Why We Need to Lower the Temperature
I’ve always been a little dramatic. Not in a storming-off-stage, throwing-scarves-in-the-air kind of way (though I do own enough scarves to stage several such exits), but in the everyday sense. I exaggerate for fun. I lean into hyperbole like it’s a cardigan on a cold morning.
But even I have to admit: the way we talk about politics lately could give hyperbole a bad name.
Some days, scrolling through the news feels like watching a national emotional fire alarm that never stops going off. Everything is urgent. Everything is dire. Everyone is either a hero, a villain, or a disappointment.
And somewhere in that noise, we’ve forgotten how to talk to each other like adults.
We’re at Full Volume All the Time
I don’t think Americans are uniquely dramatic — plenty of cultures can out-gesture us by a mile — but we are definitely running a little hot right now. It’s as if the whole country is walking around with frayed wires inside, and one wrong word blows the fuse.
I see it everywhere:
- In group chats that tiptoe around basic topics
- In family dinners with assigned seating like we’re hosting a diplomatic summit
- In social feeds where people swing between “I LOVE THIS” and “OFF WITH THEIR HEADS!” with nothing in between
It’s exhausting. Not just to participate in — but to witness.
And honestly? It’s shrinking our emotional and intellectual world down to something painfully small.
Most of Life Happens in the Middle, Not the Extremes
I don’t live my life in absolutes.
I don’t think most people do.
My coffee can be a little too hot and still be wonderful.
A movie can be beautifully shot and still have a terrible ending.
A scarf can be… well, any scarf is perfect, but even I admit that some patterns clash.
But bring up politics and suddenly we’re stuck in this bizarre all-or-nothing universe. It’s Pepsi or Coke. Angel or demon. Freedom or apocalypse.
And the truth is: almost everything worth talking about has nuance.
You can want safety and civil liberties.
You can like a candidate’s compassion and worry about their competence.
You can support a movement and question a tactic.
You can believe a system is broken and still want to fix it instead of burn it down.
That’s not fence-sitting.
That’s adulthood.
The Danger Isn’t Just Division. It’s Emotional Exhaustion.
People talk a lot about the threat of unrest. But honestly? The subtler danger feels closer to home: we’re burning out.
Emotionally.
Socially.
Politically.
When every conversation feels like a high-stakes confrontation, people stop having conversations at all. We withdraw. We shut down. We form little islands of agreement just so we can breathe.
And when we stop talking, we stop learning how to talk.
That, to me, feels scarier than disagreement.
A Lesson From Laundry-Day Philosophy
I’ve been thinking lately about Oscar Wilde — not because I’m suddenly smoking long cigarettes and fainting onto velvet furniture (though who among us hasn’t been tempted?), but because he had a way of turning seriousness into elegance.
He could say something sharp and compassionate in the same breath.
He could criticize without dehumanizing.
He could be dramatic without being destructive.
There’s a kind of lightness there — a willingness to be thoughtful without being hostile.
And I wonder what would happen if we tried even a little of that.
Not on a debate stage.
Not in Congress.
Not on a cable news panel.
But in our kitchens.
In text threads.
In line at the grocery store.
Talking about politics like grown-ups doesn’t mean losing passion.
It just means not losing perspective.
A Practice, Not a Personality Trait
People act like nuance is some rare ingredient found only in gurus or philosophers. I don’t buy it.
Nuance is just a habit.
Like folding laundry properly.
Or drinking enough water.
Or remembering which scarf you wore in last week’s photo so you don’t repeat it (a very serious crisis in my world).
You can learn it.
You can practice it.
You can even get good at it.
It starts with saying:
- “I might not know everything.”
- “This person isn’t my enemy.”
- “Maybe the other side has a point worth considering.”
Those aren’t weak statements.
They’re generous ones.
And generosity is the adult version of courage.
We Deserve Better Conversations
Not nicer conversations — though that wouldn’t hurt.
Just better ones.
Conversations where:
- We listen longer than we react
- We ask actual questions instead of delivering speeches disguised as questions
- We talk with each other, not at each other
Where we remember that the people we disagree with are often the same people we’d happily share a potluck table with, or a church pew, or the sidewalk at a holiday parade.
If we can trust each other with casseroles and children and jumper cables, we can trust each other with conversation.
Flowers in Our Hair… Even When Folding Towels
This doesn’t require sainthood.
It doesn’t require perfect emotional regulation.
It just requires the tiniest shift:
From shouting to speaking.
From reacting to reflecting.
From “off with their heads” to “Okay, walk me through your thinking.”
Even a small shift changes everything.
It opens the window.
It lets light in.
It leaves space for connection.
We may never agree on everything — thank goodness, what a boring world that would be — but we can certainly disagree at a volume that doesn’t echo into every corner of our lives.
And maybe, if we practice that long enough, we’ll look back someday and realize:
The whole country became a little calmer…
a little wiser…
a little kinder…
…because we finally remembered how to talk to each other like grown-ups.
Scarves optional, but encouraged.
