Hello fellow Steemit people!

Hello, friends. My name is Donald, and as someone interested in sharing ideas and talking about a myriad of topics, I hope to use Steemit as a platform for engagement in those ways. I’m actually pretty dreadful at these sorts of introductions, so apologies if this comes off as dry! I'll try my best, though.

First, a bit about me and my motivations, both in general and in choosing to engage on Steemit. I consider myself a very boring person who is deeply concerned about the world: you can’t even go a day without hearing of some absurdity happening that is a source of profound suffering and conflict, and oftentimes one doesn’t even need to look beyond the borders of the land they live in. Over the years, this has become something I’ve been aware of, to something I go out of my way to look out for. In a “post-truth” climate, I believe being able to see things clearly and honestly is evermore paramount, lest we fall for tactics of manipulation and conspiracy. When we live in a culture where people can assume mass shootings are “hoaxes” and the advancement of bots and technological methodology, it’s clear more than ever we need not get comfortable with our own biases and views, and challenge them at every turn.

This applies not only to society, of course, but to our own ideas about ourselves, which are often the hardest felt beliefs we have. Perhaps the greatest obstacle of bias is our own self-image, be it something we inflate or put down. I’m quite sure it wouldn’t be egregious of me to assume many of us have a problem with being our own mental saboteur, to have our feelings hijacked with a sense of negativity or unworthiness. One of my meditation teachers, Tara Brach, refers to this as a “trance of unworthiness” that colors our experience. Suffering isn’t just someone committing physical acts of violence to others, but also our own mental weaponry we use on ourselves. In many ways, we find a way to close our minds into a fist and strike outwards, either at others or ourselves. I wish to use my time and posts on Steemit inquiring into aspects of this that interest me, and hopefully interest you, so that it creates an interesting environment.

I hope to be able to engage with you all on the matters of suffering, both of society and of self, and to have conversations as well as hopefully bringing up new points or themes, both from me to you and from you all to me. I would also love to hear any suggestions on what you all might prefer, if you have a preference on issues of self or society, or even how they interlock, even some of the stories of suffering that you carry with yourselves that you may wish to share. The best way of facing difficulty, after all, is to be with it, and until we can do this on every level, we live just one moment away from being hijacked by irrationality, or fear, or hatred. May all of us find our own ways to alleviate suffering to those around us, and never forgetting to include ourselves in the picture, too.