how I learned to stop worrying & love Donald Trump
Hello there,
The morning I found out Donald Trump had been elected president, a sick lump lurched in my stomach. It felt like I had somehow slipped into a weird timeline where Biff from Back to the Future would have the nuclear codes.
You have to admit, the resemblance is uncanny.
This seemed like an apocalyptic disaster, as I'd been raised a good blue-collar Democrat, and filled to the brim with liberal values throughout college.
Also, I've had some personal encounters with sexual assaulters that make me - well, generally not a fan of sexual assaulters, as Trump definitely is, by his own rather proud admission.
And yet.
The more I pondered this great orange enigma and the sway he holds over half the US ...
... the more love and appreciation I felt for his demagoguery, blithe nationalism, and general violating-ness as human being.
I know that sounds strange, and no, I'm not being sarcastic, and no, I haven't converted to share his political views, and my heart still goes out to me and to all other survivors of sexual assault.
I just honestly really love Donald Trump and all he does, both rabidly fucked up and -- perhaps good?
(I don't know, some folks say he does good stuff, maybe they're totally right? it's hard for me to judge in this highly mediated world we live in).
But let's just stay for a minute with the popular Democrat / liberal view I was raised with -- that he's done nothing good, ever, he's just a real-bad-no-good-rapey-liar-racist-wronger.
Okay. So why love love love him? Why not disapprove of him if he's so terrible?
Well, it's been my experience that nothing in me or in other people has ever evolved through disapproval.
I've also read a fuck ton of history, and I've never found a time in humanity when "tsk-tsk, you awful man" or even imprisoning or decapitating rapey racists ever truly changed anything long-term.
I mean, demagogues are a dime a dozen. One goes to the guillotine, another one pops up a few years, decades, or centuries later. No real change, just the wheel of Samsara whirling round.
Disapproval seems to be a magnificent stun gun - it's great at keeping everything locked in place, polarized into fixed dichotomies.
Witness: the intense polarization of the Democrats / Republicans, heartily disapproving of each other 24/7 on their own news channels. Have they disapproved each other into oblivion yet?
No, they've just climbed deeper into their trenches, with feelings of righteousness and victimization gliding down everywhere like the first magical snowfall at Christmastime.
The heart-warming joy of believing oneself to be persecuted falls sweetly upon both Democrats and Republicans alike
So I've concluded, here's what the US does NOT need to truly mutate, move forward, and heal:
disapproval of its racist, sexist, imperialist underpinnings ...
denial of its racist, sexist, imperialist underpinnings ...
unconscious replay of its racist, sexist, imperialist underpinnings ...
disapproval of President Trump
(the delicious swollen Biff pimple on the face of the nation, turgid with all the rich yellow pus of that racist, sexist, imperialism)
denial of his fucked-up-ed-ness or his goodness and accomplishments
unconscious replay of the last election
... I think what we need is to take some time to gently, slowly, humorously admit to ourselves how much there's a bad bad Donald Trump
in all of us ...
... and to unleash the secret wisdom of our hearts that knows how to delight in our evil just as much as in our good, and knows this funky taboo delight to be the essence of that much-vaunted "unconditional love" that we often strive for...
... but that we often fail to give ourselves and others...
... because actually giving this kind of deep, non-condescending, embodied unconditional love -- is embarrassing, fucked up and gross.
So, I invite you to join me in the embarrassing, fucked up and gross process of unconditionally loving yourself and Donald Trump, not by denying or repeating yours or his bullshit...
... but by just being infinitely willing to kiss it with profound gratitude, like Christ kissed the hands of lepers.
love and villainy,
Carolyn Elliott
P.S. In March my book Existential Kink: unmask your shadow and embrace your power comes out, and I'll also be opening a membership community called WEALTH that's all about learning to create extreme spiritual and material wealth (money, love, well-being) through the alchemical reconciliation of opposites.
Stay tuned to learn more :)