I Want to be Like Mr. Rogers

“As human beings, our job in life is to help people realize how rare and valuable each one of us really is, that each of us has something that no one else has- or ever will have- something inside that is unique to all time. It’s our job to encourage each other to discover that uniqueness and to provide ways of developing its expression.” ~ Mr. Rogers

“In times of stress, the best thing we can do for each other is to listen with our ears and our hearts and to be assured that our questions are just as important as our answers.” ~ Mr. Rogers

“It’s the inner world that needs adjusting, tweaking and plucking when the outer world fails to please.” ~ Mike Dooley

After a week like we’ve just lived through I have only one thing to say, I want to be like Mr. Rogers.

I was too old to be the target audience when Mr. Rogers’ television show first aired. Which kind of makes me sad, but I was lucky to live with a Mr. Rogers type person, my dad. 

This is what I learned from my dad, and Mr. Rogers: I feel better when I’m kind, when I help someone feel that they are important, and when I try to understand how another person must be feeling. I feel worse when I’m mean, blame other people for my problems, when I’m judgmental, or want revenge. It’s that simple. 

I know, I know, the way we feel about ourselves gets in the way of remembering to be kind, as do our wounds. The popular idea that we’re all separate from each other also gets in the way. But the truth is, we’re all connected. That’s why we can feel the atmosphere when we walk into a room, why we cry at sad movies or books, why when the parent is yelling at their kids in the next aisle at the grocery store, we feel like they are yelling at us. Or when we see someone do something nice for someone else, we feel like they did it for us.

Popular movies like the Star Wars series using the concept of “the force” are based on the idea that everything that exists is connected. Carl Sagan tried to get us to understand that when he said in the first version of the TV series, Cosmos,“The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.” Which, in my mind means we’re connected to everything that exists because we’re all made of the same stuff.

Since I don’t live in those communities where the tragedies happened, the only way I can share their pain is to weep and hold those in pain in my heart, then go out and be like Mr. Rogers and spread as much love and kindness as I can. It’s the only way I know how to balance or reverse the negativity that is spiking right now.

I hope you are finding a way to stay balanced during these crazy times. Blessings to you all.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden © 2022

Have you ever experienced life shattering events? Yeah, most of us have. In The Space Between Time, Jenna Holden gets slammed by her fiancé walking out, her mother’s untimely death, and losing her job all in one week. But she receives unexpected help when she finds her three-times great-grandmother’s journals and begins the adventure of a lifetime.

The Space Between Time is available in all ebook formats at Smashwords and for Kindle at Amazon, or you can find the ebook at iBooks or Barnes and Noble. If you prefer a physical copy, you can find a print-on-demand version at Amazon. Stay tuned for news when the audiobook version is published

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