Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Wilk Wilkinson. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Wilk, so great to have you with us and thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts with the community. So, let’s jump into something that stops so many people from going after their dreams – haters, nay-sayers, etc. We’d love to hear about how you dealt with that and persisted on your path.
The first thing that I will say, is that hate is often a reflection of something broken within the hater, and not those who are hated. Haters and nay-sayers tend to feel unseen, unheard or feel that the recognition of the trials and tribulations within their own existence are somehow threatened by those they “hate”. This generally stems from ignorance.
The best way to reduce, or as I say, “Derate The Hate”, is to promote good-faith conversations between those of differing thoughts & mindsets. We must reject the idea that just because we don’t agree on certain things, we must automatically resort to not liking each other. Disagreement does not equate to hating one another, nor should it. Disagreement is often a good thing as it helps us to work through our own thoughts and course correct when needed.
If more people put forth the effort to sit down and truly engage with those they claim to “hate”, or those they feel are their “haters”, the world would be a much better place. Engagement and conversations are key. To quote my good friend Mónica Guzmán from Braver Angels, “Those who are under-represented in our lives will be over-represented in our minds”.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
I am Wilk Wilkinson, husband, father, Christian conservative, and host of the Derate The Hate podcast. I’m a man who’s made more than my share of mistakes over the course of my life, but most importantly, I’ve owned up to them and I’ve learned from them. I grew up poor, mostly in rural towns around the upper Midwest. I’ve been working from the age of 10 years old so that I might have the things my parents could not or for good reason, would not provide for me. For all their faults, my parents provided what was needed, of which were love and good values.
We cannot control everything that happens to us in life, or the world in which we live, but we have the absolute responsibility as individuals to control how we will react to it. Civility does not require that we force our opinions on others, demand like mindedness, or hate those with whom we disagree, but simply to see the humanity in all people despite our differences, whatever those differences may be.
I started the Derate The Hate podcast a little over 4 years ago because I saw that the hate and toxicity within our “online ecosystem” was getting out of hand, and as more people spend more of their time online, there needed to be some serious course correction. The work with my podcast then led to my volunteer work with the greatest and largest grassroots organization working towards the elimination of toxic polarization, Braver Angels. Braver Angels is leading the nation’s largest cross-partisan, volunteer-led movement to bridge the partisan divide. Through community gatherings, real debates, and grassroots leaders working together, we’re creating hope — and showing Americans a braver way.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
Be kind, be grateful, and hold yourself to a higher standard of accountability.
You never truly know what other people are going through. Everyone is facing some type of battle that you likely know nothing about so a good rule to live by is to approach all interactions with kindness. A smile to a stranger may be just what they need today to give them the strength to move forward. Smiles and bad moods are contagious, so choose wisely what you are spreading.
Gratitude is the genesis of happiness. Someone said to me once, if you are not grateful for what you have, why would anyone expect you to be grateful for anything else that you hope to get. When we start to focus on being grateful for the little things that we have, rather than envious or upset about that which we don’t, happiness becomes a more natural state of mind. Never take for granted the little things, be grateful for all you have.
Personal accountability is so huge for me. I know that I have the absolute responsibility for all my own actions and the way I respond to those things which are outside of my control. If I cannot hold myself to that standard, I know I don’t have the ability to hold anyone else to it. When we as individuals embrace the idea that we are able to choose our response to all things outside of our control, and hold ourselves to that higher standard, the world begins to look a lot different.
Thanks so much for sharing all these insights with us today. Before we go, is there a book that’s played in important role in your development?
For the longest time I would have said, “How to win friends and influence people” by Dale Carnegie. This book is still vitally important and I would recommend the lessons within it to anyone.
More recently, I had the opportunity to have a discussion with my friend David Brooks of the New York Times about his book, “How To Know A Person; The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen”. The art of having meaningful discussions, truly hearing what others are saying and being heard by them is one of the skills that is sorely lacking among so many today. Going back to what I had said earlier, meaningful conversations with those of unlike minds is vitally important for our future.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.deratethehate.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/derate_the_hate/?hl=en
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DerateTheHate
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-wilk-wilkinson/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/DerateTheHate
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@wilksworld/featured
Image Credits
Monika Wilkinson Photography
