I am big fan of the 80’s. Not only is it the decade in which I grew up, but I feel a lot of great music and films came out of that era. John Hughes, was a great filmmaker in the 80’s. One of his most popular films was Breakfast Club. A coming of age film that helped launch several careers. In the movie, kids from several different social cliques are forced together to serve detention on a Saturday afternoon. The principal requires them all to write a paper explaining who they are and why they are there. What is supposed to be a punishment, turns into an opportunity for the kids to transcend their peer created barriers and discover they have a lot more in common than they knew, or willing to admit.

You would think the lessons learned in a movie 38 years ago (I am feeling old now) should be something we mastered. Yet, in 2023 we can feel more divided than ever. People are being attacked for their color, their religion or their political beliefs. High school kids, disconnected through a world existing mostly online, never are forced to get to know each other. We still belong to certain social cliques. Not only as children, but as adults. As we grow older we tend to limit our exposure to those who are different than us. In some cases, we even vilify them. In the same turn, we often work to impress those we are associating with.

If we were to change our focus to bettering ourselves, I think we would discover a great deal about ourselves as well as others. That lesson is that despite our differences, we share many of the same struggles and aspirations. By focusing on bettering ourselves, we can be both an example as well as a source of hope for others. You only learn something by exposing yourself to something new. That not only holds true for books and experiences, but for people as well.

Let us all take a lesson from this movie from the 80’s. (watching it again might not be a bad idea) Let us take the time to really learn about those who are different from us instead of judging them. Let us change our focus from impressing others by making our life look perfect, to admitting our faults and vulnerabilities and working on improving them. This way, our life will not only look better, it will actually be better.