I’ve noticed a trend across the board, we’re doing things to the extreme. We are no longer fans of things we are obsessed with them (can we talk about our celebrity problem?). We are no longer just vegans or gym rats, we are trying to convert people to our ways. We are no longer democrat or republican we are alt-whatever. We’re taking our ideals and we’re blowing them up so big that we not only can’t agree to disagree, but we’re taking the good things about our movements and completely destroying them.

When I decided to write this post I had to stop and ask myself if there was anything that should be taken to the extreme. I thought, surely you can take some good things to the extreme. I’m a christian so I wondered about my religion, but the moment I started thinking about that I started thinking about Westboro Baptist church and realized that even something good can turn into something negative if we push it to the extreme, because people always cherry pick which things to push and which messages to ignore.

You can be passionate about something without taking it to the extreme. I think that is something people forget when they push off their negative traits on passion. You can be an activist without being extreme.

Being extreme brings:

• Extreme anger against people who disagree to the point you can’t discuss things or change their mind.
• Dismissing any other ideas and the inability to hear people out. Deciding that all other views are wrong.
• Pushing people who are only a little interested away because they don’t feel like they are “enough” for the movement/religion/group.

Being passionate brings:

• Wanting to share your beliefs/loves with others without being pushy. Talking about these things happily.
• Having good arguments for your beliefs
• Welcoming others into your movement/religion/group and making sure they don’t feel excluded.

Do you see what I’m saying? Passion is healthy, we’re supposed to be passionate about the things we love. When we take those passions to extreme all of a sudden it’s not healthy for us or for whatever we are pushing. We’re not only turning people away from us but we’re turning them away from the very things we are trying to spread.