Dr. Mort Orman here and this is my second post (Part 2) in a series of three this week in response to a blog post I recently found, written by David Cain, a young man who lives in Winnipeg, Canada and writes a blog about being human at www.rapititude.com .
His article was titled “88 Important Truths I’ve Learned About Life” and once again, if you want to read the whole thing, just click here.
I went through David’s entire list of 88 truths and picked out what I thought were the 27 best ideas that most strongly resonated with me.
I then divided them into three groups of nine, based on how I thought the ideas were related.
In my first post this week (Part 1), I listed nine important truths, from David’s list of 88, about what it generally means to be human.
Today, I have nine more to share with you about the nature of human relationships.
So here they are (I indicated the order each appeared in David’s original list at the end of each entry):
- You can’t change other people, and it’s rude to try. (1)
- It’s easy to make someone’s day just by being uncommonly pleasant to them. (65)
- Children are remarkably honest creatures until we teach them not to be. (7)
- Most of what children learn from their parents isn’t taught on purpose. (66)
- If you’re talking to someone you don’t know well, you may be talking to someone who knows way more about whatever you’re talking about than you do. (3)
- To write a person off as worthless is an act of great violence. (58)
- Yelling always makes things worse. (9)
- Revenge is for the petty and irresponsible. (41)
- If you aren’t happy single, you won’t be happy in a relationship. (47)
My Top Three
Once again, I invite you to look over this list and pick out the three most important truths that speak to you most strongly. Then, once you have your top three, identify the one you think is number one in importance for you.
Also note if there are any you strongly disagree with.
My top three were 1, 66 and 47. Of these, I think 47 is the most important—although it is tough to argue with the wisdom of any of these three.
So many people today suffer within their close loving relationships because they’ve got the wrong idea that the relationship (or another person) is finally going to make them happy.
I used to think this way, but I’ve come to view relationships differently now.
I believe relationships work out best when two or more whole, complete and happy people get together to contribute their happiness to each other (and to the health of the relationship).
I think if you aren’t very happy by yourself (or with yourself), and you are depending on other people to make you happy, you’re going to be in for a whole world of eventual hurt and disappointment.
And then you’re going to blame the other person, or the relationship, for letting you down, and your entire experience will just keep spiraling downward from there.
Have You Ever Labored To Change Someone?
Numbers 1 and 66 are also very important.
I spent a good part of my teenage years desperately trying to change my mother.
I basically wanted to stop her from mothering me so much. After all, I was growing up and becoming my own person.
I fought this battle consistently and bravely for many years. But every time I did, I lost.
I really didn’t understand David’s truth #1, but now I do.
By the way, this also causes lots of stress and unhappiness for physicians, health professionals and many other “helpers.”
It’s just in our bones—we see a problem and we want to fix it.
We see someone suffering (or headed toward suffering) and we want to take the suffering away.
It’s not that we can’t have positive influences on other people, but when our goal is to directly change them, we often end up feeling frustrated and angry.
Self-Defeating Effects Of Revenge
Speaking of anger, truths number 9 and 41 towards the bottom of my list seem very appropriate.
When you feel like you want revenge, what you really want is to punish and hurt another person. No matter what personal insult or damage you might have experienced, hurting someone else (unless you are in a declared state of war) rarely makes things better.
This is the petty part of truth 41.
The irresponsible part is that while you are emotionally consumed with seeking revenge, you aren’t taking responsibility for what might have caused your anger to occur in the first place.
Often, our angry reactions are blown way out of proportion, and sometimes they even occur when the other party was more or less blameless.
But it takes a very rational, clear-headed, objective and honest individual to examine their angry feelings from this deeper point of view, and when you are consumed by a desire for revenge, you will be anything but this.
Hope you enjoyed this second batch of nine important truths about life.
If you did, why not share this message with others.
And be sure to tune in to my third and final post this series.
I’ve got nine more important truths for you which all focus on our emotions, or things that we feel.
To your health, happiness and success,
Dr. Mort Orman, M.D., International Speaker, Author And Founder Of The Stress Mastery Academy | http://DocOrman.com
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