It's easy to feel special.  Maybe you're the smartest person in the room or you drive a big fancypants car or you have an awesome astavakrasana or you're an American.  The sense of specialness seeps into the topics not to be discussed at your holiday meal--like religion or politics.  President Obama was recently criticized for not being "more American" and not promoting the ideal of American "exceptionalism"

This is dangerous.  This is what starts wars--one person, one family,one community or nation feeling superior or separate from others.  Once you dig your heals in about a particular ideal, everyone that does not agree with you is the "other".  It's the label we put on ourselves-I'm an American, a Democrat, a Raw Foodist that widens that gap.  And when the gap gets wide enough, it becomes harder and harder to cross, if ever. Look no further than your family or beyond to the Israelis and Palestinians. Americans are inbred with the belief that if you just work hard enough you can get ahead. This leaves those that are struggling to appear lazy or ignorant or freeloading on those that do work hard.  So, should those that are financially successful or in the right place at the right time be considered "Exceptional"?   Should our way of life be considered better than anyone else's?

"We are One" sounds new-agey and trite, but dropping the labels that separate us can bring us closer to feeling connected with your fellow earthman. Wonder what makes you different from the 3 year old boy picking scraps of copper and iron from burnt foam on an e-waste dump in Ghana?  Is it because you're exceptional?  Special?  For many of us, the only difference is the good fortune (call it luck) of being born in a prosperous country and into a family that was able to feed us, take out tonsils, don braces, clear up acne, and educate us.  We are not special, we're just lucky.

Another problem with touting exceptionalism or specialness is that it is the petri dish for chauvinism, boosterism(1), imperialism and the sense that rules don't apply to you.  Ask Christian Fundamentalists, Wall Street Jockeys, and Newt Gingrich about wife number 1 when he was seeing soon-to-be wife #2. Thinking you're "exceptional" or "special" gives you the power that you can do no wrong much less admit or apologize (never).  It's becomes easy to rationalize faults or just overlook them.  Try to feel exceptional when America has the largest portion of the population incarcerated than any other country on the planet? 

It's interesting to explore what titles and labels we wear and if they bring us closer or further away from others.  I understand the Buddha did not want you to call yourself a Buddhist, because it separated you from others.  What labels do you wear?  Do they define you, maybe a bit too much?  

(1) pretty cool word, huh.

*Not new.  Recycled from last January 2012.