When I make a bowl of oatmeal, I use wildly different ingredients. Once the oatmeal is cooked, I plop a spoonful of peanut butter in the middle. Then, I cut up a banana and place it around the edges of the bowl. My last step is sprinkling cinnamon all around.
With each bite, I take my spoon and scoop up a little bit of everything. You can see clearly that the ingredients can be distinguished. At the same time, they’re mixing together ever so slightly where they touch.
At no point do I mix all the ingredients up so that they become one single flavor. Yet, together, they make up a single dish. Each ingredient is still what it was before I started. The only difference is, now they exist in a way that complements each other.
I’m telling you how I prepare my oatmeal, not just because I’m worried that some people may be turning their oatmeal into a mushy bowl of sameness without considering the alternative—but also because while eating breakfast this morning, I realized that people are just like my bowl of oatmeal.
We have different cultures, gender identities, sexual orientations, personalities, and life experiences—just to name a few. We all live in the same “bowl.” It’s the only one we have. I’m talking about this lovely rock we call home. If we want any chance of not ending up like the sad, bland flavor of a heavily mixed bowl of oatmeal, then we need to let our individuality shine.
What about that sprinkle of cinnamon? Well, we can always find things in common, no matter how fantastically different we all are. We are connected in ways that go far beyond our differences. Some call it spirituality, others interconnectedness. Whatever it’s called, we all have it—a shared humanity.
We can have communities that highlight each individual in a way that lifts us all up.
If you happen to be one of those people who blends all their food up, I’m sorry to say that I may not have gotten my point across. Can you come up with your own metaphor? I would love to read about it.