"What Side Are You?"

With so many divided families, increasingly more children have been forced to answer this question: "What side of your family do you associate with?"

This weighted question comes with the added acknowledgement that choosing one side means being anti the other. Essentially, the child must reject an entire half of what made them. It can be for any reason, as well - race, politics, religion, a falling out with a grandparent, disagreements in lifestyle... the list goes on.

Society today has so many reasons to hate, and carries so many offenses that it's become like a badge of honor or rite of passage into identity. We band together with others who have felt similar hurt to our own, and stand on identities built from our offenses. And because it becomes an identity, it must be passed down to the following generation, so that they too can take up our banner, carry our bitterness, and continue the fight we feel is righteous. We perpetuate hatred because it is our right - even our birthright.

But every now and then, there's a child who can see past that.

I wrote this book for that child...

For the child who can dream. For the child who can believe. For the child who can see humans as human first, and allow for a clean slate and for hope.

I don't pretend that resolving bitterness is easy. I'm not ignorant that pain afflicted is awful. But I am hopeful when I see children like this... that there can be an end to it. At the very least, an end to it en masse.

I write because I genuinely love people. And I love people who love people.

Humans are incredible.

If we dream it, we can make it.

We dreamt about harnessing lightning, we created the lightbulb.

We dreamt about flying, we designed the airplane.

We dreamt of the moon, we achieved a lunar landing.

We dreamt of all voices being heard, and designed a democratic system.

Yes, we still have kinks to work out, but that is true for every creation - everything can be improved, upgraded, mended, re-applied. Truly there is nothing impossible for humans when we put our minds to it, and we've proved that time and time again!

So, neither is love impossible.

Not just love, but a love that overcomes hatred. A love that overcomes apathy. The ability to care for people who aren't you. The acknowledgement that those who are not like you still have value.

And for the purely practical thinkers, caring for others isn't just for "the bleeding heart," but facilitates very logical enhancements, and creates longevity in hired workers and clients alike. A variety of minds - creative, ambitious, logical, relaxed, active, introverted, compassionate, stalwart - can benefit both individuals and businesses. Mutual benefits cause exponential improvements to economic systems and environmental systems.

Regardless, humans are visionaries by nature, even when they don't realize it.

We become whatever we believe - whatever we feed our eyes and minds to dream. If all we listen to is how bad things are and all we believe is how awful people can be, we will never envision a better future. We will never believe in one. We will dream and believe the opposite, and achieve it.

But there really is better. I've lived it.

I've been to a school of all races, multiple religions, and various monetary backgrounds and watched us all get along and laugh together and eat lunch together and throw paper at each other on the bus out of fun - and get in trouble together with our teachers. We studied together and made mistakes together and overcame our differences together because it was more enjoyable to enjoy each other.

If it can happen in small scales, it can happen in larger ones.

I believe in us.

I hope to inspire belief in my readers as well.

Thank you for reading. And may you always be inspired to dream big.

- Dani Adams

(If you wish to read the book, you can find it here.)