Elections are coming up. Like most Americans, I’m absolutely sure of whom I’m not voting for but have no idea of whom I am voting for. Whom to vote for, however, is actually the least of my concerns. What I’m really worried about is keeping my sanity until elections are over amidst daily polls that flip-flop candidate popularity, facts surfacing about candidates that I prefer not to know, and people telling me who not to vote for. I’ve come up with a few best practices to avoid letting Hillary and Donald take over my life until Nov 8th.
Politics has a place in life. It is not life. There are some places where politics doesn’t really belong. Don’t talk about candidates at work. Frankly that’s because you’re at work to collaborate and get a job done and if you’re talking about politics you’re probably neither collaborating nor getting a job done.
Don’t talk about the candidates at your sister’s wedding. You get the point. When there’s clearly another purpose involved don’t make politics the purpose.
If you make elections your life you will end up becoming a politician. If you make these elections your life you will go completely insane. Give it a break, rule out times or places in which you simply won’t talk about elections. God put us on this planet for more than that.
Quit telling people they’re horrible for whom they vote. You may not like the candidate they’re leaning towards. These aren’t horrible people though.
Tell people the facts but quit telling them whom you’re voting for. When politics come up focus on the facts and the issues. Telling people whom you’re voting for does almost no good. Unless you’re Clint Eastwood, nobody really cares. Focusing on the issues and facts gets more done. You can actually have an intelligent conversation rather than wasting time calling each other’s candidate a bigot or liar.
Don’t forget, the whole point of living in a democratic country is that people can vote for whomever they want and they cherish that right to do so. Granted, some of our politicians are endorsing horrible policies when it comes to life and liberty but when you tell people there’s only one candidate fit to be president it doesn’t help matters. They just dig in because you’re virtually taking away their right to vote and nobody likes that.
So rather than say, “Don’t for x,” just mention that you went to the theater to watch Dinesh D’Souza’s “Hillary’s America” and it was eye opening or that you read D’Antonio’s Donald Trump biography and found some contradictions in his life. By the way, the former is 1 hour 47 minutes, the latter is 400 pages. Share the facts and let people decide whom they’ll vote for. It’s their vote, conscience, and soul. Not yours.
Finally, what do you do about politics and dating? If you’re on a first date with someone and you’re open to getting to know the person bring it up later. If they’re in the another party, most likely they won’t switch camps overnight. However, a respectful dialogue has been known to help people reach an accord on at least the particular issues. On miraculous occasions you may end up sharing political views down the road because one, the other, or both of you came to realize there’s a better way.
It’s good to tell people what issues are important to you. Everybody has a right to vote. Nobody has a right to know whom you’re voting for if you don’t feel like telling them. Keep things that way and you may make it to November 8th still excited enough about elections to go to the polls.
