There are times when I want the whole world to stop for just one second so that I can get my bearings. But change is ever-present, and the needs of the moment continue to batter my psyche. Whether I have relational stress because of getting together with family for the holidays, or financial stress because I’ve overextended myself, or environmental stress from living in a world that badgers me about the things I should care about during the holidays—our lives are made harder by media and people beckoning us to the shoals of dark distraction.

Where you come from can say a lot about you and what you care about. What you do for a living can be a helpful pointer to deeper things about you. But, as we know, this can go very dark very fast. Whenever we think that a person’s nationality, ethnicity, or some other category can sum them up in some simplistic way, we have veered off into some dangerous territory.