Interrupted

My Life Thus Far
2015-08-16 07:09:34 (UTC)

Enlightenment and Compassion

Well, now that I've sat in bed for two hours and procrastinated sufficiently, I suppose I should write a little something before I go to bed. I have to be to work at 10am tomorrow. Even though work isn't necessarily taking, or hard, it definitely feels like its all-consuming. I hate working full-time.

The influx of vegan "friends" I have on Facebook are overwhelming me at times. A few of them are militant (to put it mildly), some of them are far more passionate than I, and some are just plain overbearing. Last time I went vegan I got into it with a cultish group in an online forum (yep, it was THAT long ago. I can't remember where I was communicating with them, but it was long before Facebook groups). I choose to live by example. I will never become a tyrant. I feel that when that happens, you start pushing people away. People who may have been open to trying a meat free, perhaps even vegan lifestyle.

There are dietary vegans and ethical vegans. I can't be the only person who thinks it's stupid to divide ourselves by WHY we decided to go vegan. Can't it be good enough that we just ARE? Who cares why or how we got to this point. I say we celebrate any and everything that brought us to this place of enlightenment and compassion. There's this one chick in a vegan food group I'm in on Facebook that is boycotting palm oil. She never comments or posts unless its to bash people and foods with palm oil in them. I've done a little research on palm oil and know enough to source out items that use sustainably harvested palm oil to help preserve wild life habitat, but that isn't good enough for her. She destroys any and everyone who consumes it. She's one more post away from getting blocked. I've never actually had a conversation with her, but I'm just tired of her tirades. She brings unnecessary stress into my life.

I'm a believer that veganism isn't about perfection, it's about minimizing suffering as best we can. I try very hard to avoid animal products at all costs. I'm not going to obsess about maybe's (like if a product that doesn't actually contain any dairy "may be contaminated" because it was manufactured in a facility that also processes dairy). I'm doing my best, I'm really pleased with myself for being as thorough as I have been, and I'm feeling amazing because of it.

My solution to this problem will be to unfollow any groups or people who threaten my sense of contentment. I'm a happy vegan. I've minimized animal suffering in my own life, and in my children's lives. Even my husband is consuming fewer animal products. I'm not going to feel bad because I can't change the world. I'm starting with myself, and that's just going to have to be enough...




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