I once caught the ending of a podcast where they explained that love is understanding. We take so literally the phrase “love each other as you love yourself” that we assumed we have to feel butterflies for every single person that crosses our path. But that’s not really it. You see, love has different shapes. The proof is in the kind of love you have for your partner, your children, your friends, your acquaintances. They are all different but they are all love. If you understand the other person, their motives and the upbringing that built their motives and beliefs, you have learned compassion, kindness, peace, honesty, tolerance, grace, generosity, goodness. But above all, you’ll learn how to love your neighbour. You’ll stop evil on its heels, at the root.

Get to know those around you. Your neighbours (literally. Go next door), that cashier whose face has become familiar. Don’t just do quick talk, get involved. No more indifference. You see someone crying, wipe their tears and be a good listener. You see a happy neighbour but hear his/her cries at night, be a listener, be present; be proactive. Someone insults you or treats you poorly, see beyond the anger and find their brokenness and heal it with patience and kindness. There’s no better weapon.

Dig inside your own broken soul to find a way to understand others. Don’t say it’s not broken. If you are an imperfect being, your soul has its own kind of brokenness and we are all imperfect beings. Find a way to relate to others’ pain and joy from what’s within you.

I have to put this into practice too. Believe it or not, I’m a very shy person. We’ve been living in our house for three years now and I still don’t know my neighbours beyond a quick hello when we happen to leave our houses at the same time. Honestly, it gives me anxiety to go and knock on their doors, feeling like I won’t know what to say or do, or I’ll make a fool of myself. I can already hear my babbling of jibberish where I forget half of my English and Spanish vocabulary, talk so fast it becomes intelligible and my face turning red as I dig my self deeper in shame. But I Have to do it. You have to do it. We ALL have to do it. Because when we do all that, we feed each other’s light and we grow stronger and brave to do what’s right, and slowly but surely we will defeat and eradicate the evil of this world. Yes it is possible. If you do your part. I encourage you to DO YOUR PART, don’t brush my words off. The time is NOW. In you is the key to make this happen. Just like a grain of sand is dust on its own but together with fellow grains, it becomes sand, you are small but with me, with us, with each other, we become the light this world needs. Now go and do it. You are more powerful in goodness than you believe.

by Fela Dales. Article first appeared on Fela Photography.