By “us” all “thems,” I mean finding common ground with every person – especially those you fear or are angry with or who are simply very different from you. These days this practice is more important than ever.

Here are my Top Five Inner Practices for helping this year be a good one for you and others:

1. Drop the Stone
2. Let It Flow
3. Learn As You Go
4. “Us” All “Thems”
5. Be Amazed

For most of the past 300,000 years, our human ancestors lived in small bands of about fifty people in which they survived by being good at caring about and cooperating with people inside the band – with “us” – while also being good at fearing and aggressing upon people outside their band: “them.” And for 2 million years before that, our hominid ancestors lived and evolved under similar pressures.