Why Supporting Trump Actually Demonstrates "Vegan Thinking"

I'm a vegan and I don't hate Trump. 

I lost 133 friends on Facebook during the election for making statements like, "hey give the guy a chance," so now I really don't worry what people think of me. 

I'm not saying he's perfect, but I like how anti-establishment Trump is. Maybe someday I'll be proven wrong, but for now I think he's trying his best amidst all the hate. I'm sure glad he won over a career corrupt politician-- who by-the-way we will never be able to point the finger at now. The person who looses does not get to fuck up royally. But guess who really looses? The people who support the guy in charge, not the ones who support the loser. They just get to complain and say mean things about the people who decide to give him a chance. 

Would I prefer that Trump is vegan and ends national animal agriculture, hell yeah! But this wasn't the presidency for that. It's not time yet. This was the presidency to break the current stranglehold of corrupt politicians giving money here and there for terrorism, continuing to take our rights away, building a huge big brother warmongering operation with YOUR TAX DOLLARS, and exposing the mainstream media who is owned by 1% of people, even though it looks "all different" according to all the Facebook headlines flying around.

In my opinion, this is the presidency for things to come into the light. For more transparency. How is that not AMAZING? Heck I'm jumping up and down on my bed here. This is real big picture stuff so please don't comment on here that you're a vegan and Trump has a steak company and his wife wears fur and his sons hunt and he just passed a bill saying we can hunt sleeping gorillas or something like that. That is all terrible and tragic but it's my philosophy that we take one step at a time, because this had to break first, in order for other things to break.

The problem lies with attachment. People don't want our current society to fall apart. But I do. I think the way life has been set up for us is enslaving us. And we didn't set it up. The elite secret societies did -- the people running the show. Look into this, the information is there if you choose to seek it out. Learn about the ones we don't see, behind the scenes. I want it to break all around me. Whatever is sick: Consumerism. The Media. Entertainment. The Public School System. Politics as we Know It. Our War-mongering Ways. I hope I survive it, but I want it to break. To make room for Love. 

My arrival at this realization about supporting Trump is fairly recent, and involves a realization. 

Mid 2016, I watched all the election coverage and read a lot of things that everybody now is reading, and I saw how biased practically all of the news media and the entertainment industry was toward Hillary--one sided actually-- and I started doing my research... Asking WHY, following the money, saying to myself, that's a little strange, hmm, what is the reason. I looked underneath "the narrative being told to me" because isn't THAT WHAT VEGANS DO? And I arrived at my own opinion that has nothing to do with the lies of some heads of corporations owned by people that have an agenda. The pesky elite 1% again. They keep showing up. 

Therefore, the same critical thinking required in my realization to support Trump was the same critical thinking required to go vegan. So don't be so vicious with me, vegan! Look at the pit of mental mud I was able to drag myself out of with all odds stacked against me. I hope you can drag yourself out again too, and become aware of the OTHER lies you have been fed by the true villians running the show-- who believe me -- are not Donald Trump. 

Blessings, love and ahimsa.

10 Years Have Passed Since my Unpublished First Blog

10 years have passed since I wrote my first blog entry, titled 'I Once Was Lost but Now I'm Found," which is also the title of this blogspot. I never published that post until today, 2017. I don't think I was ready until now. Maybe it took a decade to fully heal. My eyes well up with tears as I think about this.

I also included an earlier work called "Christian Friends Suck." Haha, it almost feels humorous to me now, 10 years later. Even though I don't fully feel that way anymore, that was my experience at the time and perhaps it can help someone be a better friend to a Christian who is going through a divorce. That's what really sucks, and we all need friends to help us get by.

The topic of my writing in 2007--leaving traditional Christianity, getting a divorce, finding a new group of friends-- is a lot different than it is now. A lot has changed and I will share little by little, as I'm ready and as the words come.

Thank you for reading. I hope this helps or inspires you in some way.

I Once Was Found But Now I'm Lost

On January 15 2007, I told my husband I wanted a divorce.

It was a cold day in New York City. My second time there. We were on a company retreat with our business, the graphic design company we both owned. I woke up at 6 a.m. unable to sleep and went down to the hotel lobby so I could email the man I had fallen in love with and tell him I was antsy... really antsy. I couldn't put on a front any longer. It wasn't in my nature to hide things, and I couldnt' keep it up for long.

I had barely slept in two weeks. Two weeks since our first date. Two weeks of listening religiously to the wisdom of Johhnny Cash while painting our studio space black. As black as my mood. Pouring myself into the old, worn down building that I convinced my husband to let us rent with dreams creating a theatre space and pursuing the neverending quest for fun, always fun... A pursuit that left him exhausted and asking me often, "why can't you just slow down?" His inquiry always met with my resolution to stay home more, try harder, be a better wife.

My husband followed me downstairs, before I even got time to log in to my laptop. I looked up in surprise, like a frightened teenager caught in the liquer cabinent. I scolded myself for not getting up quieter from the hotel room that all five of us were sharing. I hated myself at that moment. I wanted to hide. I wondered if he could see it. I wondered what he knew.

He sat down, a concerned and sad expression in his clear, innocent blue eyes. "This is our first time in New York City together, and you will barely look at me," he said quietly, his voice trailing off as he tried to make sense of my strange behavior. He often told me I acted like a squirrel that dashes in the street, looks around in a frenzy, dashes back, unable to make up her mind which way to go. I felt like I was crossing the road for the last time.

He sipped his coffee, always black, patiently waiting for my response.

The trendy hotel lobby was quiet this time of morning. Large absract paintings depicting colorful taxi scenes hung in front of red and black leather couches. A waitress was setting up for breakfast. A few businessmen walked by in a hurry, briefcases in hand. I wondered if they were going to a trade show, the one we were supposed to be at later that day.

"I know. I know. I'm sorry. I'm just not feeling myself these days. I'm sorry."

I had been saying "I'm sorry" for a long time. I said it so much in grade school that my teachers and friends' moms would call my parents and ask what was wrong with me. What did I have to be so sorry about? I was still trying to figure that out.

I was fidgety, sleep deprived, restless. Unable to look him in they eyes. Like I was someone else living in another body, the body of a girl gone mad. I felt 'foggy', like I had described my feelings that last week to our home group that met Sunday mornings at our house, an intimate way of 'being the church' without a building and a budget. People loving people. I loved that concept.

"Should I be afraid?" he asked.

Those simple words. I mentally flashed to a quote he had cut out and taped to his computer screen at home, the neat san-serif font reading "What would I do if I was not afraid?" I had often wondered what he was afraid of, many times viewing him with distain for what I saw as his black and white mentality, the simple and clean cut ways he thought of the world, God, love, humanity.

I remember a conversation we had had a month earlier, while I was mentoring a teenage girl in our church. She was a beautiful spirit with lots of questions and hunger for life.

One day he asked me, "Is Nikki a Christian?" I was so mad at him for asking me that, for trivializing our depth of friendship so it hung on one, stupid word... a word to him that held the depth of the universe. I felt ashamed for being angered by this, ashamed that I did not care about the answer and that I hated him for asking it. "How am I supposed to know." I answered, always defensive. "We just go shopping together. She likes white cafe mocha and blonde boys and dangly earrings. That is all I know." My heart was racing and I felt shallow and wrong. I wondered why I despised him so much.

Sometimes, when he would play the guitar in Bible study, or lovingly listen to people's problems at church, I would force myself to smile and muster a look of tenderness in my eyes like I had seen the other wives doing, just in case our friends were watching me out of the corner of their eyes, thinking, 'isn't she blessed to have a man like him'. I wanted my face to say, 'yes, yes I am grateful. God has been good to me. What a wonderful, sweet, God-loving man.' After all, isn't that why I married him?

I hadn't planned on telling him yet. In fact, I had hoped my feelings would go away. My parents always told me I couldn't rely on my emotions. I was to rely on God alone. And God hates divorce. Divorce. Divorce. The word hung in my head like a dirty rag. Just like me.

I kept telling myself, just get through New York. Get your head clear. You are with three of your employees who look up to you. You run a business together, you can't do this. You will loose everything. What will people think?

"Should I be afraid?"

'Yes, yes, yes, you should be afraid,' my mind was screaming. 'I want a divorce. I want a divorce. Dirty rag. Divorce. Divorce. I don't want to hurt you but "I want a divorce."

Oh my God did I really say that out loud?

He turned beat red. The blood started in his neck and went all the way to his close cropped dirty blonde hair. His fair complextion held no secrets. A bulging vein crept up the left side of his head. His eyes welled up with tears. He told me that if we weren't in a hotel lobby he would have thrown his hot coffee at me.

I didn't doubt it. In fact, I deserved it.

I wanted to crawl under the table and cry and cry and cry. I felt so sorry for him. He demanded 'who, who, who is it?'

"No one you know. A filmmaker. I didn't plan for this to happen. I wanted to tell you right away. I couldn't see myself having kids with you. I dont know why. No, we haven't slept together yet. It was only a kiss, a few dates. There is a bigger problem. I meant to tell you before. I tried to say something, you just didnt see. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry." My words fell out of my mouth and like in slow motion clattered on the tile floor like bone thin china teacups.

Then I was still. So calm. I barely moved. I thought for a moment that maybe I was possessed by Satan. Later he told me that I was. I wondered if this was true. It was like the time I went to see Mel Gibson's "Passion of the Christ." I knew I needed to see it, to come a little closer to understanding what our Savior went thorough, but the suffering of others makes me so upset. I can't even listen to cruelty on the news without it obsessing my mind. So I went into the theater and became numb. I did not let out a single tear for fear that even one would unleash an ocean of emotions.

They say that right before death a flood of memories will overtake your mind, one after the other. As I looked into his anguished expression full of shock and dispair, I saw the sweet, kind man I once knew in what seemed another life, walking in the city as homeless people bypass every other soul on the street and come strait to him. As if they can feel his big heart and know he will care. He would always buy them food... he would go with them to the restaurant. Talk with them, ask them questions. Find out who they are and why they were there.

What a good man.

I knew whose side God was on. 

Christian friends suck

When I got a divorce, my Christian friends gossiped and judged.

My non-Christian friends loved and accepted.

My Christian friends said things like “We have the right to know why you are going this” –Michelle, bridesmaid and friend of 8 years; “I don’t even know you anymore.” –Leigh Ann, bridesmaid and friend of 8 years; “I love you but I don’t agree with you.” –Jeni, bridesmaid and friend of 8 years; “You will loose everything you ever worked for” –RH, pastor’s wife whose church I served in for 8 years; “I’m sorry that you gave up your place in eternity for this,” –Jeff, Charlotte business associate

My non-Christian friends said “I’m here for you no matter what.”

My Christian friends forwarded emails about my personal business.

My non-Christian friends asked me about my personal business.

My Christian friends said “This is not OK.”

My non-Christian friends said “Are you OK?”

My Christian friends need to surround themselves with other people just like them to justify their own insecurities.

My non-Christian friends value people different than them because they have room in their mind to learn from others.

My Christian friends were scared it could happen in their own marriage.

My non-Christian friends are secure with their spouses because they did not choose them based on spiritual delusion.

My Christian friends called me ‘selfish.’

My non-Christian friends called me ‘honest.’

My Christian friends were unhappy for themselves.

My non-Christian friends were happy for me.

My Christian friends haven’t called me once since the divorce.

My non-Christian friends won’t stop calling to make sure I am OK.

I’m so glad I’m not a Christian anymore.

"A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity."
Proverbs 17:17