I must say that 2020 has to be one of the wackiest years on record in my memory… and we are not quite halfway through it yet! Just when you think things are getting back to normal, here comes another wave of abnormality.

Here is a funny story that happened to me. A couple of weeks ago, my watch quit working and I needed a new battery. When that happens, I take it to a jewelry store down the street from my office. The sign on the store said you had to have a mask to come inside. So I donned a mask, took my watch in and they replaced the battery. Great! Outside of everyone looking like we were prepped for surgery, that was all pretty normal. It was starting to rain when I was leaving and the clerk asked me if I was parked close by. I told her I was about a half a block away and she told me I better run fast, which I proceeded to do as soon as I hit the door of the store. It occurred to me as I was exiting the store: in normal times, running from a jewelry store wearing a mask was enough circumstantial evidence to get arrested!

Here is a not so funny story that happened today. There was a protest across the street from that same jewelry store. Nothing happened to the store that I am aware of, but I can surmise that the workers in the store were afraid of what might happen if things took the course of many other protests recently. Fear is a terrible thing. Fear makes people cower behind closed doors. It clouds our thinking. Fear also causes people to cast stones, literally and figuratively. This year, 2020, has had an abundance of fear.

I work in marketing. I love the industry because marketing is designed to offer solutions. Marketing is at its best when it is helping people resolve a problem. However, marketing has a dark side. Too many times throughout history, marketing has been used to prey upon the fears of people and lead them down a very wicked path. Name your despot and they all used the marketing of fear to get legions of people to follow them down a course towards hatred that ended in destruction.

I don’t know about you, but I am ready to push back the fear and turn back the hatred. We were designed with better intent than we are showing as a society at this point in this very unusual year. I am reminded of an old saying: There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. In my mind, it is time to put this old adage into use.