The Start Of Another Day: Chapter IV
By A.H.Z
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CHAPTER IV: Your Environment
Your environment consists mainly of the people around you, whether it is the people that are close to you, such as your family or classmates that you meet on daily basis, or even strangers you walk by every day in your town. It is important to feel comfortable in the environment that you’re in, which might be hard to do if you have your own unique set of values and point of views that differ quite a bit from the general perspectives people have in your environment, this might lead to a lot of unnecessary debates which can turn your environment into a negative, toxic one; this could lead you to associate socializing with negative emotions which might then lead you to isolate yourself. This is not the best course of action to take in my opinion. Something that has even more of a negative impact on your relationships with others is agreeing with other people in order to avoid debates, you might be wondering how it might be harmful, and the answer to that is how that same behavior disconnects your from your environment in an unhealthy way, to be more accurate, the causes behind the act itself is what causes this disconnection. The cause is often either an obsession with how people view you, or an unhealthy urge to please other people, which is why you might find it too risky to share your opinions since that might harm your image or displease your interlocutors. In any case, I firmly believe that you should voice your opinions and express your thoughts most of the time, however, you don’t have to state any arguments whatsoever even if asked to do so, if your interlocutor isn’t respecting your opinion, you should always remember that you have your very own reasons to believe in whatever it is that you are talking about and that you had experiences that helped you shape this opinion, so you are in no means obliged to justify it, but even so, try not to close off your mind to people and listen to what they have to say if you are in a mood that allows you to do so, the choice of whether to turn a situation into a debate or not is yours. Another thing to keep in mind is that in some cases where the topic might be too controversial or where it is pointless to state your opinion, I advise you to stay silent since silence is the best alternative to honesty. Getting into debates with people all the time is not only exhausting but also pointless in some cases, most of time when we debate someone it isn’t to actually make a change or to help our interlocutors, it is simply to reinforce the idea that our ideals are “better” and “more correct” than theirs and therefore we satisfy our urges of righteousness, sometimes people succumb to their ego and go into a state where they start taking the debate as if it was a personal attack which is our brain’s natural reaction to unexpected -possible- changes which makes us feel stressed and sometimes furious; I truly believe that there is no wrong opinion and that I do not need to convince anyone about anything, everyone should forge their own set of ideals based on their own experiences, in the end, the diversity of opinions is what’s allowing our species to survive and thrive on this planet, therefore debating should only be done if you want to know a person’s thought process that led him to a certain perspective on something, or, if you , yourself, want to describe your trail of thought to someone. One very important thing to note here is that if someone was ever to cross your boundaries by forcing his own opinions on you, you should definitely speak up against it, the reason why we get uncomfortable and angry when someone forces their ideals on us in the first place is because it is the way our subconscious conveys a message to us, a message that someone is making our own well-being compromised, therefore, your mind acts accordingly and pushes you towards aggressiveness, the more beneficial course of action is to get a hold of yourself and speak calmly to that person, where you indicate to him/her that you are not going to do as he pleases, that is not always the case however since most of us are overcome by anger at one point or another, do try to stay as logical as possible however. I truly believe that failing at something because of a decision I made is not regrettable, and is even commendable sometimes because I stayed true to my own ideals and not other people’s, because in any case, the only person that is most likely aware of most of the circumstances that surround you at every moment is you, furthermore, many people tend to forget that failure is probably the best teacher you can encounter, that being said, you should not miss the opportunity to learn from other people’s experiences and to change your ideals according to what they believe in if you are convinced by them.
As I’ve mentioned in the Understanding chapter, you should definitely distance yourself from toxic people, setting that aside however, you should try your best to accept people for who they are, especially if they have different opinions, if they do force them on you or if you feel uncomfortable talking to them however, you should definitely distance yourself from them which does not necessarily imply cutting them off, it just means taking a step back In your relationship such as setting barriers for a friend that became overly invasive for example; this doesn’t necessarily mean that they are “bad” people, there are people that you naturally cannot tolerate, always remember that every person has parts that you like and parts that you dislike about him, it is up to you to make the decision of whether you should distance yourself from someone or not after considering the pros and cons.
In my opinion (and I am saying this because this paragraph is relatively more subjective than any other paragraph in this book), there are two cases where you should definitely not help someone that asked for your help, the first case being that you genuinely do not want to help them for various reasons (you might be tired, you have other plans, you aren’t that close to that person and do not want to get involved with them…etc.). Even if sometimes this does make some people think of you unfavorably, in the long term however, it will definitely benefit you more since you will find that you do not put yourself in embarrassing situations as much, in addition to that, helping someone simply to be viewed as a “good” person is very taxing on your mental stability because the more you do so, the more you become obsessed with what people think of you; that aside, if helping someone doesn’t specifically bother you, or, if you genuinely want to help them, then of course, do as you please . The second case is if you are helping someone and expecting something in return. whether be it in the long term or short term, helping people shouldn’t be a way to get them indebted to you, you made the choice the help them after all -even if they ask for help- unless they do say that they will return your favor do not expect anything from them, if you do not help people out of your own willingness to help, then I would advise you to not help in the first place. Now of course, if they explicitly say that you will be rewarded for helping then there is no shame in doing so in order to obtain that reward in return. My point is, you should definitely learn to say no to people if doing so prevents unhappiness and regret.
I would like to take this chance to go deeper into toxicity; I've already defined what it means to be a toxic person in the earlier chapter as being someone that no matter what situation he’s in, is always dissatisfied and is actively trying to get people involved in his problems whether be it by constantly taking about them or by pushing his problems unto other people. A very common type of of these people are the individuals that are constantly complaining about something related to politics even though it rarely affects them. Personally, I believe that being constantly furious and offended about anything and everything slowly but surely ruins your quality of life; you can take your mind off of thoughts that make you unhappy even if there are plenty of causes that induce them, being angry all the time never stopped any form of discrimination after all. Help yourself and everyone else by first being in a state of mind that allows you to be in your optimal state that is relatively free of bias. That aside ,I would like to clarify that talking about something you are unsatisfied with is something every human does, since by doing so you feel more relieved afterwards, it is almost as if we are subconsciously searching for a relief from the pain that we feel, nevertheless, we should keep in mind that we are getting other people into problems they shouldn’t be concerned with, and that talking about your problems isn’t necessarily going to fix them anytime soon, only do so in moderation while refraining from annoying people in your surroundings or boring them out ( that is something you’ll have to figure out on your own however).
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