love that wears down mountains, crosses oceans, opens the clenched fist of hate, is in all of us to exercise.

We have to stop hating ourselves.

And care for each other.

Peace

Toby, aka Daniel J Frey

Compassion

The world has never valued kindness.

Kindness in this world of limits has always been relegated to a sign of weakness.

To be kind is stupid.

Ignorant.

You care for your own first.

Blood is thicker than the welfare of the stranger.

If you don’t know, I’m an empath.

I was diagnosed late in life after years of suffering at the hands of the words of everyone around me.

Their anger, their hate, their ignorance, their prejudice, their racism, their bias wore me down to the breaking point.

It broke me.

What kept me from taking my life?

Love.

Compassion.

Caring.

A simple act that cost the person who saved my life absolutely nothing.

But what it did was allow me to be here today talking to you about it.

There is redemption.

There is hope.

There is reconciliation with those that deserve it.

I’m not here to say that those who commit egregious acts upon you are to be forgiven and forgotten.

No.

Never.

I’m here to say that you need to forgive yourself first and foremost so that you can heal.

Never forget.

Never forget the cruelty.

The heartless acts of violence and selfishness meant to hurt, to punish, to destroy.

Compassion is about a standard of morality.

Compassion does not need a religion.

Compassion does not need a doctrine.

Compassion is the act that love tells us to do.

Compassion is stronger than hate.

Stronger than anger.

Stronger than fear.

It can heal the deepest wound.

It can bridge the distance between minds.

It can do the impossible even in the hands of the smallest forgotten person.

Compassion resonates through the centuries.

The love that men and women had in the past is why we are here today.

They fought the good fight.

They stood up to the intolerant.

They ignored the impossible and made it possible.

Compassion is defined as weakness by evil.

You will learn that those that fear a thing call it out as weakness.

As the child who is afraid of the dark calls out, telling the darkness they are not afraid of it…

BOO!

They are.

I have learned that my empathy is a two-edged knife.

It cuts to the truth, but it also cuts me.

It’s hard every day to feel the pain all around me.

It can bring me down.

Yet, it can spur me on, too.

To find a way to lift every voice.

To push for that day when hate is seen for what it is.

Weak.

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

Stop Talking

Observation…

Why is it that our conservative brothers and sisters feel the need to tell us who they are constantly?

Telling us even if we already know…

They love America.

They are Christian.

They are heterosexual.

They are pro-second Amendment.

They are pro-life.

They are pro-billionaire.

They are pro-Putin.

They are pro-MAGA.

They are pro-Trump.

They are anti-immigrant.

They are anti-Islamic.

They are anti-brown people.

They are anti-gay.

They are anti-green.

I grew up in and around a very conservative far-right Christian family and friends, and I have first-hand experience being told over and over again as if I’m an idiot.

As if I’m an idiot who can’t remember you don’t like to drive in bad neighborhoods.

You don’t like to send your kids to schools that aren’t white.

You don’t like to live next to people who don’t go to your church.

Over and over and over again.

This is rant!

There is only so many times I can hear in 63 years on this planet that Jesus loves me and died for my sins.

I get it!

I understand the story.

I don’t need it repeated to me over and over as if I have no long term memory.

I saw Old Yeller once.

I don’t need to see it again.

I get it.

I get it you don’t like the change you see in the world.

I understand you don’t like to share.

You want everyone to know how important you are.

How you’re better than everyone else.

I know you think that it’s true.

Believe me, I know you think you are granted a special dispensation to rule the world because you’re white.

I can hear you.

Stop talking.

Listen…

Listen to what you sound like?

Listen to the venom.

Listen to the hate.

Listen to the driver in your life called anger.

Consider… instead of talking to me, start talking to yourself.

Start telling yourself you can be loved.

Start telling yourself you can be forgiven.

Start letting yourself just be.

Let go.

And then…

Come join us where the world is full of joy.

Where we don’t have to tell each other we already know.

Peace

Toby aka Daniel J. Frey

Changes

Since the beginning, humanity has used every ounce of strength in its imagination in wanting to believe that change doesn’t happen.

Cave paintings, scrolls, religion, books, plays, philosophy, photography, film, radio, TV, politics, and war all have espoused a belief that change shouldn’t and can’t happen.

Big problem, though…

The fundamental property of this universe we all live in is change.

Everything from galaxies to microbes all change.

Evolve or…

Die.

So, anyone or anything trying to stop change from happening is on the losing side of the universe.

Trying to stop change from happening just can’t win.

It’s called impossible.

Now, understandably, change is not always welcome.

None of us want to get old.

None of us want to lose the people, the things we love.

But their all going to change.

It’s human not to want things to change.

It’s fundamental to the origins of humanity to want things to be the same.

Repeatable.

Established.

Regular.

Predictable.

That way, we all can make plans and not have them ruined by a rainstorm stopping our picnic.

But… shit happens.

So, if you think about it, and it’s obvious not many people do, why do we invest our time, our money, our blood, sweat, and tears into ideas that try to prevent change?

Fear.

Fear is the spider at the center of the web.

Change represents unpredictable outcomes.

What if people are free?

What if people can marry who they want?

What if people can be who they are?

What if people want to be equal?

What if people want to be loved?

All these and more represent a community and the individual to take a chance that change will not affect their picnic.

Yeah, so it was okay to free black people from slavery as long as no one was inconvenienced.

It was all right to give women the right to vote because most women couldn’t be bothered.

It was fair to desegregate schools and communities because we weren’t going to fund those schools and communities after.

My point is that change, for better or worse, will continue to happen, but not as expected.

With change there will always be outcomes that are not predictable.

That’s what change is.

That’s why I’m trying to get the attention of my conservative brothers and sisters and help them put into perspective their fear of change.

When gays got the right to marry, did frogs rain out of the sky?

When blacks got to vote, there were no more white elected officials, right?

When women entered the workforce, no man was ever hired again, correct?

When change happens, will things be different?

Yes, they will be different.

And that’s the beauty of change.

Where once there was a dead, dry seed, once planted, from that seed grows a tree under which the children and the children’s children of the planter will live, love, and know peace.

Change is gonna come…

Peace

Daniel J. Frey aka Toby

Do You Hear What I Hear?

Wokeism.

Bad side of town.

Freaks of nature.

Infecting our Democracy.

New York values.

Our country.

Our God.

Coincidence.

Poisoning the blood of our country.

Make America great again.

Take our country back.

These and more are what is being said out loud in Conservative America.

Have you asked yourself, does it matter?

What does it mean?

What does it mean?

It means that the idea put forth by our founding fathers that America was created for white, male protestants who owned the land they took, and it was this destiny that guaranteed that from sea to shining sea, the white man would always and forever be in control and dominate was established by their white Christian God… forever…

It seems that idea still persists today.

There is a group of our fellow Americans who both believe in the sanctity of their religion, having a metaphysical control on their lives, the lives of the non-believer, and the nation as a whole, as well as the real expression that Jesus Christ established this sanctity that white males are in charge no others need apply.

Any lapse of control is a sin.

These expressions are code to the true believer who is willing to fight for their whiteness as ordained and established by their white Christian God.

It doesn’t matter if Donald Trump is scum.

He could be the worst human on the planet, but he has two things going for him you don’t see.

One, he’s a white male.

Two, he’s fighting for white America to re-establish a pre-white-male patriarchy.

He can actually do anything, and none of it matters to these supporters because he’s ordained by the White Christian God to save the White race.

Do you hear what I hear?

I am constantly reminded of South Africa.

The white peoples of Europe, specifically England, discovered South Africa and declared it white.

Declared South Africa White?

Think about how screwed up inside and out you have to be to be in such a mindset whereby you deny reality that much.

They were white and in control.

But, on the horizon, their hold on the country was going to slip out of their hands.

However, that didn’t stop them from descending into a brutal police state.

Apartheid.

It got far worse for non-whites as the day approached as the white demographic minority grabbed and killed to keep control.

America is slipping down the same slope.

That hardcore group of conservative Americans is not fighting for a political party.

Are you kidding me?

They are fighting for what they believe is their race.

They will not go away without a fight.

Words are a gateway drug to actions.

When somebody tells you what they believe, you better damn well believe them.

So listen up!

Peace

Toby aka Daniel J. Frey

To See Too Much

Imagine seeing germs.

Imagine you could see germs on the people around you.

Imagine those germs are the untruths, the myths, the self-deceptions, the stories, the lies, both big and small, that people tell each other and themselves every day.

That is what it’s like to be an INFJ empath like me.

For the first 55 years of my life, I suffered under the delusion that everyone was like me.

I couldn’t fathom why people were so, so inhuman and inhumane to others and themselves.

The casual untruths, the blatant lies, why did it only seem to affect me and not everyone else?

I had no idea that my psyche was missing a fourth wall.

That fourth wall that the 97% of humanity has and I don’t.

That fourth wall that keeps them disconnected from life.

This fourth wall allows them to act independently without regard to how their actions affect others.

This fourth wall I didn’t have brought me to the point of screaming, ”Let me out!”

After 55 years of taking on the sins of the world, I had painted myself into an actual black pit of darkness.

I saw no relief for the world or myself.

I couldn’t take it anymore.

The suffering, the pain, the hypocrisy, the betrayal, the lies, the anger, the hatred, the anger everywhere.

Like a dark black rain, it poured every day non-stop.

A ghost kept screaming in my ear I was useless.

Unloved.

I needed to end it.

As the day approached, a fairy light appeared in my dark oubliette and asked me to believe in love one last time…

If you know an INFJ empath, you know, even in the end, I couldn’t refuse to listen.

I found out that empaths do exist.

I found out it wasn’t science fiction like I thought it was.

I found out that all of the lies I saw were real.

My depression was caused by real-life circumstances, like losing my job, dreams, family, and love.

Those were real; any normal person would become as depressed as I was.

However, being an empath made it incomprehensibly worse than a normal person's.

I couldn’t separate other’s emotions from my own.

I fell into a spiral of doom.

I also found out that I needed to establish healthy barriers to my psychology to regulate the flow of the pain of this world.

I learned that everyone needs to have a mental health check-up at least once a year.

You probably don’t realize how screwed up you are and how many people know you’re screwed up but won’t tell you because they think that’s the way you are an asshole.

Now, I’m 63.

Now, I have built back love and restored hope.

I still see too much.

Being an empath is not a blessing unless you feel seeing everyones darkness is a happy thing.

But I’m here to say to fellow empaths it can be managed.

I learned it a bit late in life.

But I learned.

Peace

Daniel J. Frey aka Toby

Shoes

When you walk in another’s shoes…

Been told that ever since I can remember.

But what happens when you try on another person's shoes and find out they fit?

What happens to that story you told yourself about your place in society?

What happens to that ego you have believing in your own entitlement?

What happens when the shoes fit?

Somehow since, before the American Revolution, the People convinced themselves that they were exceptional.

Disregarding the French, who had already overthrown their Aristocracy, Americans told themselves a story that they were first.

They were the first to stand for liberty, for freedom.

But they weren’t the first, no far from it.

They weren’t the first white people who carved out for themselves a special place in the hierarchy of the universe.

American Exceptionalism is a unique kind of myth.

There are many kinds of myths that we get along with every day.

A universal myth that cuts across all cultures, ethnicities, races, and religions is that my myth is the only myth that is true, and all the rest drool.

Exceptionalism is everywhere.

You can’t get past the exceptional trees to see the forest.

It’s a human thing.

Humans convince themselves of a lot of nonsense.

It's what keeps us from all having nice things.

What happens when the shoes fit?

What do we tell ourselves?

Those people don’t feel pain; that’s why they don’t need health care.

Them folks don’t know how to cut their lawn, so take away their property.

They buy stupid things; don’t give them a bank loan.

These people are animals; they don’t deserve justice.

It’s all bullshit.

People, and I’m telling it to you straight because I’ve been raised with a lot of white racist people; they tell each other whoppers every time they are together how bad everyone else is.

White people in America have an exceptional problem imagining being in another person's shoes.

Why this self-imposed ignorance?

Why the hate?

It’s fear.

Fear of losing exceptionalism.

It is quite literally the fear of standing in line with everyone else and not getting to cut to the front of the line.

A fear that someone will catch on to all the exceptionalism bullshit and force you to the back of the line.

The first will be last.

What happens when the shoes fit?

When that day comes, what rejoicing there shall be.

When young and old embrace the fact that none of us are getting off the earth alive.

When we understand, we all bleed.

We bleed for the sake of love.

To love and be loved.

We bleed for respect.

We bleed for freedom.

For justice.

Take a look at your shoes.

Peace

Daniel J. Frey aka Toby

The Rain Is Here

All around us, the rain is falling.

Since Dylan put it into lyric, by the way, that was 1964, the American public has been at odds with learning how to swim versus sinking like a stone.

What I'm talking about is leaving ignorance behind and learning we can do right.

The rain falls…

The rain falls, and what it's doing is revealing truth.

In the 20th Century, the rain fell, revealing fascism.

The rain fell, and segregation was revealed.

The rain fell, and we discovered the poor were in need.

We discovered that women had rights.

The rainwater rose, and white nationalism was thrown into the spotlight.

If, by the 1980s, you weren't swimming, you were sinking.

Why?

The rain kept falling.

The rain washed away our delusion that authority, our leaders always told the truth.

The rain fell.

The rain fell, revealing a rainbow of gentle souls wanting to live their lives without fear.

It revealed that religious leadership preyed upon its followers' hearts, minds, and bodies.

The 21st Century arrives, and the weather forecast looks cloudy.

The rain fell.

They're hiding in plain sight; our social servants charged with protecting us instead abused us.

The rain fell.

No justice, no peace.

No justice, no peace.

The rain fell, washing away the delusion that justice was applied fairly and evenly in America.

We rediscovered that some people believed themselves more equal than others.

The rain falls.

It will continue to fall.

Because love applied will never give in.

Love applied will open the eyes of the self-ignorant.

Love applied will openly ask will you change and join us in a great community?

Or will you prefer to sink like a stone?

Wish you love.

Daniel J. Frey aka Toby

We Help

What are you doing with your life?

There is only one thing we all have to do to fulfill the purpose of living.

You help.

A person is coming through the door you hold it open.

That man needs a meal you feed him.

That girl needs a new school book; you get it for her.

You help.

That woman is grieving; you sit and listen.

That young man needs a job; you hire them.

The old man at the store is lonely; you say hello.

You help.

If you’re not helping, you’re hurting.

If you’re not lifting up, you’re putting down.

If you’re not caring, you’re evil.

Life is about growing out of your comfortable shell and caring for those around you.

What does it take to make the blind see?

What does it take to make the deaf hear?

What does it take to make the heartless love?

The truth?

The truth is nothing.

There is nothing any of us alone can do to make the stubborn self-righteous, selfish person join the human race.

Nothing.

What we can do is join with the living, move forward to that bright community of love, and just in case…

We can keep that door open to freedom from fear.

That someday, in some way, the fearful, selfish person will open their minds and join us.

Until then…

We press forward.

We open doors.

We expand liberty, freedom, and justice for all.

We help.

Not just for those we love.

But also and more importantly, for those we don’t know.

Love has no limit.

The only limit that can be put on love is in our hearts and minds.

Cut loose, be free, and see what is possible when you pursue truth.

Peace

Daniel J. Frey aka Toby

Last Thing

Feeding yourself.

Buying that new pair of shoes.

Ordering online.

We’ll do that.

Flipping someone off.

Talking behind a friend's back.

Getting high.

We’ll do that.

Not stopping hate.

Not comforting the lost.

Not smiling.

We’ll do that.

We will do a lot of things, too many to count.

And we will do them gladly if not out of a sense of duty, of pride.

What is the last thing you’ll do?

Love.

The last thing too many will do is to love.

Why?

It’s too hard for too many of us.

We don’t know where to begin, so we never start.

Too many of us lack the foundations of love.

We don’t love ourselves.

If we don’t love ourselves, then loving others, the stranger, represents danger to our existence.

If we don’t love ourselves, we are handicapped unable, unwilling to reach out and restore hope.

To not be just sympathetic but to attain the highest human ability empathy.

If we don’t love ourselves, we are doomed to be turned inward, focusing on feeding our desire at the expense of all life around us.

What is the last thing you will do?

Love to be effective must be exercised.

Love is not something to keep locked away.

If love is locked away only for ourselves, then it is a wasted expression.

Love to become real, to grow, to mature must live in the light of life and grow.

What do you represent?

Selfish desire or giving love?

What is the last thing you will do?

Peace

Toby aka Daniel J. Frey

The Trouble With Truth

Truth is not widely accepted.

Truth is inconvenient.

Truth will set you free only if you want it to.

Humans have told themselves stories in place of the truth since speech was a thing.

Their stories, myths, and beliefs all feel better and right and are easier to swallow than the truth.

It’s perfectly understandable; it’s perfectly human that we prefer our stories over the truth.

Our stories feed our prejudice.

Our stories feed our selfishness.

Our stories feed our entitlements.

If we had to face and accept the truth, the consequence would be responsibility.

What would we be responsible for?

The truth reveals that we are responsible for justice.

For equality.

For freedom.

For peace.

For the planet.

For each other.

We can eliminate poverty.

We can feed the hungry.

We can care for the sick.

We can live in a clean world.

We can control guns.

We can make the world and everyone living their lives fuller, richer, and free from fear.

That’s if we want to.

That’s if we want to let go of the stories we tell each other.

The stories that put the blame on other people.

The stories that say our deities will sort our problems out for us.

The stories that make us deaf, blind, and dumb to the suffering and despair in our world.

Our world is in balance.

The world teeters between the past and the future.

Our stories find their origins in our past.

The future is yet to be written.

Love can see us through, but love alone won’t get us over the mountain of ugly lies we prefer to believe in.

If love alone could have overcome our stories, the human race would not continually find itself on this carousel of doom it likes to ride.

What will break humanity from chasing its own tail of self-deception?

History, yes, history demonstrates it takes just one person standing against the darkness and saying no more forever.

Are you the hope the world is looking for?

Peace

Daniel J Frey aka Toby

What Love

You tell me to love, why?

Love never tells you to do anything… it expects you to.

I love my family; that’s enough.

Love expects you to love your family and your neighbor's family and your neighbor's neighbor's family.

Why do I have to love them?

You don’t have to do anything.

It’s all up to you what kind of a day, a week, a year, or a lifetime you want to spend your time in.

When we love our neighbor, we open a door that lets the fresh air of truth into our lives.

If we only love ourselves, we shut the door to the world.

The air of truth can’t get to us; we recycle our own thoughts over and over and over again.

We twist reality and bend it till we create a monster.

A monster that tells us only what we want to hear, what we want to know, what we want to see.

No more rainbows.

Only a dusty dank darkness cocooned in a web of self-delusion.

What?

We lie to ourselves, and we believe our own lies.

I can’t trust people I don’t know.

Trust is always earned.

So I love other people, but they don’t love me back.

Love doesn’t expect a dividend.

Love is not a business transaction.

Love gives; it doesn’t take.

That’s how you can measure the quality of love.

Love doesn’t wait.

Love is now.

Love doesn’t keep 90% of the profit and gives the remainder to those in need.

Love doesn’t just show up on a day of the week.

Love doesn’t arrive on one day a year.

Love is constant.

Love waits.

Love listens.

Love moves.

Love stands for justice.

Love fights for freedom.

Love means honor.

What is love?

Love is the force that binds all people together of goodwill.

Love will take us to the stars; love will lift the forgotten out of misery.

Love is not an easy partner.

Love will always ask more never less.

A life of love is a life fulfilled.

What love?

Peace

Toby aka Daniel J. Frey

Friends

Everyone is your friend until proven otherwise.

The proof is through what they do and what they don’t do.

Who is not my friend?

The person who doesn’t want justice for me.

The person who can’t hear me when I cry.

The person who doesn’t understand peace.

The person who is entitled.

The person who lets me starve.

The person who is okay if I live in fear.

The person who hits me.

The person who doesn’t care if I live.

The person who doesn’t see me because of my color, my gender, my ethnicity, my race, or my personal belief.

Who is my friend?

The person who speaks up against injustice.

The person who comforts me in my despair.

The person who doesn’t make Drama in my life.

The person who lets me go through a door first.

The person who shares their lunch with me.

The person who checks in with me to see if I’m okay.

The person who hugs me without asking.

The person whose life would be dimmer without me.

The person who celebrates my life, who I am, who doesn’t need to change me.

To be a friend is both the most tremendous responsibility as well as the simplest.

True friends may not see each other for decades, but when they come together, its as if no time has passed.

This bond, this relationship, is the outward manifestation of an inward purpose.

That purpose is made real through our actions and inactions with each other.

That purpose is the true meaning of love.

True love and true friendship don’t mean no boundaries.

True love and true friendship mean we consider each life, each person an individual worthy of respect, of consideration, of life, of love.

Friendship ends when respect for boundaries is crossed.

Yet friendship is ever-growing and will continually change.

Friendship leaves open the door for redemption even up to the last second of life.

Friendship is symbolized by the open hand.

Is your hand open?

Open to those around you?

To the stranger?

To yourself?

Who are your friends?

Peace

Toby aka Daniel J. Frey

Indifference

Race haters believe they are the majority when they are not.

It is the Indifferent.

The indifferent do not react the world over unless they individually are annoyed.

They will sit on their hands.

They will bind their feet.

They will blind their eyes.

They will tune out the noise.

They will box in their hearts.

They will shuffle their morality.

Not until they are personally devastated will they take action.

Oddly enough, when annoyed, the Indifferent split almost down the middle on which side they will take up.

Just a tick less will become fascists as anti-fascists.

The Jewish genocide proved the power of the indifferent.

A nation, a world, the human race calmly sat by while millions of real people were put to death.

Their response was to do nothing.

Not in my backyard.

Until it was in their backyard, and their sons were killed at Pearl Harbor.

Not until then did we, as Americans, say we better put a stop to hate.

Charles Dickens wrote in a Christmas Carol how Father Christmas was warning Scrooge, the Indifferent, about Humanities' two children.

Want and Ignorance.

Want is the easier of his two children to care for.

Want needs, and once those needs are filled, hunger, shelter, comfort, free from fear; Want won't cause Humanity trouble.

Ignorance, however, will always be the root of evil.

Ignorance, both by accident and especially on purpose, is the cancer in the soul of humanity.

Ignorance will brush aside the milk of human kindness.

Ignorance only sees itself.

That is, until they are personally annoyed as a consequence of its inaction.

To paraphrase MLK, he said he would rather deal with evil because you know where you stand.

Indifference will wait on time.

Putting off doing what's right.

Until time runs out.

I'm also reminded of what that quiet voice keeps asking all of us.

Love reminds us that we all need to do more.

There are no alternatives.

There is no choice.

If you hear the voice of love, it asks us all to do.

To do right.

To do it now.

To do it without hesitation.

To stand, to clap, to raise our voice, and never be silent.

Silence is just as evil as hate.

Peace

Toby aka Daniel J. Frey

Moral Bias

Do as I say, not as I do.

That's moral bias.

When individuals and groups hold another individual or group to a standard that they do not adhere to.

There have been many words created in our language concerning moral bias.

Hypocrite.

Liar.

Flim-flam man.

Carpet Bagger.

Charlatan.

Fraud.

Con artist.

Cheat.

Fake.

Imposter.

Pretender.

Phony.

Bullshitter.

These individuals and groups gain power and influence by feeding fear to the fearful.

Society has been plagued with these people since before there was history.

Sadly, there's no real way to stop them.

There's no law to pass.

There's no protest march.

There's no vote that will matter.

There has only been one way to counteract liars.

The truth.

Only through the light of truth shown into darkness can a reasonable person make a judgment.

Just today, we learned of Speaker Pelosi's husband being assaulted in his home.

A TV personality incredulous wondered why the person who assaulted Paul Pelosi was in jail with attempted murder charges.

Wasn't it simple assault?

This TV person demonstrated clearly moral bias.

If this TV person wanted to be truthful, they would not have conflated you or I being assaulted versus the Speaker of the House's husband being assaulted.

An assault on the Speaker's husband was an indirect assault on our government.

The perpetrator clearly was heard wanting to wait for Nancy to come home.

For what?

A coffee klatch?

The point is the moral bias that we are all assaulted with daily.

Where lying is moral in the pursuit of power.

America has a cancer at the center of its soul.

And we all know what the cancer is called.

Racism.

You ever wonder why racists come down on people because their grass isn't cut?

Why do they drive an old car?

Why are they on welfare?

Why they don't wear their clothes right?

It's because of their moral bias.

Prejudice and bias will warp a lie into the truth.

That's what we're all up against.

Those that profit from telling the lie and those that feed upon the lie.

The lie being there are races of humans.

The truth is there is only one human race.

The only difference you will find between people is not in their DNA.

The only difference between people lies in their capacity to understand love.

Peace

Toby aka Daniel J Frey

Everybody

The depth of hate has no bottom.

The truth has a limit for people to believe.

Everybody has fears.

Everybody has hopes.

Everybody has beliefs.

Our fears, hopes, and beliefs we seldom share.

We are mindful that sharing what we say to ourselves out loud is considered being soft.

Weak.

Unworthy.

Why?

Because we believe strength makes right?

Some of us do.

Some of us see the person who does what they want, when they want, how they want as being a leader.

Damn the consequences.

Damn, the lives destroyed.

Damn, what's right.

They got it done.

Everybody wants a hero.

We want to be rescued.

We need someone to come and make it better.

But no existential hero is coming to save us.

The only superhero waiting to make a difference is we, the people.

Our fears can become so great that we're willing to listen and obey any voice.

Those that profit from our fear knows this.

That's why they whisper in our ears the things we want.

Everybody has a problem with the truth.

No one likes to find out they are wrong.

Nobody.

But being wrong is just as natural as being right.

The only thing about being wrong is if and when you find out you're wrong, you do nothing to change it.

That's when you've consciously decided to turn away from life and become a servant of hate.

Everybody feels pain.

Everybody can heal.

Everybody can make their corner of the world better.

We just need to believe that only love can conquer hate.

Peace

Toby aka Daniel J Frey