shut up about your candidate.

Unless you live somewhere without any access to any form of media, you know that today is election day in the United States.

This particular election has been one of the worst, if not the worst election to date. It's brought out the ugly side of everyone, with people taking to social media in record numbers to express their disdain for a candidate. Even worse is how damn personal this thing has gotten. Suddenly it's not about how if you don't vote for this candidate XYZ political thing will happen. Instead, it's if you don't vote for this candidate, you're harming me personally.

I'm ashamed to admit that I got caught up in that mindset and posted something along those lines one night in a fit of ill-advised rage. At the time, I felt that no sane person could possibly disagree with me.

Here's the thing: the sky isn't going to fall if your candidate loses. You're not going to suffer a great personal loss.

Source. 

Yes the President has a lot of power.

But this is not a monarchy. It is not a dictatorship either.

The President is not going to have nearly as big an impact as you think they will.

Supreme Court nominees have to be confirmed by the Senate. It's actually fairly common for them to not be confirmed. Don't believe me? Check out this list.

The President does not have the power to repeal a law enacted by Congress.

Executive orders are still subject to judicial review and can be struck down. Presidential directives are only issued with the advice and consent of a major agency or department within the government.

At the end of the day, whichever candidate gets elected will have to work with Congress to do a lot of what they campaigned to do.

And we all know that Congress is notoriously difficult to work with.

Yet despite the important role Congress plays in our political process, we tend to ignore their elections, which is unfortunately how we got to the Congress we currently have.

All of this fear mongering needs to stop.

Immediately.

After giving in and doing a little fear mongering myself, I realized something. I wasn't changing any one's mind. I wasn't encouraging anyone.

I was simply fanning the fire and making the situation even worse. I was also simply making myself look really really bad.

If Clinton wins the world will keep spinning and your life will more than likely remain almost the exact same as it is now. If Trump wins the world will keep spinning and your life will more than likely remain almost the exact same as it is now.

You are the only one with the power to make your world stop spinning. Full stop.

Voting is important. Please encourage people to vote. I encourage everyone reading this to cast their ballot today. Yes our choice is between a crooked liar and a different crooked liar.  And that really really sucks.

But there are other things to vote for. There are Congressional elections, local elections, and local and state ballot measures. Every bit of it is important. Honestly, the local stuff is what's going to impact your life the most directly and immediately so please pay attention to it. Read the proposals and research the candidates ahead of time. I mean, you should do that for all of the candidates anyways. Just please don't forget the local and state stuff in the process.

Instead of campaigning or acting like the world will end if things don't go your way today, how about we spend the day being nice to each other? This whole mess has us all stressed out so let's give each other hugs (of course do not hug someone unless you have their consent first). Let's commit random acts of kindness. Let's make social media a happy place to be again.

Most importantly, let's find something nice to say about people who voted for a candidate other than yours. Let's remember that independence and diversity of opinion is a really beautiful thing--it's what makes this country so great. Yes that means that sometimes someone you love is going to say something that you really disagree with.

But that's okay. They're not a bad person. They're no different a person than they were before they said the thing. Their morals haven't suddenly degraded because of the thing. Two equally good and virtuous people can vote for different candidates without losing their goodness or virtue.  Please remember that.

Please just be nice to each other. Whatever happens today, I implore you to do two things:

First, I implore you to not take to social media to post about how the world is ending and everyone who voted for the winner is a moron and immoral and hates America. People vote because they love this country and they want to do what they believe is best for it. Just because what they believe is best doesn't match what you believe is best doesn't mean that they're wrong or that they don't care. Remember, if there were only one right choice this would be a dictatorship and not a democracy.

Second, I implore you not to be Henny Penny.

The sky is not falling kids. In fact, whatever happens tonight, you'll wake up on Wednesday and find the world is still spinning & everything is still okay. You'll wake up to find the same thing the day after the new President is sworn in. And you know what? You're gonna keep waking up to find the same thing.

So please, shut up about your candidate already & be nice to each other.