My Heart Does Not Cry For Robin Williams

My heart does not cry for Robin Williams.

I feel so sad. But my heart does not cry for Robin Williams. 

My heart was heavy last night when I heard the news. 

Robin Williams was a man committed to doing a lot of good in the world, beyond acting. However, he was best known as a man who could turn the corners of our mouths up and form wrinkles around our eyes. He was a man who brought many smiles and lots of laughter to people of all ages. He was a man who helped us forget about the weight of the world for some moments in time. He was a man who allowed us to not take life, nor ourselves, too seriously. He was a man who helped us forget, when that was what we needed. And he was a man who helped us remember, when that was what we needed. He was a Mrs. Doubtfire who made my sister's wig cool we she lost her hair as a 6-year-old. 

I don't have any idea what Robin Williams was going through.

I barely know anything about him.

Yet, my heart cries. 

But, I don't think it's crying for him, specifically.

Nor is it crying for the Israel and Gaza militants, who don't know how to engage in peace talks. 

For the Palestinians who sit beside their rubbled homes. 

For the innocent children, who most likely cannot yet define geographical borders, yet whom already are too familiar with war. 

My heart is not crying for a boy killed yesterday in El Salvador, by the gangs he didn't want to join.

Nor for the young girl who was raped when she crossed the border last month, hoping to find a job to send money to her daughter.

Nor does it cry for the mother who died recently in Liberia from Ebola, leaving her children lonely and worried.

My heart does not cry for the victims of Hiroshima, living a lifetime with the detrimental effects of radioactive chemicals ingrained in both their physical bodies and memories. 

Nor does it cry for the US soldiers, who helped fly the planes that dropped the bomb upon young-girl-trolley-drivers, trying to make a living. 

My heart does not cry for the bodies of fellow-New-Yorkers, who threw themselves from the burning buildings.

Nor does it cry for the fellow-New-Yorkers, who stereotype, generalise, and discriminate.

My heart does not cry for the refugees in northern Iraq.

Nor for the murder of another young black man. 

Nor for the low-income families who cannot afford anything but processed, poisoned and preservative-filled food. 

My heart cries for humanity.

For the one big heart of the world that beats inside all of us. 

For all the suffering. 

For the ways we have forgotten.

For the ways we have been distracted. 

For the ways that we continue to hurt others

Even though we know ourselves how bad it hurts to hurt.

At the end of the day we are all human. Equally human. 

We each have the capacity for good and evil - it just depends on how we choose to deal with what life gives us and how we use our experiences to love more... or fear more. And we each have this power and responsibility, equally, to choose. And so we each are so very important because we are all here beating together. 

But the media- it will tell us that Robin Williams matters more today.

Or that Gaza matters less. 

That Israel is evil.

And Costa Rica is happy.

That East Timor doesn't matter.

Or Sierra Leone doesn't affect us.

But the truth is, it is all one and the same. 

And I don't say this from a spiritual perspective.

Nor a scientific one.

I say it from a human perspective.

You can feel it, too. If you let go of your judgments and stop trying to fill the boxes that we have been taught to place things inside of.

When a man without a home helped me adjust my bicycle seat, I asked myself to stop thinking of him as a homeless man, with all the stereotypes that come attached to this, and recognise that he is just a man without a home. I don't know his story.

When a man who said mean words to me admitted that he grew up without a mother, I asked myself to be more gentle with people who have not had the opportunity to know the compassion that a mother can pass on. 

Sometimes, in life we are given the opportunity to really connect with people. We let our guards down, we become vulnerable. Sometimes, it happens by choice. You help someone with their bags and they, in turn, look up and you and thank you genuinely... and you feel something- a little tingle inside of you. Sometimes, it happens during a fight. Someone starts to cry and admits that they have never forgiven themselves for what they did to their past lover. And you suddenly lose your anger and hug. Sometimes, you ask someone how they can be so calm and composed all the time... and they tell you that one time, when they were stabbed by their own father, they were not as so. 

And I can't explain it through science nor with spirituality, but I think we all know that feeling: When something in us, deep within us, turns or tingles or clicks. And we say to ourselves: 

"Wow. He is a human being, Just like I am." 

So, my heart cries today.

Not for anyone specifically.

But for all of us equally. 

The media, society, our friends - they will all tell us things. Some may be true, some may be not, some we may agree with, some we may not. 

And we ALL make mistakes. We all have acted out of greed, out of selfishness, out of fear. 

The different experiences (good and bad) have shaped how we see the world today and how we treat each other. 

The important thing

Really,

Is to remember

That we all matter

Equally

As human beings. 

It SO matters what you do today

How you treat your neighbour

Or the man who drives your taxi

Because a little bit of compassion, and love, is contagious and it spreads. 

And because that heart that cries inside Robin Williams

Inside that child in Israeli

Inside that banana-field worker in Costa Rica

Is the same heart that cries inside you 

and inside me.