This August, I signed up for a Kamala Harris phone banking event. I had just registered to vote, and I wanted to help campaign for a president who could unite our country. I felt more patriotic than I had ever before.

At the shift, 128 people showed up in the Zoom meeting, which was a record amount according to the moderator. Before I dialed my first call, I wiped my sweaty palms on my pants multiple times, took deep breaths and then forgot how to breathe. I repeated this cycle a couple times before pushing myself to just wing it.

My first call was a hang-up. I shook off my disappointment and kept going. Like the statistics nerd I was, I jotted down my results: two wrong numbers, one busy, five pro-Kamala, three hostile comments and a whopping 40 hang-ups. It was great rejection therapy.

There was one phone call that stayed with me. I had kept on getting hang-ups, and a particularly mean response had made me wilt—there is something so personal about hearing a real person’s voice telling you to “go f**k yourself.” But I told myself to keep going, to end on a good phone call. Finally, I received a phone call from a registered voter who told me she was unsure of who to vote for. She was the first person to patiently listen to my spiel on Harris and Walz, and I managed to change her mind. I felt like I had won the lottery.

Despite the positive call, I felt so emotionally drained from anticipating calls that, after only 51 calls, I decided to switch to text banking the very next week, where I hoped that the protection of a screen could reduce my anxiety and give me time to respond.

In the weeks counting down to the presidential election, I sent thousands of texts to people across the country, urging them to attend rallies, volunteer in the campaign and vote. But if I felt comfortable sending texts behind a screen, the people receiving the texts also felt comfortable replying. And that wasn’t always a good thing.

I’ve been called a communist, which is tame compared to other names. I’ve received enough explicit language that would make Gordon Ramsay recoil. I’ve been threatened with my life. What I wish people would understand is that texters are real people with real thoughts and feelings. I used to take the insults personally, but now I dismiss them as trolls.

Human decency should transcend party lines, regardless of which candidate you support. It doesn’t cost much to treat others with respect, and hurling ugly language only reflects badly upon the bully. Despite all of the polarization happening in our country right now, is it so hard to be civil and say “Please remove me from your text list” instead of “Stop texting me you anti-Americans”?

Of course, not all opposers are rude. I respond to “Trump 2024” texts with “Got it. Have a great day,” and I’ve gotten a few “Thanks, you too!” texts and a “God bless,” which was really nice. It’s important that we always assume the best intentions of others. This was one of the values that was emphasized in the training, and the scripts that texters were equipped with were all very positive, with even the reply to hostile responses as “Got it. Take care.”

But for all the harsh replies, they don’t diminish the people I get to meet virtually. A person who works two jobs a day just to scrape by. An 84-year-old who is eager to vote. A mom who is proud of her registered-to-vote children. It amazes me how many individual people I can connect with across the country.

It’s within these respectful conversations I have with supporters and non supporters where I find the eye of the hurricane, a strange calmness that is separate from the torrents of polarization. It’s here where I witness the essence of the true American spirit: an enthusiasm to make this country better for everyone. And that gives me more hope than any victory ever could.