Who Deserves Respect?

A long time ago, when I was in high school, I did something without having put much thought into it. I picked up the phone and called my friend. I will mention that he is Vietnamese, as perhaps there were different cultural expectations at play in this story.

A man answered the phone. It was my friend’s father, though I had never spoken with him.

“Hello, is [my friend’s name] there?” I asked.

He went ahead and got my friend on the phone.

Then this friend of mine, with some embarrassment, explained to me that his father was of a different generation, and it was important that any time I called the house and if he answered, I should be more respectful in how I spoke.

He explained to me that I should say something more like this:

“Hello Mr. [last name], may I please speak with [my friend]?”

While I didn’t think I had behaved disrespectfully, I understood that actually, I was being disrespectful in the sense that I had spoken to a grown man in the same way I would speak to a peer, in a casual, and perhaps dismissive fashion. I hadn’t even greeted or acknowledged him or introduced who I was.

Despite that I felt I behaved respectfully at the time, clearly, my friend’s father had disagreed.

This is an experience I have often reflected on. I was very surprised that my friend mentioned my disrespectful behavior at the time, because he was a kind of reckless individual, seeming not to have a care, and not particularly respectful.

Nonetheless, I did not want to be viewed as disrespectful, so I happily treated his father in a more respectful manner after he instructed me about the different expectations of his “father’s generation”.

So today I wonder about this idea of respect.

Is respect an outdated idea, where older people simply wish to keep some form of power over younger people?

Is respect something that is earned, that those who are older or wiser, or more accomplished deserve?

Or is respect something that we all deserve, and that we should all have the right to?

And if different cultures or generations or people may have different ideas of how we can show respect, then how are we supposed to behave respectfully?

My thinking is that as humans, we all do deserve a fundamental kind of respect. The exception of course is if a person himself is not behaving morally, disregards the thoughts or feelings of others, or is otherwise disrespectful. Then, some of that innate deserving of respect may be lost.

Think of it - will you go out of your way to show your respect to the one who doesn’t appear to even respect himself, and shows little interest or care for anyone else?

Personally, when I meet someone new, I aim to be respectful, and I wish to be treated the same. I do not need to be revered, but at least I hope that my space, my time, and my being are all respected, not imposed upon, and not treated carelessly.

Much of what respect is, of course, is just basic courtesy and consideration for others.

Many of us, I would think, may behave more respectfully, or think it is more important to be respectful around a boss, or generally around people of higher status, power, or authority.

That may be a reasonable approach, but of course, such situations essentially dictate that we be respectful. If you are not respectful of your boss, you may upset him and he may look for a reason to fire you. If you are not respectful of an authority figure, they may abuse their power and make your life difficult. So if those are the only cases where we behave respectfully, then that does not show much value for respect itself.

Sure, some people behave the way they do out of the expectation for the returns that they will get, treating their decisions as if they were an investment that they needed to profit from. And they may see no reason to respect someone unless they can gain something from it. I do not live my life that way, but certainly, the reality is that such individuals are out there.

Rather than just situations where respect is almost required of us, I believe respect is important in many circumstances beyond this. I reflect on the experiences that most people have gone through, and how these make us deserving of respect. For example, most people have had some kind of difficulty or pain in their life. Most people have had something go wrong, or had a failure of some kind. And most people have struggled in some way to do what was right or moral, or with figuring out their life’s path.

Many or most people have also had the struggle of dealing with their own minds, perhaps vicious negative thoughts that they impose on themselves.

For example, just before writing this post, I saw a live chess video by a Woman Grandmaster (this is the name of the chess title) and she made a poor move in a game and berated herself, calling herself stupid for it.

I have found a spiritual calling (so to speak) in removing such negative thoughts from my mind. The most toxic negativity is that which is imposed on the self by the self. The world is sometimes unkind to us, so we must build mental resilience and fortitude, a mental fortress if you will, and focus on positivity, not berating ourselves with hurtful self-talk.

As this post is about respect, the most minimal way to show respect would be to avoid offensive gestures and language, and certainly to avoid verbal abuse. Unfortunately, many of us struggle to even be respectful to ourselves. And if you don’t respect yourself, you will not respect others.

Keep in mind that there is a sort of human struggle that we have all taken part in, and which may make us worthy of respect. As much as our successes or good experiences make us worthy of respect, perhaps the fact that we have all shared failures or negative experiences also makes us worthy of respect.

Now that I am old enough to have seen cases where a younger person was disrespectful, either to me or another adult or senior, I relate more to how my friend’s father must have felt. I wish these kids would consider their behavior and realize that the people around us deserve a basic amount of respect and decency.

Of course, we all have learning and growing to do.

Something I have to remind myself of is that children and younger people also deserve our respect. They have minds, beliefs, emotions, and lives of their own, and perhaps some of them get tired of adults undermining them and treating them as if they do not have much value.

Their way of dealing with this perceived lack of respect may be to lash out and disrespect older people, or simply to not show them proper respect.

I would say even for someone who feels disrespected, it is important to at least attempt to show basic respect to those around us. You can disagree about something, or have personal differences, and still be respectful about it.

Something that has come up many times in my life is that I learned after having met a person and known them for months, or years, that this person saved someone’s life, volunteers to help children in need, survived a particular trauma, is world-class in a skill, or has many connections with elite individuals. And many times, after learning this, I thought – Wow, I had no idea. This person truly deserves more acknowledgment and honor, or at least respect. Respect would be the minimum we could do, really.

Understand that there are so many things we do not know about the people around us. Many people around us appear to be ordinary but have actually gone through something much more, that we are not seeing.

I believe the least we can do is attempt to treat people in a cordial, respectful way.

Respect in the end may just be a way of saying to our fellow humans - I see you, I see that you matter, and I acknowledge to you and those around us that you matter, despite your successes or setbacks, despite your productivity or problems, despite our agreements or disagreements.

As to how we can be respectful, that is something we have to learn for ourselves. Being respectful to a colleague or peer may be different than showing respect to an elder or superior, or someone with a special title such as “Doctor”. Also, showing respect to someone you know may be different than showing it to a stranger. There may even be differences in how you show respect to people of different cultures or backgrounds.

To show respect, you have to take into account the expectations of the person you are with. What do they expect, or what do they feel is proper? Be observant, and see that if they do things in a particular way, the most respectful thing to do may be to join them in how they do things. If they speak in a quiet tone, perhaps be careful not to be overly loud. If they prefer to shake hands rather than hug, then shake hands. Of course, if they have their own unique cultural or religious customs, you should ask before joining in.

Be mindful of things from their perspective, and this will show you the road to being respectful.

I believe you will find that when you show people the proper respect that they deserve, you will be held in much higher esteem by others. They will like you because you are simply giving them the proper respect and cordiality that they were due. You will in turn be someone that people come to respect.

Forgive the Past. It is Over.

“Forgive the past. It is over. Learn from it and let go. People are constantly changing and growing. Do not cling to a limited, disconnected, negative image of a person in the past. See that person now. Your relationship is always alive and changing.” - Messages from the Masters by Brian Weiss

I have a friend, Elizabeth, who never forgave her father. When the topic of dads would come up, she would state something she didn’t like about this man.

He was too distant, not helpful enough, didn’t have his priorities straight, or he was never there when she actually needed him. That is what she would say.

Sometimes people around her would get uncomfortable because if they happened to mention something positive about their own father, she would make it a point to say that her Dad did not have that quality. Many people enjoy talking up their fathers and showing them in their best light. She would talk hers down.

I’ve never met her father, so I don’t know his side of the story, but I know that she virtually never sees this man. Yet, she does talk about him, even if what she has to say is often negative. He occupies her mind, but there is something about him that she never let go of. She never forgave him for something.

Clearly, Elizabeth never let go of something that happened in the past.

Or maybe it was something that didn’t happen. I understand that her father was a truck driver, and so perhaps when she was growing up, he wasn’t as available for her as he would have liked or as she would have liked. Perhaps she needed more from him, and he was not there to give it.

Yet Elizabeth is now an adult, in her 40s. I can tell that she has still not forgiven her father. She has not even sought a real connection with him, as in her adulthood, it seems she has turned the tables on him. She perceived him as distant in her childhood. Now, she is the one who is distant toward him. When he has tried to reach out to her, she told me that she would sometimes purposely ignore his calls. If he invited her to meet, sometimes she would decline.

This is a man who she very rarely even sees or hears from. Yet she doesn’t let him close – she keeps him away as if he were a stranger.

No one ever tells us this, but forgiveness is hard work. We have to work to see a perception we have built of someone as just that, a perception. It is a temporary way of seeing someone at a point in time.

But consider this:

We are all in flux, changing, growing, evolving, and time can make us stronger or wither us away. If we hold onto our perception of someone from the past too stubbornly, we permanently grasp at a temporal event.

And this is as ludicrous as it sounds, like grasping at fog and hoping to catch some of it in our hands.

Keep in mind that forgiveness is something we choose to do on our own. Often, we are the only ones in control of this. No one else can induce you to forgive.

In the 10th grade, Jeffrey, a friend of mine, asked me, “Why were you so mean to me in the 7th grade?”

I had vague memories of this by then. But I could grasp just enough of the memories to see that, yes, I had been a terrible person to this friend of mine. My other friends and I had often made Jeffrey the butt of our jokes. I don’t think we were purposely malicious toward him, but upon reflection, I could see that we had indeed been mean to him, without any reason.

By the 10th grade, even after Jeffrey discussed his issues with me about our past, he remained friends with me. It must have been true, hard work for him to contend with what we had put him through. And I doubt it was of much consolation to him that I didn’t recall what we had done very well, whereas the details must have been seared into his memories. He held onto what happened, but at the same time, he was willing to forgive and let it go.

Personally, I lean toward letting things go, moving on, and working on building up friendships and kinships. We should strive to forgive. But of course, we all have a breaking point. Perhaps some things cannot be forgiven when someone has gone too far, and then we must all ask ourselves what that point is.

What is the point of no return?

My friend Dr. Bob Rich (found at Bobbing Around - a wonderful resource on improving our lives and the world), a clinical psychologist, has said that “Normal is the walking wounded.” Here, I understand him to mean that most people are holding onto emotional pain in their lives. Of course, there is physical pain too. But one way or another, most of us are suffering in some way. And if not suffering presently, we are often subjected to memories of a prior suffering that we went through – yet, this is suffering too, even if self-imposed. There are countless ways that someone may suffer, unfortunately.

When you struggle to forgive someone, I will urge you to remember that we all have our personal pain points. We have all been through our personal suffering, which is probably not known publicly to the world around us. Even those who choose “bad paths” in life have suffered their share.

I’ve made it a point in my life to forgive people, and I hope you do too.

Consider this: A dear friend of mine was kidnapped last year and robbed. At first, of course, I was upset. But upon reflection, I decided to forgive the perpetrators for what they had done, as I saw great pains and suffering in the past’s of these criminals, and likely for that to continue in their future. What person with a good life would commit such a crime? They wouldn’t. These were broken, disturbed people. They were clear examples of the “walking wounded.”

I forgave them from afar, in my heart, as I don’t know who they are.

Forgiveness isn’t easy. It is hard work. But this is something worth working on, especially with the relations that truly matter in our lives.

Today I ask: Is there someone worth forgiving in your life? If that person is no longer with us, you can still forgive them in your heart.

Strive for Loving Relationships, and Avoid the Toxic Ones

Today’s post is an excerpt from my book, 7 Thoughts to Live Your Life By: A Guide to the Happy, Peaceful, & Meaningful Life.

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Generally, relationships should be based on love, acceptance, and understanding, which is good and healthy. However, they can sometimes be based on distrust, dissatisfaction, and a lack of understanding, which is not good and healthy. We have to learn to attract good kinds of relationships and to avoid bad ones.

Think about who is in your life the most, from day to day. This will probably include people you live with, whether your parents, spouse, children, or possibly roommates. Some of your close relationships may also be with your coworkers or with superiors at work. These relationships tend to be very important because we spend a lot of time with these people, meaning that they can have a greater influence over us.

Be cautious if you find yourself surrounded by people who are insensitive to your needs. They may belittle you, be sarcastic, attack you verbally or even physically, actively get in the way of your pursuits, start intense arguments with you, and so forth. Depending on the frequency and intensity of these, they can create a toxic environment for you.

Something to be aware of is that healthy relationships have issues too. Don’t worry that if you have an intense argument with someone, this automatically means the relationship is toxic. This isn’t necessarily the case. The problem is when you feel drained and agonize over interactions with certain people. Keep in mind that in some families or some relationships, arguments may be a normal part of life, and it can be an effect of personalities that clash but who still care for each other. In fact, some people may have a way of bonding through their arguments. The issue is if someone becomes distraught through chronic arguments. If such a thing occurs often, we may have a toxic relationship that needs repair.

If you have found yourself holding all of your thoughts inside and becoming resentful to keep the peace, you should realize that this isn’t the best path either. In some cases, it is reasonable to disagree with someone and possibly even to argue. I will ask that you consider the middle path. Do not always argue, and do not always hold in your feelings and keep them to yourself. Perhaps the best option is to state how you feel without needing to argue about it. Be who you are and hold your own viewpoints, and allow others to be who they are. Some people get intensely argumentative because they ultimately wish to control others, and people, of course, cannot be controlled so easily.

Note that if you find yourself in an overly toxic environment that harms you, you should consider leaving that environment if possible. This may involve stopping an activity, changing your workplace, or even changing homes. The more drastic the choice would be, the more deeply you should consider if it is truly worth it to leave the environment or if there is another way to repair the situation. For instance, if you have an issue with a sibling, discussing the matter with another family member could help. Or, if you have an issue with a fellow worker, discussing this with your employer could help.

Even if you are not contributing to the toxicity in any way, you will suffer through everyday exposure to it. For this reason, you may consider leaving such environments even when it is not your fault.

Remember this: Allow others to be who they are, and be who you are. You do not need to agree with everyone, and everyone does not need to agree with you.

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7 Thoughts to Live Your Life By is available on Amazon, Google Play, Apple, Kobo, and Barnes & Noble, and other retailers.

What Are You Thankful For?

I’m thankful to have had so much love and support from family and friends.

I was born into the right family for me, and I truly could not ask for anything more from them. My parents did everything they could to raise me well, and the rest has been up to me from there. I am always thankful for all the opportunities I was granted through them. Growing up, my mother made sure that my brother and I were always well cared for, and my father always encouraged us to push ourselves further.

I think a big part of what I am now grateful for is the belief that my parents always had in us (my brother and I). Of course, more than just belief, my parents actually followed through to help us make that belief into a reality. This is what truly made the difference.

Something memorable to me is that from around 8 years old, it was understood in my home that I would go to college. What that meant to me is that my parents believed in my abilities. Before I had a strong enough inner drive to know what I believed in, my parents believed in me. I wish everyone could have this. Before we can have our own Thoughts as children, we probably adopt our parents’ thoughts. So, it certainly helps if they have good thoughts worth having.

Through my career and sometimes through happenstance, I have connected with so many great people through the years. Some of the people with who I have built friendships with in the past years would be Arthur von Boennighausen (research engineer / real estate developer), Michal Stawicki (author of many self-improvement books), Dave Edelstein (co-author of Question Yourself), and Bob Rich (clinical psychologist). I have met many, many more who I am also happy to hear from, but these are the ones that I tend to stay in communications with regularly. I am thankful for these connections.

Of course, I am thankful for my wife and the extended family I have now, thanks to her. My wife and I see and support each other every day, and I’m grateful for this.

I’m thankful to have all my needs met every day

I know many people in the world are struggling, and I feel fortunate every day that I have not had to worry about having any of my needs met. My whole life has been a privilege, and I aim to give something back to society to help compensate for all that I have been given. A key way that I am doing that is through this blog.

To meet my needs, I must focus on some of the key fundamentals – such as eating well, meditating, exercising, and being spiritually centered. At this point, I’m grateful to have the time and energy to focus on this.

I’ll be honest and say it is quite easy to forget about all the needs you have every day when you actually have them every day. It’s easy to take for granted: clean water, healthy food, a dishwasher, a laundry machine, a clean space of your own to live, helpful friends and family, warm clothes, etc. It’s very easy to forget that these needs are not a given. It can take determination, hard work, and often even luck to get them. I make an effort to be conscious of this and be thankful every day.

I’m thankful for my career.

When I began my career, I was very doubtful about my abilities. I wasn’t sure which direction I was going in. I wasn’t sure if I could make a living doing this. Now, I am doing it. I am earning a living with my writing career, which is all I ever hoped to achieve. I get contacted monthly with new business opportunities, and it makes me smile. I am already at the point I had hoped to reach. I have found my rhythm.

Now, of course, I have new ambitions. I want to grow this blog. I want to produce more audiobooks. I want to have my books translated into more languages (my usual ones are English, Spanish, and Portuguese).

Speaking of translations, I would like to give a special thanks to my mother, who translates my books into Spanish. She works hard and does an excellent job. My books in Spanish are widely read, and I have to give her credit for this. I have published many books, and more often than not, she is working on translating one of them. I’m honored and grateful that she has been happy to help with this.

Even though I have reached the point I wanted to reach, there are always new goals for me to strive for. Luckily I have been enjoying the journey, the work, and seeing where it takes me. I’m thankful for all this.

In the end, I have to remember that my career is mostly about helping my readers. I’m thankful to be able to help so many people, truly.

To you, yes you, the person reading this now, thank you for reading!

This career is just beginning – I look forward to evolving and growing along with you. I hope you stay along for the ride.

I am thankful for my teachers

I’m thankful for all the teachers I ever had. Of course, a few stand out above the rest, as I think they went above and beyond what was truly necessary.

Mr. Strombeck, in the 5th grade, taught me many life lessons that made an impact on my life. He was a very strict teacher, and I dreaded the class when I was there, but many years later, I realized that he was doing his best to prepare us for real life. It wasn’t just another class.

Mr. Gerhold, in the 9th grade, helped me learn algebra by volunteering to tutor me in the early mornings, even though I was struggling and thought I was going to fail the class. He spent a couple of months working with me so that I could understand. With his help, I ended up doing very well in the class. I still remember what he taught me, even though my field does not involve algebra. While I don’t use algebra in my daily life, this class was critical to do well in geometry, trigonometry, and then calculus. If you don’t understand algebra, you can quickly get left behind.

Mrs. Short, in the 11th grade, was a ruthlessly difficult chemistry teacher. If you wrote out an answer and had it 90% correct, you still got it wrong in her class. Oh, and I shouldn’t forget to mention that she was (in)famous for assigning 2-3 hours of homework per night. Yet when I made it to college chemistry (for majors, meaning they made the class extra difficult), I was glad that my high school class had been so difficult. In college, my classmates were dropping like flies. Week after week, the chairs emptied as students dropped, transferred to an easier class, failed, etc. I made it to the end with an A, thanks to the fact that Mrs. Short never took it easy on us.

I am thankful for all the medical staff

In these difficult times, we can’t forget to be thankful for the medical staff (e.g., nurses, doctors, paramedics, psychologists, etc.) working hard every day to help save lives. I can’t pretend to know what they’ve been going through. I am sure the job can be quite grueling, but they are doing it. Whatever they are paid, it isn’t enough. These are true heroes, and we should all be thankful for the job that they do.

Remember that even if you have not needed any medical care this year, someone that you love may have. The important thing is that if you ever do need it, they will be there for you.

I will leave you with a question: What are you thankful for?

What is the Point of Conflict?

There is plenty of conflict in this world, even if we don’t go looking for it.

When I was in graduate school, one of my colleagues was a Mormon – let’s say “Jim,” and one Friday, apparently most of my colleagues didn’t have much work to do, and so they sat around his desk, and it became “Ask a Mormon” day.

Many of the questions were calling into question the credibility of his religion. They pointed to some unusual practices, and they would ask him if he actually believed in that.

Jim took it quite well and did not seem uncomfortable about it – I’m guessing this wasn’t his first time being ambushed. I asked a few questions too. I felt at the time that I was asking them in a neutral way and not trying to add fuel to this “fire” that seemed to be more about seeking entertainment by trying to poke holes in someone’s belief system.

Jim’s answers to everything were pretty reasonable – I recall that he stated some practices he engaged in were a matter of tradition and community-building. Later on, I regretted having taken part in this interaction. I didn’t like the approach or attitude of some of my colleagues, who actually seemed to enjoy trying to start a conflict. They questioned in ways that bordered on being disrespectful and antagonistic.

After this interaction, I thought: What was the point? What was anyone trying to accomplish?

Just as Jim had his beliefs, it seemed that most of us had our beliefs about what Mormonism was, and our minds were probably never going to be changed. Neither would Jim’s, obviously - he was born and raised a Mormon, and most of his friends and family were also Mormon.

Again, I come back to the key question – what was the point of this interaction/conflict?

As far as I can tell, the point was that some of my colleagues found it amusing to try to show off their intellect or superiority by looking for holes in the Mormon belief system. It seemed like if they made Jim doubt his beliefs, my colleagues would gain points. In the end, neither side won anything, and they were left at a standstill. This “game” was not very satisfying, and afterward, as I said, I regretted even having been there. One of my other colleagues admitted to me in private that she had felt the same way as me. By being bystanders and idle participants, we felt like we were encouraging it.

I wish more of us would ask ourselves this before seeking or participating in conflicts:

What is the point of this conflict? What can anyone gain from this?

More often than not, here is what you can expect from a conflict:

•       Hurt feelings

•       People making fools of themselves

•      No one changing their minds

•       People believing more firmly in their own beliefs and even less in the opposition

•       Friends becoming enemies

•       A waste of time, as none of your goals, are accomplished

Of course, I wouldn’t go so far as to say that you should avoid all conflicts. Sometimes, you need conflict to learn and grow or come to a common understanding with someone. Other times, if someone brings conflict to you, you may need to defend yourself. But usually, these conflicts are not over deeply held beliefs that you know no one will ever change.

If you want to engage in a conflict that you know you can win with “facts” and “logic,” be aware that your opposition may disagree with your facts, making your logic irrelevant. You can’t win if your opposition refuses to follow your facts and line of reasoning. Then again, the point should not be to win - we’re not talking about high school debate teams. Rather, it should be to come to a common understanding of something. To hopefully do something constructive rather than destructive.

From what I have seen, most of us are more concerned with appearing to be right rather than actually being right. We are not interested in finding facts and then following the objective line of reasoning. We want to find a convenient story that makes us feel good, and we gain points if we make the other side look bad. This increases the divide between us. And ultimately, there will be no winners if we proceed that way. Read here to learn what actually guides human behavior besides reason.

I’m at a point where I want no part in unnecessary conflicts. I find that the vast majority of them are unnecessary. I can’t remember when I had a conflict with anyone (okay, minor squabbles with a spouse or family member do not count). Believe me, I’ve received the invitations into conflict. Someone will invite me into a conflict, and I politely decline.

Sometimes no response is the best response. Feel free to take a moment to stop and take a breath - this will help you to avoid doing something you will regret.

I want to wrap up by saying something about Jim. When I was moving out of the state (a 17-hour drive), Jim was the only person willing to help me on a Saturday at 7 AM to carry all of the things from my house into a moving truck. He happened to be very efficient and helped me to get it done quickly. He told me he had gotten a lot of practice from helping people in his church to move. His willingness to help is something I will never forget. Now when I hear someone question the Mormon belief system, I tell them this.

In the end, it seems that our character and actions speak louder than our privately held beliefs.

Stay Connected with the People Who Matter Most

Most people now have large networks of people that they know. There may be family, friends, coworkers, acquaintances (or friends of friends), professional connections, and so on.

Our networks get larger and larger, but also more and more superficial. We know more and more people, but we know less and less about them.

Through the years, I find that it’s very easy to lose the connections that were actually the most important to our lives. If given enough time, the ties get weaker and weaker, to the point where they can break off after a certain point.

Of course, if you had a strong enough connection with someone, you should always have some ability to reconnect and continue your bond or friendship.

Today, I want you to consider if there are people with who you are gradually losing connection but who are worth keeping up with. Just because one of you moved or changed jobs does not mean that you cannot keep in contact.

Some simple ways to maintain a connection are email, social media, messaging, or phone calls. Of course, there are even letters or postcards.

What I have found is that staying connected is a two-way street. You may try to stay in touch with someone, but perhaps they don’t make much of an effort. Perhaps they are content to allow some of their relationships to fade away with time. This can be difficult, of course, but you can only do your part to try to keep up with relationships that are important to you.

Who have you lost touch with that made a big impact on your life? Is there someone you would like to reconnect with?

In some cases, perhaps you actually had a problem with someone. You can ask whether that problem is worth losing contact over. Sometimes it may be, but in other cases, perhaps with time, you have seen that the issue was not major enough to hold a grudge over. It may be time to make amends and reconnect.

What I have found is that good friends are worth keeping in contact with. Close family is also worth keeping in contact with. Sometimes certain bonds may not be as strong as you would like – of course, in those cases, working on continuing to develop those bonds and friendships is worth it.

It’s easy to make excuses - but that’s all they are, excuses. We all have a few moments here and there to send an email, a message, or even make a phone call. No one is so busy that they can’t periodically check in on someone important to their lives.

You may be interested to learn that the author of The Top 5 Regrets of the Dying (read a useful summary on her website here), Bronnie Ware, actually identified this as one of the common regrets people had when they were dying:

“I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.”

Some of my best friendships go back to middle school and high school. Unfortunately, with three of my closest friends, they ended up moving away during high school, and I never kept in touch with them after this. I did manage to find one of them on social media, but the other two I have never heard from again.

Sometimes we don’t realize the value of certain relationships until it is too late and we have lost them.

Try to think of someone worth reconnecting with (or building a deeper connection with) in your life. Consider this:

• Is this someone you love?

• Is this someone who supported you during a difficult time?

• Is this someone who you grew up with, and you were there for each other?

• Is this someone that you miss?

• Is this someone who you regret having fought with over issues that now seem trivial?

• Is this a friend or family member (e.g., cousin or aunt) who felt more like a sibling or second parent?

• Is this someone who you “clicked” with or connected with immediately when you met them?

Today, think back to the important people in your life. Is there someone you haven’t talked to in a long time that was a good friend or who played an important role in your life? Consider trying to get in touch again. They may be happy and excited to hear from you.

“I Don’t Understand”

When someone tells you about a difficult situation or experience they’ve gone through, no one wants to be the one who thinks or says, “I don’t understand.”

We would rather say – “I see,” or “I know how you feel.” However, this is unlikely to help anyone if you do not actually understand what someone is going through.

I deeply want to understand, but I have seen that I often do not truly know what someone else is going through.

We often hear that the first step toward solving a problem is admitting that there is a problem. This makes sense, but what is the second step?

In many cases, the second step may be acknowledging that you do not understand the problem or situation. Sometimes the greatest obstacle to understanding is actually thinking that you understand something. Then when you expect something to work in a certain way and it does not, you are just left confused. Many of us will keep proceeding to try to resolve a problem, using our faulty understanding – and we will keep failing. In such cases, thinking we understand keeps us from making progress.

Let’s consider people’s life experiences – do we truly understand them?

Some experiences are so general that we have all had them in some way.

We have all been hurt in some way. And we have all felt a variety of emotions such as anger, fear, love, joy, embarrassment, pride, and so on.

Yet, we have also all had our own unique experiences that are different from everyone else’s.

Imagine someone who is drained, who has pushed himself to the limits every day – working two full-time jobs, parenting young children, and barely having time to eat, sleep, or go to the restroom during the day. Perhaps he is beyond the point of exhaustion, wanting to take a break but simply not having that option. He needs the jobs to support his family – and he believes that to do anything differently would be irresponsible.

If this person comes to me and shares his life experiences, it’s quite easy for me to use the words:

“I understand.” It even feels natural, as if that is what I am supposed to say.

However, it’s not true. And unfortunately, it’s not helpful to this person because it will be obvious to him that I could not possibly understand.

I have certainly worked hard, and I have even felt overworked, overstressed, and overburdened at times. But I have never been in the situation of needing to work multiple jobs to support a family – and I have certainly never felt that there was no option available to take a different path in my life. I have never lived one day in that type of lifestyle. So how could I possibly understand someone who was truly living that life every day?

If he were to explain his life to me, then empathy and imagination could help me comprehend what he is going through. But it may not give me a true understanding of his life.

Out of necessity in his life, he may skip lunch to commute from one job to the next. He may feel forced into neglecting his kids since he needs to work the hours he does to help support them. He may be past the point of exhaustion every single day, where he feels like a zombie going through the motions rather than a true human being. Perhaps he needs someone to talk to or to help him, but he spends all his time working and helping his family, and he rests very little.

These are life experiences where I don’t think you can truly understand them unless you have lived them.

Similar things can be said for various kinds of trauma. I have had my own challenging experiences in my life, but some people have experienced deep traumas that surpass any troubles I may have gone through.

Recently, when someone was telling me about his troubling life experiences, I found myself saying, “I understand.” Calmly, he told me that “you don’t understand.” And he was right. Certain experiences are too difficult to explain and even more difficult to truly understand.

Sometimes, we can listen or attempt to gain some awareness of what someone has gone through while admitting that we do not truly understand.

This lack of understanding is not a failure. It is actually a true step forward in your growth when you can admit this. When you can understand that you do not understand, you will be able to come to a more truthful place with yourself and the people around you.

At the heart of it, feeling the need to say “I understand” to everything is untruthful. Just because we want to understand does not mean that we do.

In general, in your life, the awareness of not understanding will help you see that there is always so much room to grow.

Arrogance and ignorance make for the worst combination of all. This would mean that you think you know it all, yet you know very little. We must avoid this.

Instead, we should be humble, aim to understand that there is much we do not understand, and hope to grow and understand just a little bit more, day by day.

If you want to get closer to people in your life and build meaningful connections, you will get there more efficiently when you admit that you do not understand their experiences fully. This will open up a window into true understanding.

Who Are You Following?

Most of us are following someone or some group in our lives. As humans, we have strength in numbers, so it is natural for us to belong to a group or various groups.

There are all kinds of groups – your country of origin or ethnicity, age group, hobbies, religion, politics, ethical beliefs, athleticism, occupation, income, and so on.

Take a moment to consider who you are following in this life. Some of the groups you fall in may not be so important to you, but others may have a major influence on your life.

Ask:

What are the groups and leaders that act as a guiding force on your life?

Following is not bad, just as leading is not bad, but we should question whether you are following or leading. What exactly is your group's destination?

Are you truly motivated to work toward betterment, or are you just motivated to live life as a sport where winning is the only true goal?

Are you motivated to think for yourself or to have someone conveniently lay out a plan of action that you can follow without much thought?

Does it matter that what you do is right and good, or are you fine with anything as long as your group wins and gains advantages?

Some of us have lost sight of what is important.

We have decided that winning is all that matters. Or we have decided that having our group like and approve of us is what truly matters. We have come to think that if something makes us feel good, then it is good. And this is not necessarily the case.

We must think deeper.

At the end of the day, are we truly doing what is right?

A good follower should still lead his own mind and does not need a leader to tell him what to think. We should not follow blindly but use the mind and heart to come to our own conclusions.

Ask if your mind is on autopilot, where you hear something from your group, and you automatically assume it to be valid without properly considering alternatives. When this happens, people will repeatedly echo the same thoughts, making them appear valid even if they are not. From there, if the group is influential enough, major world actions can be implemented, such as encouraging people to be harassed or bullied, changing the laws, and in the most extreme cases even war or a great divide, without a good and justifiable reason.

Some people or groups want us to believe something, and so they will spread the information (or misinformation) that benefits their cause, even if it is misguided or untrue.

Today, consider this:

Are you going to lead yourself or be led any way that your groups want to take you?

Are you going to consider the “facts” for yourself, or allow someone else to compile them, analyze them, and then sell you the story that they want you to believe?

You have the right to follow any leader or group you like, but take some time to think for yourself – no one else should do your thinking for you.

Tomorrow’s post will cover some tips and tools for better thinking.

“How Does That Make You Feel?”

I once interned with a clinical therapist (when I was a college student) – her specialty was working with adolescents and families who were facing a variety of problems. Some of those problems could be behavioral issues, communication issues, improper parenting techniques, drug abuse, domestic violence, and sexual abuse.

Her goal was generally to help resolve some of the problems they presented but also to help bring families closer together so they could communicate better and solve their own problems.

In seeing this therapist in action, I realized that she had a catchphrase that worked quite well for her. After someone presented a problem or issue in their lives, she would ask:

“How does that make you feel?”

People naturally wanted to discuss the problem, which usually involved other people being wrong, and them being right. But the therapist always brought the conversation back to feelings. It was important to figure out the feelings that had made people so upset and led them to take certain actions in their lives. It was important to look more closely at which feelings may have led to growing conflicts and problems rather than resolutions. The feelings by not having been properly processed, acknowledge, and directed, had led people into toxicity, maladaptive states, and chronic troubles in their lives.

By not processing or understanding our own feelings, we can get stuck at one station in life.

I must note that she had a compassionate, delicate way to ask this question. It wasn’t just the question itself but how she asked it that helped people open up to her. She was truly empathic and cared deeply, and surely this helped her to open up communication channels with her clients.

Understand that when we communicate, many of us are mostly paying attention to our own feelings. We tend to get absorbed in this and forget that the people we communicate with also have their own feelings. We have to be open to communicating with our true feelings to open up someone else’s feelings and then come to a meaningful understanding. When someone’s feelings are not heard or acknowledged, they tend to become aggressive, or they may want to avoid you, or they may ignore you. None of these provides a proper path toward fruitful communication.

Of course, opening up our true feelings is not always easy, but we must learn to do it if we wish to communicate openly, rather than set up walls that shut down communication.

This simple question, “How does that make you feel?” has made me realize over and over that many of us have a lot of room to grow when it comes to our communication skills. We have gotten used to only surrounding ourselves with people who we agree with. Being around people we agree with makes us feel good, but unfortunately, it can stunt our personal growth. In this age, we also surround ourselves with social media or news feeds that only provide us with the viewpoint we already agree with. Again, this makes us feel good but does not necessarily help us to grow as a person.

What happens when people agree with us? This may make us feel smart, liked, or special in some way. And when they disagree with us, we may feel dumb, disliked, and useless. So when people disagree with us, rather than allowing ourselves to have those negative feelings, we may jump into rationalizations and justifications and bitterly defend our positions. Even if, at times, our position is not actually reasonable.

Feelings are important to how we communicate, but at the same time, it should be obvious that just because I feel good about an idea does not make it true.

Why are feelings important to communication, then? Feelings are about finding a pathway toward understanding and resonating with people. Feelings get at the core of who we are. We own our feelings as a part of ourselves more than we own our facts or rationalizations. Facts and rationalizations are available to all. But we see our feelings as uniquely something that we are experiencing. Even if I am sad and you are sad, we are still sad in different ways, so we always know our own experience to be a unique marker of who we are at a point in time. To deny my feelings is to deny me and to say that I do not matter. When someone debates rationally while completely ignoring how I feel, I feel as if I do not matter.

“Well, our budget is smaller this year than last year, and we needed to cut something somewhere. There’s no other way. Sorry, we’re letting you go. I need you to pack your stuff up and be out by the end of the day.”

Anyone faced with hearing the above would probably feel completely denied as a human being. There is no interest in hearing how you feel. The decision is made about your life without actually factoring in your life, feelings, purpose, and will.

Of course, this denial of who we are makes us angry, depressed, anxious and provides us with a full spectrum of negative emotions. The denial of our feelings makes the situation seem worse than it had to be, somehow.

Here is another scenario to consider. For whatever reason, you may find yourself seated next to someone who holds opposing viewpoints on big life issues. Well, what if instead of bitter debates, personal attacks, and building up our anger and hatred for each other, we instead focused on our feelings?

What if the conversation went something like this:

Robert: “I hate how liberals are always trying to control us.”

Martin: “Well, how do you feel when that happens? (Notice that rather than fueling the fire or resisting this potentially antagonizing idea, we ask a neutral question.)

Robert: “It feels aggravating and like we always have to fight just to keep our basic rights.”

Martin: “I’m a liberal, and I feel aggravated too like we always have to fight to make any basic progress toward something better. It sounds like we feel the same, doesn’t it?”

From there, perhaps the conversation could grow in a direction where both people realized that they both feel aggravated, they both feel misunderstood unheard, disregarded, treated unfairly, etc. Both sides are probably experiencing the same feelings, but they are processing them differently, and they have formed different belief systems or worldviews.

We could choose to focus on the common human factor here, which is our feelings, rather than what splits us apart. When we argue, even with facts, all either side truly hears is:

“He disagrees with a plainly obvious truth that anyone with basic intelligence and human decency should be able to see – so he is obviously ignorant at best or a wretched person at worst. I should give him a piece of my mind so he knows how ignorant and wretched he truly is.”

And, of course, such thoughts cannot possibly go anywhere productive.

The way we tend to behave isn’t as a person who is calmly evaluating facts and weighing them against each other. Rather, we are more concerned with our feelings. We tend to react to the way things make us feel.

In our real conversations, of course, it will be a challenge to have a calm, reasonable conversation with someone from an opposing group or belief system. This is a great challenge because we must connect to our emotions while not letting them rule us. Connecting to our feelings will help us see that we share something that unites us with even people from opposing groups.

While we can reason logically through the facts, the reality is that most people do not think in this way. Most people have a feeling or emotion about something, and then they pick the facts or arguments that support their position. There is a confirmation bias – meaning that we only pay attention to evidence that confirms what we already believe. After you believe something, it becomes quite a challenge to change someone’s mind.

So instead of trying to change minds, why don’t we aim to respect our differences and build connections with people? Ask how people feel and encourage them to tell a story about what got them to that point. If you open your mind and listen to people’s pains, you will see that we can’t argue with feelings. We can argue by using logic, but implementing logic successfully is an overwhelming challenge when we live in a world with more and more misinformation, misinterpretations, and biased information. Also, new research is constantly identifying that what we thought was true becomes false overnight, as new “truths” replace the old ones. And of course, when you argue with logic, people tend to get quite emotional about their “facts,” which defies the point of using logic in the first place.

Understand that when we argue from the point of needing to be right, we can’t convince anyone.

The more you feel the need to be right, the more that the other person will feel the need to be right. And the situation we end up creating is of locking horns (such as with bison, antelope, or moose). And sometimes, in nature, both animals lock horns so tightly in a gruesome battle that both sides end up losing their lives. If that is not the future we want to create for ourselves, then we should reconsider our need to be right and instead look for ways to open ourselves up to others and get them to open up to us.

Debating the people we disagree with in an angry, hate-filled way is not the path forward.

Ignoring that the people we disagree with exist is not the path forward.

Treating the people we disagree with as less than human is not the path forward.

Instead of closing down, we must open up and invite people into our hearts, minds, and souls.

If we open up and explore people’s feelings, we create an open window of communication—a channel between souls where true understanding may develop.

“I am Better Than You”

The thought that “I am Better than You” may be one of the most harmful thoughts ever produced in all of society, yet it is often seen as quite benign or even as a good and healthy thought to have. For many people, they may view it as their right to think this thought every day.

I will admit that I have been guilty of thinking this thought at times. I am well educated, and I think education is highly important. So it is tempting if I meet someone who did not go to college to think that I am better.

Yet, in reality, I just happened to be born into a family where a college education was highly valued. Since I was 8 years old, I knew that I would go to college – it was never a question. Another 8-year-old in my neighborhood perhaps had never even heard the word “college,” as his parents may not have found higher education to be especially important. Another 8-year-old in a less fortunate country was perhaps working full time to help his family survive, and the idea of college would be completely foreign to him.

There is not a good reason to convince ourselves that we are better than others. Often, we just had different circumstances and different opportunities.

A humbling thought I sometimes have is that if I had been born exactly in someone else’s position, meaning to another mother and father, in the same context as someone else, then I would be that other person. We like to focus on our self-control and our ability to do what we want, but if you were born in an environment without proper nutrition, education, healthy mindsets, good role models, and so on, then why would you be the 1 in a million statistic that performs well in life?

Contrariwise, if everything in your life were moving you toward love, wisdom, and success, with good parents and good school systems, and positive nurturing family and friends, what type of person could fail to live a fruitful life in this case? If everything were aligning you toward being a good and successful person, then to fail horribly in life would perhaps make you quite the unusual statistic.

With this type of thinking, I see myself in every individual I cross paths with. I see that if things had been different, I would be them, or they would be me. In a sense, we’re all the same individual because if I had been born and raised in precisely your circumstances, I would be you, and if you had been born and raised precisely in my circumstances, you would be me. This is a powerful idea that has impacted my life.

There is nothing to feel too proud about. I should not feel that I am better than you. Or if you are in better circumstances than me, you should not feel that you are better than me, either.

This thinking helps me sympathize more and relate to people who are not in as fortunate circumstances. I think many of us fear interacting with someone who has less than us because I think deep down, we all know that we could just as easily have been in their shoes. But rather than empathize, we often choose to distance ourselves more and more from them. It’s easier to pretend they do not exist or to blame them for their shortcomings.

From a group or nation level, “I am better than you” is probably a persistent thought from people in many nations throughout the world. Nations tend to want their people to feel proud of their country – e.g., patriotism. Yet, there is a point where feeling that we are better than others can result in prejudices, racism, harassment, violence, etc.

When we think we are better, the mind easily shifts into a dark place, where we start to think it is okay to take control over someone else’s life, to use them for our purposes, to objectify or dehumanize them, or in the worst of cases, as a justification to exterminate people.

We should aim to support our thoughts with evidence. We shouldn’t have a thought and feel it is true just because it makes us feel good. And, we should aspire not to feel good just because a thought strokes our ego. We should aspire to get our self-esteem from good thoughts and good actions, not from belittling and looking down on others.

All I ask is that we take more caution with this widespread thought that we probably all have had at some point or another: “I am better than you.”