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In this conversation, Brynne Erickson explores the complexities of human relationships and the quest for peace in a world filled with differing opinions and experiences. She emphasizes the importance of grace, compassion, and understanding in fostering a more harmonious society. Brynne reflects on the nature of human reactions, the significance of love and forgiveness, and the collective responsibility we share in supporting one another through life's challenges. Ultimately, she advocates for a deeper connection among individuals as a means to navigate the struggles of existence and promote healing.Brynne’s Social:Facebook: @Brynne Erickson - my public pagehttps://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61573316550355Instagram: @brynne_ericksonhttps://www.instagram.com/brynne_erickson/Takeaways:We all have different opinions and thoughts, but we can still live in peace.Creating a peaceful world requires internal change, not just external rules.Experiencing both highs and lows is essential to appreciate life.Everyone has low moments; no one is exempt from struggles.Compassion and support for one another can lead to healing.Love can take many forms, and it's important to explore how we express it.Our choices impact others, highlighting our collective responsibility.We should focus on connection rather than division.Finding grace in our imperfections is crucial for personal growth.Living with our scars means learning to manage them, not eliminating them.Chapters:00:00 Seeking Peace in a Divided World03:29 The Role of Grace in Human Interaction06:32 Understanding Human Reactions and Emotions09:28 The Importance of Compassion and Support12:20 Love and Forgiveness as Pathways to Healing15:17 Collective Responsibility and Community18:07 Living with Our Scars and Finding PeaceKeywords:peace, grace, compassion, love, forgiveness, human nature, support, healing, connection, collective responsibility
If you're a spiritually-minded person in the beautiful, messy process of creating your life and asking the hard questions then you just found your people. Middle Ground is hosted by life coach and mom Brynne Erickson, and is a space for the real, honest, sometimes uncomfortable conversations about faith, identity, relationships, health, personal growth and much more. With roots in Latter-day Saint (Mormon) faith and culture, this show explores the full, multidimensional experience of being human and becoming more with genuine curiosity about the many other ways of living and believing. Because the more honestly we see each other, the better we love ourselves and the people around us.
Brynne Erickson (00:31)
How are we as the human family?
going to live in peace.
with all of our opinions and thoughts, preferences that are all different as they're supposed to be.
How can we be different and yet live in peace?
Hmm.
That is the question I want answered. I've been thinking a lot about this today. Today is September 10th when I'm recording this and Charlie Kirk was assassinated, which shook a lot of people and caused a lot of different opinions to surface.
And I am not one to engage in social media much as far as scrolling or checking up on current events. I leave that up to my husband and people that like to be informed to tell me. Cause it just weighs me down a lot. But I did ⁓ scroll a little bit and was just kind of taken aback by the comments of he had it coming.
and he brought this upon himself.
And I did think, huh, I wonder if I've ever thought that. I'm sure I have about someone before that I didn't agree with or someone that I thought was less than me.
And I felt a moment of shame about that.
and
How, how, how are we gonna create this peaceful world that I would think that we all want? Maybe we don't. Maybe I'm a woman, woman show over here. I don't think I am. I think there are plenty of people that truly do want more harmony and peace and compassion and less violence, less hurt, less war.
suppression.
So how do we do it? What's the answer? Is it making more laws? Making more rules? Reforming? What is the answer?
And the word grace actually came to my mind. Cause we can make all the laws and rules that we want, put them on paper, tell everybody about it, try and enforce it. But if our hearts don't change, if we as the people, the ones who are going to abide and carry out these rules, if we aren't willing to do the work on the inside.
then we'll never do the work on the outside, meaning how we act and show up in the world.
And we're always going to have our own view on this life that is affected by the experiences that we have, by the people that influence us, the traumas that we have, the love that we feel or don't feel, ⁓ what empowers us.
and we are also very much human. Like this life experience is about opposites. That's the whole purpose of this life is to experience the highs and the lows, the good and the bad, the sweet and the salty and the bitter. Are those really opposites, sweet and salty? I don't know. But you have to experience them all.
to appreciate the opposite. So as much as it sucks that there is murder and suffering of all kind.
I hate saying that it is essential and necessary and a part of this life.
But it is. Does it have to be to the degree that it is? I don't think so. I think that is something that we can have more control and a say in what that suffering looks like. Obviously, we have more control over that, but it's going to happen. Like, I think how people's these days.
with cameras all over the place and social media. Any human at any point, their low moment, their moment of like them being at their worst can be captured and put on display for the entire world. So let's say you're yelling at your kid, someone catches you, puts it on display for everyone to see, you are scrutinized and destroyed, right? And how awful and sad is that because
All of us have those low moments. No one is exempt from that. If you're a person that has reached complete ⁓ non-violence, non-anger, non-lashing out, I would love to meet you. ⁓ I wonder if you have children. Kids have brought out a whole different side of me.
And I lash out and I believe that that's our natural man in who we are trying to overcome. And that is the big part of this life experience is learning to overcome those impulses, to yell, to hit, to scream, to be silent when we maybe should speak up. Not being so reactive and even not reacting.
is a form of reactiveness when actually doing something is the best answer or the better answer, but you don't. Does that make sense? So basically, I think a huge part of this life is learning to overcome that natural man, which to me is that like initial reaction. And is usually the reaction you wouldn't necessarily choose.
if you had had a moment to like think and process and come up with a more intentional reaction.
And nowadays so many people, mean, the current one that's going on on social media right now was at a baseball game. You've probably seen this one, right? And a baseball goes out into the crowd and a woman is going down and she's about to reach for the baseball. And then a dad comes down the aisle and grabs it before she does and takes it down to his kid and gives it to him. And it's his birthday. Well, the woman.
comes marching down and gets in his face and demands the baseball back and throws a fit about it and he gives the baseball back. And this woman was just torn apart, right? I heard that she even got fired from her job. Like, I don't know if that's true. I mean, it's crazy that she would be that this one moment, right? Would affect her entire life because of this world we live in and of...
everyone being on all the time. And yeah, that stinks. That was a low moment, kind of maybe a poor decision in hindsight. But then again, I get curious. I'm like, why? What's going on in her life that that baseball was that important?
Hmm. Interesting.
And I wonder what she thinks of her decision now. Right? Now that she's been able to take a step back and evaluate the situation.
there often times where I'm grateful for prayer because that's kind of a moment that you get to reflect on your day in quiet in your heart and go over the things that went well the things that you want to change and do better in and that to me is what the atonement is all about is looking inward I mean like man
This wasn't the way I wanted to show up in the world, but I keep doing it. So we're just gonna keep working on it. And I'm gonna show grace and compassion to myself as I'm working on this part of me. Because this is a part of me for whatever reason from trauma or I was just born this way, but I'm going to keep working on it and draw on strength from for me. It's from Jesus.
And I'm blessed to have amazing supportive people in my life. And I know there are people out there that don't have huge support systems or even any support system. And imagine if we all looked out for each other. Like what if we all went to the supermarket and it was just bustling with people checking in with each other all the time, whether you knew each other or not.
You just went up to someone and like, hey, how are you doing today? What can I pray for for you?
Wouldn't that be cool? We just had each other's back all the time.
We're learning so much more about trauma and the toll that it takes on us. Mental illness, whether you're born with it or not, and how that causes us to make decisions.
Again, you have to have the highs and the lows in this life.
And maybe we will all live in peace at one point. Maybe after Jesus comes again, if you believe in that thing. But until then, what can we do now?
mourn with those who mourn, comfort those who stand in need of comfort. Love your enemies.
What is love to you? Think about that.
How do I love someone I don't agree with? How do I love someone I cannot stand? How do I love someone that has hurt me, abused me, wrongfully used me?
How do I do that? I don't know that there's one right answer. But I do believe with all my heart that it's possible.
and that the atonement, forgiveness, love.
I think they all run on the same frequency. They're all the means of setting us free.
from the hard things that hold us down.
I read in a book, the four agreements once highly recommend it changed my life. But it referred to sin as anything that keeps you from being your truest self, I believe. Your truest self, your highest self. It's not just a set of lists, a list of rules that apply to everyone. And I would say that there are typical things that make it hard to live in a higher.
Energy and vibration full of light if you're out murdering people right you're out lying to everybody all the time It makes it hard to show up authentically and ⁓ Being helpful To humankind to each other because we are collective. We're all in this life together Whether we like it or not every choice that you make affects someone else
Which is crazy.
and amazing at the same time.
So.
I think love can, how we love each other can look different for each one of us and that's the work to be done. And if we would spend time and energy with our brains trying to solve that and less time and energy on finding ways to keep us separated.
Meaning my group of people is being hurt and belittled in this way versus your group of people.
as we talk that way that just keeps us more separated. If we're finding ways to judge each other, finding ways to keep us apart, we're just gonna stay that way. But if we start putting our brain power and our heart energy into how can we come together? How can I see this person in a different way? This is how I see them right now and that's not serving me anymore. It's exhausting.
and I'm tired of being angry and I'm tired of feeling bad and inferior. I don't want to feel that way anymore. I don't want to think that anymore. want to think whatever, whatever's more empowering to you. I want to think that we are all.
strong. I want to think that we are all loved. I want to think that we are all valued.
and then start looking for proof and evidence of that and speak it and support it. And if we all start doing that and taking care of each other, holding space for each other, which for me is that comfort, those who need comfort, mourn with those who mourn. You don't need to fix people's problems. You don't need to fix them or even change them.
It's just allowing them space and a moment to sit and tell you what they're thinking, what they're feeling. And you trying to be as neutral as possible. Not even neutral, but like embracing and loving them even when you don't agree with them or you're having a hard time seeing it their way, but not thinking I'm better.
than you. I've got this better. I've got my life put together more than you. I am superior than you guys. That's not gonna be helpful. And it's counter to what we're trying to achieve here, awesome humans.
I feel lighter now having said all that it's been on my mind
in my heart today. I've been holding back my tears.
I have no doubt that when you share my episodes, you're like, she cries a lot, but it's okay. She's very secure in sharing and expressing her emotions.
I'm gonna get all of you to be comfortable criers too. Expressing your emotions is healthy and healthy, helpful ways. It's been a big day for us ⁓ in one way or another.
And my heart goes out to you because I have no doubt. here they come
that you are going through something or have been through something.
that you have scars on your heart from.
and I may not know you.
but I am aware of you.
I believe.
that
There are a lot of people that are aware of us on the other side.
helping us somehow.
I am aware of you and your hurts.
And it's heavy and it's hard.
but with time and in searching for ways to let that go and to overcome that hurt. So it's not so prevalent anymore. I don't know if we ever completely get rid of our hurts. mean, scars are left behind, right, of our hurts, but they get smaller. Maybe less visible with time, less irritated.
But they are part of us, always and forever, but it's how do we live with them so that they don't control us so much.
This life is a crazy experience and the more that we can help each other through it with love and grace and compassion and curiosity. I think we'll be making steps in the right direction. More peace. Will it ever be complete world peace? I don't know. But I think we can make more of it. So.
We got this. Cheering you on.