The Cat in the Hat was wild I was traumatised by The Cat in the Hat when I was a kid. Especially when he came back. In his attempt to annihilate a single dirty spot, he spread and multiplied it. As the mess grew, he doubled down on his attack. Ultimately, his chaotic army of fiendish little cats smeared the stain across the entire yard (or, as it seemed, Universe). Has a “War on…(anything)” ever worked? To this day, the sense of a problem being magnified by the attempt to fix it flashes me back to The Cat and his minions charging headlong towards disaster. It happens especially when I judge or resent something. A vortex of attack and validation spins up as I yearn to erase the disliked reality from existence. It can be the pettiest thing: A spoon again in the knife drawer. The colleague who types too loud. A small personal failure gnawing at me. Then, the rumination that takes hold! The shrill self-righteousness. The judgement upon judgement seeking to erase the impurity. It’s an exhilarating crusade. And it forever dangles the carrot of a flawless victory - a victory where I get to keep my prejudice and live in peace. But it has never worked. Never. It is a fool’s game. I’m sure the same il-logic is at play in large scale intransigent conflicts: Wars on Terror / Drugs / Crime…Ukraine, Gaza, etc. But who am I to tell nations what to do? I escalate into an arms race of criticism and validation at the drop of a hat. Best I set my own house in order - then see how the world looks. Cleaning up the mess Thankfully, the Cat and his mischievous friends had one final trick up their sleeve (under their hats) - and in the end, magically dissolved their self-made chaos. We all know that love is the antidote to fear and hatred. These toxic attitudes are not defeated by love so much as rendered unnecessary by it. When love is there, they can relax. Take the rest of the week off. But how can we love a wrongdoing, an insult, a failing, an excruciatingly annoying thing? We can’t. It’s not possible. Focus on the wrongness in something and the assault has already begun. Fixate on it and we ourselves become unpleasant, judgemental people. We don’t even enjoy our own company. We need to see beyond the failings that trigger us. See the blessing that we have a spoon at all. See the kindness in the colleague. See the yearning desperation in ourselves to be good, lovable people, despite our failings. Raise our focus and we pull out of the chaotic spiral. Of course we can’t be naïve about the injustices in the world, but unless we see them from a broader, more embracing, perspective we only accelerate the mayhem.