Choosing Love in a Divided World

In this solo episode of The Becoming You Project, Jess shares an honest reflection on what it means to choose love in a divided world — and how awakening isn’t just a personal process, but a collective one. Through a story about a simple act of kindness in a school lunchroom, Jess explores how empathy, awareness, and courage can ripple outward to create meaningful change.

This episode is a heartfelt reminder that becoming isn’t only about finding yourself — it’s about recognizing the energy you bring into the world and the responsibility that comes with awareness. Jess invites listeners to stand in their values, use their voices, and take small, loving actions that make a big difference.

If you’ve ever wondered how to navigate the heaviness of the world without losing hope, this conversation will help you reconnect to your power — and to the truth that change begins within.

Keywords: collective awakening, personal growth podcast, choosing love, kindness in a divided world, mindfulness, using your voice, awakening journey, self-awareness, ripple effect, conscious leadership, healing the collective

Let's Connect! 

Find me online at:

JessCallahan.com

@jesscallahan_ on Instagram

becomingyouproject.substack.com 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:03

Hey guys, welcome back. This week's episode is a little bit different. So when I started the Becoming You project, my intention was to help women find their way home to themselves, to remember who they are underneath all the noise and expectations. But I never meant that journey to be an isolated one. Because becoming isn't just about self-discovery. It's about recognizing the energy that we bring into the world and the way our healing ripples outward. It's also about the responsibility that comes with being awake and aware. So this episode is about what's going on in the world around us right now. And it's a message about the choices that we can make in our individual lives today to start to make a difference in our world. It's a message of choosing love and spreading kindness, and about remembering that we're all connected and that the energy we choose to embody matters. This conversation is also part of my own becoming, like learning to use my voice to stand up for what I believe in and to keep choosing love, even when it's uncomfortable. So let's dive in. I was reading an article the other day, and it took place in the cafeteria lunch line in some high school somewhere in America, and there was a boy who was checking out with his school lunch, and for one reason or another, his funds had run out. He couldn't afford the hot lunch at school. And so the cafeteria aide shook her head and she pointed him in the direction of like these cold-cut sandwiches. And the author of the article, who I think was a teacher at the school, called it lunchtime shame. Because although the boy had something to eat, he was eating this special lunch, this separate lunch, and the lunch screamed, I don't have enough money. I'm different. I'm less than. I have this lunch while everyone else eats that lunch because for some reason I can't afford that lunch. And yeah, I mean, something like that constructs shame stories in the minds of our youth. I mean, really, in the minds of our adults too. Um, but especially in the youth who don't know how to categorize the shame, to deal with the shame, to rewrite those shame stories and to understand that like having less than does not mean that your worth is any different. You are a human being and you are worthy and you have value, but something like that sticks with them. And the teacher writing this article saw that. And at some point, you know, after the lunch hour, he approached the lunch aid and said, Next time somebody can't afford to have the regular school lunch. I want you to use this to cover the difference. And he slipped her a 50. And every week thereafter, he gave what he could to cover the lunches of any students who couldn't afford to have the regular school lunch. And eventually other students caught on and they started having bake sales and fundraisers and, you know, raising money so that anyone in the school who couldn't afford the school lunch didn't have to eat this separate meal. And it wasn't about the food itself. It was about the fact that like they saw the humanness in each other. They saw that they are all human beings. And just because a family is experiencing hardship or somebody doesn't have the money to afford something one day, it doesn't mean that they should have to be different, that they, that there should have to be such an obvious difference based on something that they can or cannot afford. They took care of each other, they showed kindness, they showed unity. And it really got me thinking: like, I want that world again. That's that's the world that I want to live in. I want to live in a world where we show each other kindness by default, and we know that there are differences between each and every one of us. We are all so beautifully, uniquely different, but also the same. And our value doesn't come from how much we make or how much our parents make or job titles, the things that we have. We are human beings and we are worthy as we are. This article was published long before, you know, the threat of government shutdowns and snap benefits and millions of people going hungry. And it just felt so much more relevant, you know, as I read it and reflected on it and just thought, like, I know that these acts of kindness are still happening every day, but I'd venture to guess that they're happening a little bit less now. You know, the world is an unforgiving place, and we live in fear of what people will think or say, or the retribution that comes with this whole idea that like simple kindness is politicized and weaponized. And, you know, when these acts of kindness do happen, we're not talking about them as much because, again, we're just we're afraid of what other people will say. We're living from a place of fear of each other's differences and of the retribution instead of like living from a place of love and defaulting to this place where we reach out to our neighbors and we see the differences in each other and we honor those differences. We love those differences because that's what makes us who we are. We're not meant to be cookie-cutter molds, replicas of one another. Like each of us was created with really unique gifts and experiences and you know, just like insights to offer at this world. And gosh, what a boring place that would be if we were all the same. But but we live in this place where differences are these like chasms that sit between us, and we're uncomfortable bridging that gap, we're uncomfortable sitting in somebody else's experience without finding a way to fit it into our own experience or like rectify it with our own experience, like you know, or even like place it into some sort of hierarchy with our own experience based on worthiness and value. And I don't know, I mean I sit with this a lot. I sit with this idea that like we've become so uncomfortable with so many things that keep us divided. We've become so uncomfortable with emotion, feeling our own emotion, witnessing the emotion of others. And I think that's part of what keeps so many people feeling numb to everything that's going on, because you know, when you start to look at some of these issues head on, you realize that you have to feel something in order to really witness them. You have to feel the horror that's happening to our neighbors, to people all over the country right now. And for a lot of people who were never taught to feel those emotions, it's just easier to look away. We weren't taught to honor the differences in each other. We weren't taught to ask difficult questions, have hard conversations, take time to genuinely listen, simply to understand the experience of another human being, you know, not because we want to respond or we want to provide value in the conversation or because we have something to add or we want to share our own experience to, you know, maybe to relate, but also just to share our experiences, right? We we don't sit and just listen and learn about each other because it's uncomfortable and because we don't know how to do it. And so we would rather just like revert to our little echo chambers, and that's the hard part because we're living in these like little isolated, we're living on islands, and you know, they're not physical islands, but someone's on an island with the people who are a lot like them and they're in their comfort zone, and and then there's another island across the way of people who live differently or think differently, and and there's no bridges between the islands. We need bridges, we need to reach out to understand and to make connections. Because if we don't, if we don't proactively make that choice to make connections with each other, to understand each other, to witness each other, we just we just further divide living on these islands. I think a lot of it comes back to this idea that we create the world that we live in. And sure, you know, I none of us has control over the whole, you know, the entire landscape of what we're living in right now. But change starts at the individual level. Change starts when each of us separately makes the choice to do just a little bit better. And when we choose to live in like fear, hate, division, and isolation, that's that's what grows. That's what blossoms. And by choosing to not do anything, you're still choosing fear and isolation. The harder thing right now is to reach out in kindness. The harder thing is to be the bridge between communities. And I get it, like we're all stressed. There's so much going on, and it's like impacting every part of our nervous systems. And what are we supposed to care about? Everything, but like nobody has the time or empathy or ability to literally give the attention that every single issue needs right now. And so, like, I would challenge you to say that like the best thing that you can do is to make the choice to change the world around you, to choose kindness, to have a conversation with somebody that maybe you wouldn't otherwise reach out to, or to listen next time, next time you're in any kind of you know, disagreement with somebody, like just take the time to listen to their perspective, even if you know you're never ever going to agree with it, just take a moment to listen. But like the one thing that we shouldn't be doing right now is staying silent, because when you stay silent, it allows the louder voices to win. And right now, the loudest voices are the voices of cruelty and division and fear and control, and when you use your voice, even like it doesn't have to be some like loud show of um you know support in one way or the other, it doesn't have to be political at all. But when you stand up and say, like this isn't okay with me, like this cruelty is not okay with me, or like the divide, the division, like you know, when you take the time to know your values and know what part of like the madness going on right now really conflicts with your values, and when you speak up for that, whether it's to the person next to you, whether it's on your social media, whether it's on a bigger platform, however you decide to use your voice, it creates a ripple effect around you. Because when people are living in a place of fear, but they see somebody that they love or they respect to speak up in support of what they believe in, it empowers them to speak up a little bit more too. It gives that like silent permission that so many of us are waiting for to say, like, no, this is the right thing to do. These are my values, and I know that when I use my voice, those around me will start to do the same thing. And that's like it's that ripple effect that creates waves and eventually tsunamis of change, but it has to start on the individual level. You know, like I don't know how we fix things today or tomorrow. I have no clue. But I have hope in the next generation. I have hope each time I see, you know, one of my kids or one of their friends stand up for the person next to them, they do it really naturally, especially when the examples that they're seeing are people that do the same thing. When they speak up for what they believe in, and when they don't let something happen on their watch that is cruel or unjust or unkind, I really have so much hope. But in order for the next generation to really be able to create more and lasting change, it starts now. It starts with the conversations that we're having with them, it starts with the work that we're doing now. Because if we don't do the work now, and this is the great work of our generation, this is the work right here. How do we rebuild a world of kindness? And maybe it means like absolutely obliterating the structures that we have in place right now, I have no clue. But how do you build a world that lives from a place of love and not fear? And it starts now because if we're not doing the work now, if we're not at least changing our own habits and the ways that we live and the ways that we reach out to other people and the ways that we show kindness to each other, and if we're not modeling that for our kids, what kind of world are we passing on to them? Somebody's gonna have to do the work eventually, right? This isn't sustainable. And so we're just passing our problems down the line. If we don't do the hard thing and decide now that it's time to speak up and stand up for what we believe in and understand our values deeply so that we can live by and align our lives with those values. So if we're not actively having the conversations with our kids, the voices that seed the division are still winning. And it's hard to have these conversations, it's hard to figure out how to talk to your kids about it. But kids are resilient and we can't shield them from it. Sure, you can like take YouTube away from your kid, but like they're still going to be exposed to all of the same stuff. They're still gonna hear the language, they're still gonna feel the division. And so if we don't equip them with ways to stand strong in their own values, in their own belief systems, when they do hear this information, then we're really just passing on the very same problem that we inherited in the first place. I dream of a world often where we don't have to justify our value or worth based on how much we produce, the color of our skin, our country of origin, our belief systems, where we are all human beings and we are equal and kind and worthy, and it it all comes down to I think just like choosing love above everything else, and and using that as an anchor to guide the choices that we make and take a stand for what we believe in. And I think when you do that, like when you choose love, when you choose to live from a place of love, when you choose love to be the thing that you are passing down and let it let it live in every thread of your life and your legacy. That doesn't mean you know that it is like sunshine and rainbows all the time. I think it's actually the opposite. We're not ignoring the problem when we choose love, we're going headfirst into the problem. We're doing the thing that feels uncomfortable, figuring out how to feel the feelings, and it gets messy at times, especially if you're somebody who hasn't always had the tools to feel and express the emotions that are naturally just like flowing through you. Because of course we know, like if you're not feeling them, they're still happening in your body, they're just getting stuck in your body and they're taking root in your body, and they're gonna manifest in different ways. So we have to feel the feelings, right? And we have to really take the time to know what we believe in in an individual level, and I think that is what it means to choose love. I think we're at just like this critical point in time, and sure these points have happened before, but this is it's an inflection point, and I I really believe that we are on the cusp of a collective awakening. I think that we are living in a time when things are like just imploding everywhere, right? There are structures of just power and control that have always been these like threads that have that have always controlled our lives, but you know, they've sort of run unnoticed and the control has just happened, right? The conditioning that has uh kept us working really hard without rest, the conditioning that says that the color of your skin matters, the conditioning that says that men are inherently more valuable and powerful, and a woman deserves to be in the kitchen because she isn't capable of having a job and raising kids. And, you know, it's all of these, it's the it's the conditioning that our culture has run on for so long. And I think that people are really starting to wake up to the conditioning and starting to say no to the conditioning, and that's why we're having these massive clashes because there are people in power right now who are perpetuating this like centuries-old story of conditioning and like control and fear-based obedience. And I think people are waking up to the fact that like this isn't right, this isn't how we want to live. I don't know if any of you have been, you know, falling into this K-pop demon hunter's craze. My four-year-old is currently watching it on repeat, and I have to say there are worse movies. I um, you know, watching it on repeat is a little bit much for me, but uh, the music's great and the message is great. And at the end, when Rumi is, you know, battered and broken, and she's told that there's basically like no way to fix the world, like the the structure, the protection that like their world lives within. There's no way to fix it. And she acknowledges, she says, I know, but we're gonna build a new one. And I feel like that's the moment that we're living in is it, I don't know that it can be fixed as it is, right? I think there's so much that has to change if we're going to uproot the foundations of like you know, fear and control and hatred and cruelty that so much is built on right now. But rebuilding from a place of love, I don't know what it takes, but what I do know is that I can just I can feel it, I can see it, hear it every day that we are experiencing, you know, these early stages of this collective awakening. And I have so much hope that as people take a stand for what they believe in, as people choose to live from a place of love versus a place of fear, it's the ripple effect that changes everything. And it starts at home. It starts with the individual choice to do better, to have the hard conversations, to sit in this messy place of discomfort with your neighbors, with the people who aren't just like you, and take the time to just witness them and understand them and learn from them and build the bridges between communities. You know, it's not it's not about politics anymore. It's about like basic humanity, it's about basic human decency. And so I think we can all give ourselves permission if, you know, if we don't want to be political, fine, don't be political. I mean, I think that's a whole separate conversation that we don't have to have right now, but this isn't about politics anymore. This is about right and wrong, kindness and cruelty. It's about seeing the humanity in each other and making the choice to do better. And it's about the world that we're passing on to the next generation and the knowing that when we don't choose to do the hard work right now, when we choose to stay silent, when we choose to let all of this happen around us unchecked, we're giving a permission slip for it to happen. We're letting those voices win. We are being complacent with all that's happening around us, and we're also just passing on the problem to those who come after us. Because this doesn't go away, like it's not going to just magically disappear. This isn't something that just dissolves. Like it's not just like an inflection point where if we don't get involved, if we stay silent long enough, it will just like simmer down. That's not how this ends. This ends when we choose the world we want to live in. This ends when we choose kindness and love and basic human decency, and we set those as the bare minimum for the world that we want to live in, for the world that we want around us. When we take a stand for what we believe in, and when we choose love, everything else around us shifts. And, you know, I don't claim to be perfect by any means on this journey. These are things that I'm learning myself still, and they're things that I'm, you know, actively and consciously working to bring into my own life. And I know that, you know, it's it's not a switch that we flip and we say, okay, we chose love and life gets better, but you know, I don't even think that we can change the trajectory of what's going on until one by one we each start to make these choices and make this change. And so I challenge you, I challenge us this week, this month, just do one thing to stand up for your values. Do one thing to choose kindness and love, to invite more kindness and love back into your life, and let that ripple effect happen around you. See what happens when you start to make those small choices, just see how your world changes. And when enough of us make that choice, I think the world really does start to change. All right, guys, that's all I got for you today. Um, I will be back next week with another interview, and I look forward to connecting soon. See ya.