This article is the second in a two-part series that began with “Is Tolerance All It is Thought to Be? Is There Something Better?”

If you believe in a God of love, you will also have to believe in a God who makes a sharp distinction between right and wrong.  Why?  Because love without goodness (justice, fairness, and truth) can be poison at work in human life.  A normally loving person who is “black-hearted” in their thoughts and actions toward others does not truly love either themselves or, especially, others.  They satisfy themselves with a fake replicate of self-love!  It doesn’t take an Einstein to understand that!  There is something better than tolerance and that something is clearly identifiable.

Out of the Heart Comes…

We were told centuries ago that “out of the heart comes murder… theft, false testimony, slander” — and love!  The point is, we all know that is true.  Even if we fool ourselves into believing (like the postmodernists keep telling us) there is no such thing as a universal truth, our hearts and our sense of justice and fairness tell us otherwise.  Don’t we daily identify wrong when we encounter it — especially in unabashed attempts to deceive and hurt?  And we get angry when we encounter it, don’t we?  There is a deep-seated cry within all of us that wrong is universally wrong and right is universally right.  What kind of an answer to horrid wrongs is an insistence that we should be tolerant?  We must apply a better answer than tolerance.

The Basic Question Identifies the Distinction Between Right and Wrong

The basic question is whether we should tolerate anything and everything, which (to make the issue clear) would include murder and violence?  Can we build a culture where peace is the goal if we tolerate such things?  Who would answer yes?  There is something better than tolerance.  I’ll introduce it in a moment if you don’t already know what it is.

Deeply consider this:  If it is your own child or spouse that is murdered or raped, I don’t think you would be an undisturbed advocate that we should do nothing more about such behavior than just tolerate it!  If tolerance is all we are required to do, it is a pathetic, sick, feeble ethical standard and is abysmally inadequate to deal with the human condition or the fair formation of a society in which people want to live.

Parents Teach Us the Distinction Between Right and Wrong

Parents insist on loving their children.  But they also see the need for discipline because right behavior is equally needed if the child is to be taught to love with goodness as a standard.  Hatred and deceit are the tools used by those who love themselves more than they love others.  A life worth living loves others to the same degree as it loves itself.   

How Great Is Tolerance? What Is Better than Tolerance?

Tolerance can’t hold a candle to love.  Ah! Yes, love (infused with goodness and dominating our hearts) is what reigns supreme in any ethical system that is worth your thought.  Have you noticed people don’t marry with the promise “I will tolerate you forever”?  We do tolerate people we love on occasion.  But if that is all there is to our relationship, it won’t create enough desire to keep even a necessary motivation alive.  Love is the only standard that shapes a happy peaceful society.  And when it is absent, that society has to do more than be tolerant.

What does tolerance of lying, scheming, and hurting people do for the world?  When the hurt is too much to bear, tolerance collapses into hate and revenge.  Tolerance always comes up short in the world all of us know.

Let’s not settle for tolerance to cure our society’s ills.  Let’s aim — and aim again — at an ethical standard that towers above all others: LOVE FOR ALL!

In my new book Who Am I?, I describe how we have become “crooked thinkers” and how to break out of this prison of the mind to become instruments of change for a better world by recognizing the source of our value as humans.  You can get your copy HERE.  (Psst!  Subscribers to my weekly updates can receive a 15% discount and free shipping from that link!)

Lean into the whole truth by discovering the truth of who YOU are — the “Real You” — and who your children truly are.  Discover how to best engage your children in finding the whole truth.  Our team at InnerKinetics is ready to provide that help.  If you’d like some assistance, you can request a consultation and an InnerKinetics consultant will call you to answer questions and schedule your meeting. Schedule an Initial Consultation. If you are more independent and want to cut to the chase, you need not wait for a call back because you can get answers to your questions and schedule your session HERE.

THE WAY TO HAVE A HEALTHY MENTAL SYSTEM

Weekly Help for Your Mind/Brain

This weekly addition to my articles provides practical guidance for the application of commonly known facts about brain health. 

Protein is essential.

Protein is the building block of cells and supplies needed elements for healthy functioning.  Its major sources are from meats of all kinds, but it can also be found in lesser (but significant) amounts in some vegetables.  Dense protein sources are, for example, duck and sockeye salmon (which surprises some of us).

If we do not meet our protein needs, muscle loss could result, or we can suffer from general ill-health.  All meats and vegetable sources are not equal.

Among the meats, liver is a major source of nutrients that are essential (provided the meat is not contaminated by chemical additives used in raising or finishing off the animal before slaughter).  Consult reliable sources, some of which I have cited in previous blogs.

Bottom line: consume adequate protein.  Your brain needs it as does the rest of your body.

Vitamins and Mineral, YES!  But Avoid Sugar!

Fresh fruits and vegetables are a needed source of vitamins and minerals, as are nuts, thus supplying a varied diet.  So eat up.  However, whatever you do, don’t stock up on sugar —  especially cane or beet sugar.  Learn about your brain’s needs and treat that as number one in terms of a nutritionally healthy diet.  You may note that what is good for the brain is also good for the heart — and that makes sense.

Next: Does the brain slowly deteriorate?