How to Help Solve People Problems: Do Unto Others what You want to be done to You
It would solve SO many problems
People are always gonna be ignorant, rude assholes. Racism, sexism, ageism all kinds of ‘isms’. The question is where do you stand?
The problem
Most of the people problems in my life comes from 3 things:
- Not knowing where I stand and not being true to myself
- Jumping over hurdles to get people to understand me
- Trying to fix people
A lot of anxiety comes from refusing to relinquish control, especially over another’s actions. When you start feeling upset, surrender and acceptance are key.
I think we can agree that we can’t REALLY control what people think or do. Unless you’re a slave owner or parenting a child but even those 2 examples have their limitations.
The only thing we can TRULY control is ourselves, our thoughts and our actions. To be a TRULY Powerful person, one must know your values and where you stand:
(1) If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything. (2) Those who stand for nothing fall for anything. (3) When you stand for nothing, you fall for everything.
-Alexander Hamilton
“Do unto others what you want to be done to you”
The solution
- If you stand by your own positive values, it's easier to understand how to treat people. In one of my articles I wrote “I want respect, kindness and understanding.” If I don’t get it, and I care, I tell them what’s not working for me… then work together to resolve it.”
- Once I know where stand I don’t have to jump through hurdles for people to understand me. Having strong values is like being a strong tree. It would be like one of those resilient trees that won’t break even in a hurricane.
3. Fixing people and their negative opinions of who you are is like the heavy wind of a storm. Wouldn't you much rather be the strong tree?
You can’t REALLY control what people think or do unless you are parenting a child or a slave owner. But even those 2 examples have their limitations.
Trying to fix people never worked for me. Has it worked for you?
I’m not saying you should agree with everyone but trying to change people is like swimming against the tide or trying to chop down someone else’s tree. The only way I worked to resolved problems is acceptance of where people stand and listening through the lens of respect, kindness and understanding.
I’m not into brute force in my personal life. I’m not a dictator.
Of course, negative opinions matter to us, and reputation is important but it’s only important as a by-product of your values. The irony is that opinions and reputation are not even that important once you live by your values like respect, kindness and understanding.
What are your values anyway?
Asking yourself how you want to be treated is a good start.
In an interaction with Julius Evans, he posed very good examples of ‘value’ questions:
“If you found lotto numbers that were going to win, would you share them? Or better, if you found a wallet filled with cash and an address, would you return it?”-
Remember, do unto others what you want to be done to you
If you don’t know what your values are maybe this article I wrote would be helpful:
The next time you are running into people's problems ask yourself :
What are my values?
Do their values align with mine?
If not, how can we work to resolve that?
But what do you do when you can’t seem to resolve an issue?
A psychologist taught me about ‘active listening’. It means turning off your comments in your head when someone is talking to you. This is hard especially when someone is saying something that is not in alignment with your value or beliefs.
The next step is to stop and think about what they said BEFORE you speak.
It’s better to understand a little than to misunderstand a lot
If you have expressed your opinion and they're still not understanding you, it’s best to squash it for now, not try to chop down their tree with brute force and to accept who they are.
If you love them, you can always bring your opinion up later. Maybe there are not there yet. Sometimes new ideas take time.
However, sometimes you have to agree to disagree and part ways. Have respect, kindness and understanding through acceptance of another person’s stand.
It’s exactly what I would want to be done to me.
I personally navigate my life through the golden rule:
“Do unto others what you want to be done to you”
Of which Rowena Starling responded with a simple genius reason why the golden rule works:
It would solve SO many problems
Her response made me think about why it would solve my ‘people’ problems. If you don’t like me or my opinions. I’m ok with that, I’m not gonna try to cut down your tree. I’ll rather understand it.
I believe the bible was speaking of the golden rule in the verse:
“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? -Matthew 7:3
People are always gonna be ignorant, rude assholes
I read on a fortune cookie message “It's better to understand a little than to misunderstand a lot”.
Once I’m coming from a positive place, I know where I stand.
Do you?
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