We all wrestle with our own contradictions. In this episode, I name mine. I call myself a hypocrite - because even though I talk about love, I catch myself judging, "other"-izing, and letting anger spill out. That honesty becomes the doorway into a deeper question: what does it mean to choose love in a world where fear is loud, cruelty is cheered, and tolerance itself has limits?
Drawing on philosopher Karl Popper's "Paradox of Tolerance," I explore how love doesn't mean tolerating harm, yet it also doesn't abandon the truth that every human being carries the breath of the Divine. I share the soil that shaped my own passion for diversity - growing up near Washington, D.C. where difference felt ordinary and beautiful - alongside a story from South Carolina, where invisible lines of segregation still divided daily life. These contrasts reveal the choice before us: fear that build walls, or love that expands.
This episode is less about having answers and more about wrestling with the tension honestly. Fear shrinks the world. Love expands it. And even when love feels fragile, it is still the only force that heals.
Joni Miller, Ph.D., is a writer, researcher, spiritual coach, and speaker who uses her knowledge, education, and love of all things spiritual to help spiritual wanderers find a place they can call home, navigating by the light of Love. www.SpiritualGeography.net
Photo by SHVETS production: https://www.pexels.com/photo/a-woman-in-red-dress-standing-on-green-grass-while-holding-a-mirror-8929561/
