When I was a young teenager there was a song, I loved to listened to by Dionne Warwick called “What the World Needs Now Is Love.” It is a sweet, sentimental song imploring all of us to embrace our differences, lay down our hatred and violence and live together in peace and harmony.
The message of love is a message of acceptance and understanding. It is a message of care and kindness. It is a message of diversity. In the media recently there have been reports and stories about critical incidences where the lives of others were imperiled because of a lack of compassion, understanding and forgiveness.
When NFL quarterback Colin Kapernick “took a knee” at the football game he was willing to make a stand for acceptance. A stand for intolerance of hatred and violence. It wasn’t about disrespect, but of complete respect for the First Amendment and the unalienable right we all have to be treated equally and fairly. Black lives do matter.
How sad that we had to have so much violence and lack of acceptance of diversity to see this. The #Metoo movement shed light on the plight of so many who have been sexually abused or assaulted because of lack of respect and acceptance for them as valuable, powerful people who deserved to be treated better.
Our voices will be heard! This is the message of embracing diversity. There is nothing to be feared with accepting the myriad forms of diversity. These are just a few examples of how our world is gaining in consciousness about the need for acceptance of diversity so that we are all free.
As Martin Luther King said in his 1963 speech in Washington DC “When we allow freedom to ring-when we let it ring from every city and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last, Free at last, Great God a-mighty, We are free at last.”
As a Marriage and Family Therapist and Registered Play Therapist-Supervisor I work with children, teens, adults and families from all walks of life, from every religious perspective, from all gender and sexuality defining ways, from all things that make us unique and special. Our job at Treehouse Family Counseling Services is to be able to see the world through your eyes. We can’t do this if we do not accept the diversity we see before us.
We have specialized training that brings forth the desire to see each client, each child, each family with eyes and hearts of acceptance so that they may be “free at last” from the pain that binds them. Treehouse Family Counseling Services is in deed a safe place to play and heal with complete acceptance of who you are.
Mary Ruth Cross, MFT, RPT-S
