Raising the Vibration

Joy, Kindness and Hope in Politics -- oh my!

As a lifelong democrat or liberal-leaning independent I’ve often been frustrated by the difficulty progressives regularly have in developing and delivering a compelling message. Wonderfully that frustration has evaporated like a wisp of mist with Harris and Walz. I don’t know if it was strategic or just good fortune but they clearly tapped a deep hunger in our nation for more joy, levity, and hope in our political discourse. One of my wise elder women friends recently expressed how encouraged she felt that so many people were responding to the joyful tone. She also said she loved witnessing the kindness and genuine fondness between Harris and Biden. I agreed. There is something refreshing and optimistic in knowing so many Americans are tired of the ugliness and attack-oriented tone of election cycles of late and it’s encouraging to feel widespread enthusiasm for decency.

In addition to the beautifully buoyant tone, the Harris Walz campaign is making some brilliant strategic messaging moves. First, rather than directly attacking, they’re diminishing, subtly trivializing Trump. They’re naming his low-brow name calling and penchant for personal attacks as what it actually is, a sign of weakness. As Harris has said, a leader who tears people down isn’t strong, but cowardly. And Walz of course famously called Trump and Vance just plain “weird”. That went viral because so many of us have had repeated surreal moments of, “I can’t believe this crazy crap is actually happening.” More importantly, labelling it just weird is another way of diminishing the story of Trump.

In some esoteric spiritual traditions there’s the concept of an egregore, which is a thoughtform that becomes like an entity created by the collective thoughts and emotions of a group of people. One can think of sanctioned slavery, Naziism, excessive consumerism, as egregores. Trump’s MAGA is an another. The way to dissipate an egregore is to stop feeding it energy. We can be wise and take action to nullify the current threat to democracy without inadvertently making it stronger by feeding it attention, hatred and fear.