We live in a world where we're going to be on the losing side of a bunch of different decisions. And how we lose is sometimes as important as whether we lose.

We need to start with the assumption that most people can be wrong—even deeply wrong—without being evil.

Jesus encountered people with compassion and truth and love, and he wasn't afraid to say hard things. But he recognized the human beings across from him. And sometimes he interrupted his own agenda to stop and pause with the person in front of him.

The question, "Who am I becoming?" is what should be top of mind for all of us. In reality, we often set that aside and forget about it, and we go about our days somewhat unreflectively in the habits and practices and time commitments we take on ... And if we don't pay attention to it, and if we're not deliberate about it, we're just not going to win against the algorithms and the noise and the loud voices.

Living in this world politically and engaging in the political system is living in compromise ... It doesn't mean compromise in your beliefs or convictions, but it does mean, like Jesus did, you have to go out and be with a bunch of people who aren't like you.

When we get into this ends-oriented thinking that will let us win at all costs or treat people however we think they deserve it, that doesn't really bode well for our civic life together.

An inability to compromise is not always a dead end, and even zero-sum decisions can usually be reconsidered. Use the opportunity to deepen your understanding of what’s at stake in a disagreement and why others see things differently. And recommit to work toward a different solution while continuing your efforts to persuade others that your position is, in fact, the better one.

Am I so sure in my own character integrity way of being that I know how I would act in that situation that I've never encountered? The answer is usually, no. There's usually a lot of ambiguity and questions. That's not to say you never pass judgment because you have to pass judgment in law and in society, but it is a caution to slow down and ask about the limits of your own understanding or even capacity to understand.

We need to be able to hear a response that is dismissive or critical or even mean without jumping immediately to our own defense mechanisms or our own rage or indignation. And maybe just thinking, what's really going on there?

I sometimes say civil liberties are for losers — meaning, when you win in the political process, you get your policies or you get exemptions for your interests. It's when you lose, and you still have to participate in that conversation, now from a position of dissent or dissatisfaction, that you need the protections of the law to be able to do that.