Election Day can be really discouraging.
Sometimes your vote feels inconsequential in a lopsided election. Sometimes (often, these days) you don’t have an option on the ballot you were inspired by. Sometimes it’s just the anxiety of watching results roll in, unsure of what the balance of power will look like in the coming hours.
I felt varying degrees of all three standing in line to vote this morning. And it’s a weird feeling that seems incongruent with the beauty of democracy and the privilege of the right to vote.
But as I scrolled Twitter waiting for my turn to cast a ballot (you know, healthy coping mechanisms and all), I came across a reminder from Kaitlyn Schiess that helped put things in perspective.
Maybe that’s why the times I’m most politically anxious tend to be the times I’m least active in my own community. A mere piece of my agency to love my neighbor and to create better places starts to take up a disproportionate and unhealthy amount of space in the greater pie.
Voting is both an immense privilege and a remarkable responsibility. But our electoral ballot isn’t the fullness of our toolbelt to effect change. In fact, it’s not even the only vote we get to cast.
As Atomic Habits author James Clear says, “every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become.” This is true in personal development, and it’s also true in building a playbook for loving our neighbors and creating better cities.
And perhaps the most powerful form of activism we can take is when we invite others to join us in these habits of service. Attending zoning meetings, choosing bikes instead of cars, and mailing copies of Strong Towns or Walkable City to local officials are all done better when done with friends and neighbors. And we get to do them all far more often than we get to vote for public officials.
The votes we each cast in those daily, monthly, or quarterly actions and habits are the real most consequential elections of our lifetimes. Even when our preferred political candidates are elected to office, our agency largely stops at the ballot box. But the habits we build to change our neighborhoods and cities for the better are always fully within our control, even when the outcomes aren’t.
One of the great paradoxes of life is that we are both smaller and more powerless than we care to admit, and yet often more capable than we’re able to recognize. Election Day is a great reminder of both truths. But as feebleness starts to become daunting, let’s lean into our strength.
And with every decision, let’s vote to love our neighbors and build better places.