How To Overcome Political Differences & Feel More At Ease

4.7

10-Tage-Kurs

How To Overcome Political Differences & Feel More At Ease

Von Dr. Femke E. Bakker

Was du lernen wirst

Political tolerance is the willingness to put up with opinions and behaviors of others who you dislike. It is the oxygen of democracy, since tolerating each other is the pre-requisite for a peaceful co-existence. Tolerance is, however, one of the harder values to cultivate. It's a quality and we must consciously decide to foster and cultivate it. Over 10 sessions, you'll learn about the value of tolerance for any political community, and you'll explore what tolerance means to you personally. This course can challenge the beliefs you hold about yourself and others, it actively asks you to answer difficult questions about yourself and your ability to tolerate other opinions, beliefs, and behavior. Through the use of meditation, you'll find out who it actually is that you find hard to tolerate, and what your intolerance tells you about yourself. You are guided to explore these feelings, and to consciously connect, through the use of meditation, with the true unconditional love that we all have unlimited access to. This course is for: anyone who wants to be politically engaged from a more positive perspective, explore and cultivate their level of tolerance, feels challenged by the political ideas of others, gets stuck in patterns of blaming others for what goes wrong in politics. The tools you will learn during this course will support you to, over time, really start meaning it when you say that you "agree to disagree".

Dr. Femke E. Bakker

Netherlands

Femke Bakker, Ph.D. is a meditation teacher and a political psychologist. She works as a professor at Leiden University, the Netherlands, where she teaches and studies political leadership, decision making, and political behavior from a psychological perspective. Over the years, Femke has been most interested in how diversity of individuals can...

Lektion 1

Me And My World

Our first session introduces you into the meaning and value of political tolerance for a society. We like our world to be peaceful, pleasant, relaxed, and friendly. But then, others might 'spoil' that for you. Whether they are living in your house, or whether you see them on television, there are often things about others that we don’t like and our focus on them can make us feel irritated, annoyed or even angry. As a consequence we might feel that our world isn’t so peaceful, relaxed and friendly. Today, you are briefly introduced to the meaning and relevance of political tolerance for our (political) society. We then start with the first building block of tolerance with a guided contemplation practice.

Lektion 2

What Is Political Tolerance?

In today's session we dive deeper into the meaning of political tolerance and it's value for democracy. Why is it so important to cultivate political tolerance? What is the value to us personally and are there any reasons not to be tolerant? After this discussion, we then start to explore what tolerance means to you personally. We will close with a thought about tolerating ourselves.

Lektion 3

The Role Of Self-Love

Today, we discuss the importance of self-love as a prerequisite for feeling love and compassion for others. When we feel irritated (or worse) towards others, it is often a sign that we don’t acknowledge something about ourselves. We tend to project our fears onto others and blame them for our fears. By acknowledging ourselves first, we set an important pre-requisite to tolerate others. We continue with a guided lovingkindness meditation (metta) that focuses on sending love and compassion to ourselves, followed by sending and receiving love to and from people that we love.

Lektion 4

Dealing With 'Difficult' Others Who Are Close To Us

When it comes to politics, everybody seems to have an opinion. And when others don’t share ours, we feel like we have to explain ourselves, defend our position and make them understand why we are right and they are wrong. It can be hard to accept someone else's opinion when it is so far away from your own. In particular, when these folks are closer to home, like our neighbors, relatives, or even our family members. In today's session, we explore how you can deal with intolerant feelings towards close ones.

Lektion 5

"Easy" Political Tolerance

Today, we will expand our focus to others who are a bit more distant from us. We discuss how, if we want to learn to tolerate them, we will have to put in a bit more effort. Being open towards these people fits in with the view you like to have about yourself as a tolerant person. These folks offer a bridge between the feelings of tolerance towards ourselves and our loved-ones (which we have explored the last four days), and our feelings towards folks who are really very difficult to tolerate.

Lektion 6

Opposing Political Ideas

Today, we take our work a step further and actively explore our feelings about folks who have very different political ideas. People who vote for a very different political party of political candidate. They trigger us, and make us forget why we should embrace diversity in our political and social life. We discuss why our political opponents are the most important people we would want to learn to tolerate. After all, we share a country. We are all in this together.

Lektion 7

Embracing Diversity

In today's session we continue with the work we started yesterday. We recall why tolerating our political opponents, who are also our fellow citizens, are the most important people to learn to tolerate. We use a loving kindness meditation to start processing our intolerant feelings towards them. Our intention is clear: We want to learn to recognize the desire all beings share: to live a good and happy life. We, in your way. And they in their way. After all, self-compassion is the first step on this path.

Lektion 8

Intolerance

Today, we get to the most difficult category of people: the ones we actually don’t want to tolerate because we dislike them so much. In other words: people you are instinctively inclined to be intolerant towards. We discuss how it is not our aim to embrace their perspective, nor to condone any behavior that you don’t want to condone. Rather, the goal is to discover what feeling they arouse in you and to explore what this feeling means. Through a visualization, we explore our intolerant feelings and what we need to soothe them. We finish with a thought about keeping our peace even when thinking about people who we find very hard to tolerate. If you feel like revisiting this day a few more times before you like to progress, that is ok. These can evoke difficult feelings, so please take your time.

Lektion 9

Dealing With Intolerance

Yesterday we entered the toughest part of this course by exploring the feelings and emotions we hold about folks we dislike. Today we start dealing with these unpleasant emotions by using a loving kindness meditation. One session will probably not get you there completely. That’s perfectly normal. Just know that, over time, continuing to practice loving kindness meditation and sending compassion and loving kindness towards folks we so strongly oppose, will get you there. So, feel free to stick around a few days longer at day 9. We close with the same thought as yesterday, to actively explore our possible progress in dealing with our feelings.

Lektion 10

Cultivating Political Tolerance

During the final session, we go one more time into the value of political tolerance. For ourselves, for our close ones, and for our society. We discuss how we, as individuals and as citizens, can take responsibility to foster and cultivate tolerance, using the tools of this course. The last meditation we share is loving kindness. We will close our course with setting the intention to recognize the feeling of oneness in our desires, no matter who we are. Please remember, the work you started here is the beginning of a process. Becoming more tolerant takes time. Allow yourself that time and always be kind to yourself.

Neueste Bewertungen

4.68

154

Annie

February 7, 2024

An important work. To build self-compassion and love, in order to extend that compassion and love (with grace and forgiveness) to others with whom we have different perspectives on politics and how to live ‘a good life’. Thanks Femke for your efforts in preparing this course and for your interactions in the classroom. May we all learn to be more tolerant. 🙏♥️

Judith

November 4, 2021

Excellent and important course that is really needed in this world. It helped me enormously in taking a new perspective.

Leslie

October 24, 2021

This was a very helpful course, with Metta practices to help encourage lovingkindness for ourselves and others. I'm certain I'll be returning to it again next political election cycle!

Riccardo

November 25, 2020

Great course, it open up to tolerance and to understand our emotional triggers when it comes to political confrontation with others. Indeed was useful for me. Thank you Femke 🙏

Michael

October 11, 2020

A lesson in daily living towards others and oneself to learn tolerance and understanding. 🙏🏻

Alicia

July 31, 2020

This course is so relevant right now, and I am so grateful that I stumbled across it. While it did help me to begin the process of showing more love and understanding toward others who do not share my political views, it also equipped me with the tools needed to have better relationships with everyone around me. Any time I am feeling frustrated...

Emily

July 30, 2020

Very very helpful to have a tool to deal with so many feelings during this difficult political time. Thank you

Colette

June 1, 2020

This course covers very difficult terrain. It is a very difficult time in the US with much stress due to the polarization of political parties, COVID 19, and continued racial tension. It it like walking a tightrope and the rope is very ridged. This course comes at a very needed time. Intolerance is an easy road to walk, but tolerance takes...

Freebird

May 2, 2020

I am so grateful for this course! You have equipt me with some incredibly valuable tools to use as situations arise and as I continue to evolve. Thank you Femke!

Brian

May 2, 2020

This course covers the important topic of tolerance. We need more tolerance towards others and the course give us tools to start that process. Thank you. I will come back again to this practice. 🙏🏼🧘🏻‍♂️🌈🌞🌚

Tracy

April 27, 2020

An extraordinary course. The teacher is highly knowledgeable about the topic and has thought through it well. She is also highly skilled at the emotional elements of tolerance loving kindness. Her voice is pleasant, and she respond to my questions quickly and thoroughly and with powerful insights. The course is so helpful, I will take / listen to...

Nick

April 20, 2020

Awesome course Femke!!

Mandi

April 11, 2020

Great course in these trying political times

Anj

April 5, 2020

This course is really helpful, not only in finding ways to practice political tolerance but in dealing with general feelings of dislike for others. My biggest realization in this course is understanding how important the foundation of self love is in learning to love and tolerate everyone else around you. I may have finished the course now but I...

Anne

March 23, 2020

Very helpful words to help develop compassion for others. Helped me reduce the stress that I clung to kept inside me.

Razen

March 11, 2020

I feel more tolerant towards a friend who hurted me, i forgave him remembering how he hurted me. Namaste!

Stacy

March 6, 2020

A very helpful course in navigating sometimes difficult emotions.

Jeanie

February 28, 2020

This is certainly an ongoing process. Thank you Femke, for a very calming and insightful course. The practice of loving kindness is easy with beings one agrees with and likes. This course is a gentle stretching of ourselves beyond our comfort zone. I need this and I appreciate it deeply.

Ryan

February 21, 2020

It may not have been the course that I perceived it to be; however, the content and presentation was top notch. I can see how the course would help expand the mind and heart for someone who frequently deals with difficult people in his or her life.

How To Overcome Political Differences & Feel More At Ease

Dr. Femke E. Bakker

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