Last week with the firing of Don Imus for his racist remarks, it brought an opportunity that I do hope is not lost as the media is now focused on the Virginia Tech massacre.  If we are to persevere as human beings we must cut off one of our sources of hate and that is to detox from watching programs or listening to those that promote it. 

Also programs that promote hate are akin to a human trait known as rubbernecking.  As many travel the highways, we come across car accidents and we slow down to see what happened.  As a result, traffic slows down and we remain stuck within it.  When it comes to shows that promote this hate which often humiliate people on-air human nature what it is, we rubber neck and become stuck in this human misery. But, we do have the power of our remote.  We can become un-stuck in the clicking of a button.  One thing to ask; how do you feel when you see someone torn down before your eyes or on the radio?  Does it feel good to see someone ripped to shreds?  Do you feel good after hearing it?  Or does it leave you feeling empty?

Hate can also lend oneself to feeling drained and tired.  I have stated within other articles in the past that these past six going on seven years have left me tired.  I may have said in some that I do hate the president for lying to our nation and it has left a void in me.  Why do I say void?  It is for the simple reason that I want to feel good.  I suspect that it has had a similar reaction in you.

To help cure or detox myself of this hate, I have distanced myself from the source. I do so in order to save my own soul and focus on other stories in which people are in need of help.  Or I choose to focus on stories in which good people are doing good things for their fellow man.  Now those are my favorite stories to write of.  In fact, the article I wrote of the Roloff family who star in TLCs (The Learning Channel), “Little People, Big World” has consistently been at the top of my site stats on my blog.  In the past few days it has been the number one story that people are reading.  I love it.

But getting back to hate and how to detoxify ourselves from it, I want to give all of you an exercise to try out.  If you are a political junkie like me, forget the politics and focus in on your emotions as well as signals coming from your own body.  Those signals are your heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing.

Now, you are going to think me daft our out of my mind as I suggest to you to turn on Fox News “O’Reilly Factor”.  Again, let the politics of his show not even enter your mindset.  I know that it is hard, but I know that you can do it.  I want you to focus in on his style of heightened speech in which he often assaults those he interviews verbally.  Notice the confrontational style?  Take note of the volume in his voice.  There is nothing enriching in elevating one’s tone of voice.  Now check for your emotional reactions.  Also check the signals coming from your body.  How are they?

After doing that, put his show on mute and watch for his facial expressions, since they too have a story to tell.  Are you beginning to see the affects it is taking on your body?  Is your heart racing, your blood pressure rising and your breathing over the top?  Yet, people subject themselves to this toxin night after night.  Do you want to detox off of it?  Take a bold stance and turn the channel to watch a show that is relaxing.  At the end of a long day, night time is for most a time in which we wind down.  But, how can anyone wind down when they have had their emotions heightened as well as signals coming from their own bodies?

While this show, “Scarborough Country” is not filled with hate, it uses the same amount of excitability that “The Factor” does.  In discussing many issues, Joe Scarborough will invite onto his show three to four panelists to discuss an issue and all are clamoring to be heard.  They will often scream in order to be heard.  You cannot fully debate an issue in ten minute time slot. But it does have a negative affect on the viewers.  As with the “O’Reilly Factor”, it too can lend your emotions and body signals to elevate.  In the sixties show, “Lost in Space” remember what that robot used to say, “Danger, Will Robinson”?

Not to only pick on these two shows since there are others, do so with other news broadcasts in which people are interviewed to see if they do the same to your body.

While newspaper sales are down due to television and the Internet, I still prefer reading my Newsday with my breakfast.  There I can sit quietly, delve into any number of stories instead of being screamed at.  I often come away better informed than I was by watching a ten minute debate on any number of news programs.

There is an age old saying that laughter is the best medicine and instead of watching confrontational shows or listening to Rush Limbaugh lash out in his hateful style; why not turn on a comedy?  By laughing it increases one’s endorphins and they do make us feel good.  Laughing softens us and opens us all to a new way of thinking.

The popularity of “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert Report” is because both hosts use comedy in order to deliver the news of the day.  We will laugh at their presentations, and we often come away feeling better and more relaxed.  By the way, any show that can poke fun at politicians, I find to be a laugh riot.

A cab driver who often drives me around will listen to the radio as he works and what he listens to is classical music.  He told me it relaxes him and in this divisive world, we all need time to relax.  Relaxation opens all of us to new possibilities.

Besides the “Little People, Big World” show, there is another show will enrich you and fill you with ultimate joy.  I once wrote of this show and it is ABC’s “Extreme Makeover/Home Edition” Be forewarned to have beside you a box of tissues.  In this show they build brand new homes for deserving families.  I am addicted to it.  But, I would rather be addicted to crying than to hate. Crying is good, it is cathartic and it cleanses your soul as rain cleans the air.

Now we move onto books.  Instead of buying a book written by Ann Coulter in which her hateful words will assault you, buy a book by another writer.  Detox yourself off of Ann Coulter.  Why not a non-political book?  After all it is politics that shapes our way of life.  You know taxes, less money to spend in which one does get angry.  Anger after all is an offshoot emotion of hate.  One writer that I highly recommend is Clive Cussler.  He writes action-adventure stories that delve into deep mysteries.  Contained within his many books are humorous moments between the main characters Dirk Pitt and Al Giardino.  I remember when I was first turned onto this writer; I would stay up half the night reading many of his books.  They are page turners.

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