Canada Day Reflections: When “Good Ideas” Turn Out to Be Horrible

Be Careful With Your Opinions: What If We Got It All Wrong?

Jun 27, 2025

This post touches on some difficult parts of Canada’s history — including residential schools — alongside reflections on personal growth, hindsight, and the beliefs we hold today. I’ve written it from a place of reflection, not judgment. My goal isn’t to provoke, but to invite perspective and compassion — for ourselves, for others, and for the country we call home. Thank you for reading with an open heart.

What if we’re wrong?

There was a time when people believed residential schools were a good idea.

Not everyone, of course — but enough people did. Enough to create a system so deeply damaging, it left scars still felt today. Reconciliation doesn’t “fix” the loss, at best, it may eventually give it a place. There was also a time when Canada thought clubbing baby seals to death was considered perfectly normal. These were decisions actively made by people who, in their time, may have truly believed they were doing something right.

But history, as always, has the final word. Time doesn’t heal everything but it does provide insight.

From today’s perspective, it’s finally become painfully obvious how wrong those decisions were. Even if we believed otherwise back then, they were never right, but the culture, the “zeitgeist1,” hadn’t caught up yet. That’s the uncomfortable truth about progress: it’s often too little, too late for those who needed it most.

This too shall pass

The gap between belief and awareness goes beyond politics and public policy; we see it in our own lives too. Think about that job you stayed in for too long, or the relationship you fought for past your own breaking point. Things that once seemed like the best decision in the world can, and often will, change entirely.

"This too shall pass" reflects on the temporary nature of the human condition. Neither the negative nor the positive moments in life last forever.

Breakups, job losses, and even major shifts in worldview rarely feel “right” in the moment. It hurts, even when you might know, or feel, that it’s time for a change. The body still mourns the loss, and the heart still aches. It’s not about getting over it, but giving it a place. Grief doesn’t get better with time, but it usually does find a place over time.2

Years later, those painful moments might reveal themselves as turning points. That doesn’t help when you’re going through it. Only after the fact, you may start to see why some changes had to happen. You recognize both the version of yourself that was trying so hard to hold on, and the version that ultimately needed to let go.

Progress isn’t perfect — and neither are we

In the middle of anything, whether it's a personal crisis, a tough conversation, or a national reconciliation, it’s impossible to see the full picture. We get stuck in our corners and hold on tightly to being right. But that’s no place for reconciliation. What if we allowed just a little room for doubt? For growth?

Take the COVID19 vaccine debate, or any modern social or political issue. Your social media feed may have a few examples of contentious topics. The truth is, we often won’t know the long-term impact for many years. That doesn’t mean we stop doing what we believe is best today. It’s usually best to assume positive intent, until proven otherwise. But let’s approach things with a little more humility, and a lot more compassion for those around us who might be doing the same thing, just from a different angle.

Despite our highly individualized society, we forget we’re still in it together, with a shared system of facts that apply to everyone. Our sense of common ground has been destroyed by misinformation and algorithm-driven media. We used to argue about what to believe about the facts. Now we argue about the facts themselves.

Go get vaccinated - or don’t. Get tested - or don’t. Just don’t protest outside someone else’s decision-making. Especially not outside hospitals. There’s no kindness in that. No room for growth.

But what about freedom?

Canada’s dark history, and the world’s, for that matter, continues to show us that we need to be careful about what we believe to be “right”. Our “right” can be deeply harmful to someone else. When your sense of freedom starts to impede on somebody else’s, it’s a recipe for disaster.

True freedom doesn’t mean doing whatever you want, whenever you want. Instead, it means choosing to live in a way that respects yourself in an environment shared with others. Minor example: the fact that you can have a conversation on speakerphone in public doesn’t mean you should.

Just because we have access to endless opinions and echo chambers of fragmented information online, doesn’t mean we should abandon the idea of a shared reality. A reality that’s grounded in verifiable facts, mindful empathy, and shared responsibility to each other and this planet we coexist on.

We don’t need to be perfect. We just need to stay awake — to learn, to listen, to care. That’s progress. And if nothing else, let’s be kind to one another.

That’s something we can celebrate this Canada Day — even if the rest still feels messy, unresolved, and in some cases, unforgivable.

“Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” — Maya Angelou

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If you're navigating personal change or questioning the things you once believed in, my book The Freedom Project: Happiness might resonate with you. It’s about unlearning, choosing differently, and bringing the feeling of freedom home — no matter what you're healing from. Get your copy here →

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