A Museum Inspiring Being Excellent to Each Other

by Ernie McCray

The words,
“Be excellent to each other out there,”
that I read on a Facebook post recently
really struck a chord with me,
especially considering
how too many of us
treat each other these days
on social media,
attacking a fellow human being’s very person
rather than challenge
a specific point-of-view intellectually,
the very opposite
of treating someone
the way you want to be treated.

Such thoughts were on my mind that day,
as I had endured a couple of beat downs
for my thoughts
on a topic or two
and I was going through ideas
to write about my feelings
but after a while
I laid such thinking aside,
and flipped through essays
of a magazine
on my coffee table
that caught my eye
and came upon a composition
about the
Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in L.A.
that filmmaker George Lucas and his wife
had been working on for nearly two decades
and it gave life
to my thinking
about being excellent to each other
as the museum,
I learned,
was dedicated to reflecting human experiences
from a diverse range
of voices and perspectives
through Lucas’s accumulated art,
works he didn’t want any part
in selling
as he’s more interested
in organizing a museum around
family and love and adventure,
stories and visuals that shape community identity,
and help humanity
make sense of the world,
hopefully inspiring visitors,
through illustrations and moving images
and photography
to consider
what’s common among us
in our shared humanity,
plans that resonated with me
like food
to a hungry man.

What a gift Lucas is leaving society,
a place
where we can contemplate
a reality
where being excellent to each other
is the source
for the betterment of humankind
over time.

Upon putting the article down
the question,
what would Yoda and Luke Skywalker have to say about that,
came to mind.