Cultural Intelligence

What is cultural intelligence?

Let's make this very simple.

Love. Respect. Consideration. For everyone.

Everyone we meet comes into our lives with their own backgrounds, experiences, customs, preferences, identities, the things that make them them. They have learned these things from the path they have walked. 

When we take the time to forget about ourselves and love, respect, and consider other people, we are developing cultural intelligence. We learn more about them and their background. We become involved in their lives, in their troubles, in their struggles, in their joys, in their triumphs. We help them, we defend them, we celebrate them, we enjoy them.

We enjoy us too. We share what we have. Our traditions, our customs, our beauty.

Cultural intelligence is about both receiving and giving. A free flow of sharing; learning; developing. It changes us. We become more. We can't help it. It changes them. They become more. They can't help it. Everyone benefits.

New foods, new words, new jokes, new traditions, new customs, new perspectives, new friends, new lives, new communities, new world.

Can you imagine it?

It looks like an American baking scones for an English neighbour. 

It looks like an Indian immigrant sharing traditional homemade food with a new friend to celebrate Dawali. 

It looks like an Iraqi woman sharing her fears about her children growing up in a country so different from her own. 

It looks like a teenager sitting on a porch swing with an elderly neighbour to listen to stories from "back in the day". 

It looks like a black woman offering to help teach a struggling white mom how to care for the unruly hair of her adopted black daughter. 

It looks like a person learning simple sign language so they can communicate with their deaf co-worker, even though he is a stellar lip-reader. 

It looks like two religious leaders setting aside their doctrinal differences to bring their congregations together for regular community service projects. 

It looks like a friend offering support and unconditional love to someone who reveals they are homosexual. 

It looks like a teacher practicing the pronunciation of a difficult foreign name until they can say it correctly.

It looks like understanding and forgiveness when miscommunications or misunderstandings occur.

It looks like grace as we recognize everyone is still growing.

It looks a whole lot like heaven on earth.


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