There is a connection between why the Democrats lost the election, Thanksgiving, and Amazing Grace. There is a quotation from Maya Angelou that is current but also speaks to an ancient piece of wisdom. She said, “I learned that people forget what you said, people forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
The Democratic Party has been doing active reflection on why they lost the election. A lot of it has been finger pointing. But when Philadelphia members of the party interviewed random people in each political district, they learned the real reason for the Trump victory.
The Democratic Party including Kamala Harris had a central message that included thoughts that never got linked to the people’s feelings. The focus was on saving our democracy and stating the ingredients included in the 2025 position papers which Trump lied about and are now part of his plans for our collective future. But when people were interviewed post-election, many reported that they didn’t even bother to vote. The large amount of money spent on getting the people out to vote made little or no difference. When they dug deeper into the people who didn’t bother to vote, they discovered that the focus on the economy and what Biden did at home and abroad which was noble and noteworthy, did not address the helpless and hopeless feelings of the people. Peoples’ feelings of living from paycheck to paycheck were not heard despite all the great things that the Biden Administration did to improve the economy (which was history making).
Talking points are just that, something nice to say. That was like salt in a wound. The end of the day conclusion is that the Democrats lost not due to votes for Trump but because of votes against Biden. “Look at all the great things we accomplished at home and abroad!” was the mantra. Those policies did not touch what the people felt.
“I learned that people forget what you said, people forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
Someone should have brought Maya Angelou’s wisdom attached to a banner. It could have shaped a different conclusion.
I don’t know about you, but in my own life I know that her emphasis on how we feel takes precedence over what people do.
One of the basic core issues of therapy is to pay attention to how a client makes you feel. As a therapist that is the most valuable content you can have. If you feel frustrated in the relationship, know that the client has an investment in you feeling that way. That is like gold. It is your currency to produce change.
Thanksgiving should be more than a day. It should be a feeling, a quest to make others feel included and special. My wife is a friend magnet. I call her Barbara Walters because in a short period of time someone will tell her their life story. She walks Sadie, our lab, in the woods. It is really a beautiful park sponsored by Radnor Township with a stream and paths through the woods ten minutes from our home. Often when she comes back from walking Sadie, she will have a story about someone or a couple that she met.
She came home recently and told me that once a person she met found out what my life’s work was, the individual said, “I am taking care of Grace Haupt.” At EA she was known as Amazing Grace. Grace Haupt had Friedreich’s Ataxia which is a neuromuscular disease which causes muscle weakness and fatigue. She was confined to a wheelchair, but nothing could stop Grace because she lived her life with thanksgiving and gratitude. She too was a people magnet. People were always present around her to laugh and have fun and open a door for her wheelchair. I can still picture her on campus. Her sense of thanksgiving and gratitude were contagious.
She attended Haverford College where she majored in History and minored in Creative Writing and Classical Culture and Society.
Her mother, Dr. Holly Hedrick, is a physician at CHOP and shares those same characteristics. When I visited Grace at CHOP, her mother was present as well. When I left the room, I felt that I had just spent time with the very best in humankind.
Enjoy your turkey and pumpkin pie. But if your day doesn’t contain the FEELING of GRATITUDE AND THANKSGIVING, your will miss the not-so-secret ingredient that embodies the life of Grace Haupt. Below experience a Chapel Address Grace gave in 2020, and the song which is a song of Thanksgiving.
Amazing Grace is a person and a song!
Happy Thanksgiving
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