I try to compliment others on even their little feats. Most times, they think I’m crazy or I’m trying to mock them. But I’m not, this is my genuine reaction. They still think I’m weird.

But it got me thinking:
Am I the one who’s weird, or is it our society in which nobody who does good is appreciated and congratulated, but the moment when someone makes a mistake, even if it’s a tiny mistake among a thousand successes, they jump upon them, try to tear them down and say absolutely nasty things about them without even wanting to know what actually happened or what the person has to say?

Some think, “Well, this guy is paid, so I can just pay and be rude to them”. But every human being deserves to be treated with respect and dignity. When that doesn’t happen, when a person is not appreciated, it makes them weary, sad, unwanted and lonely.

Sure, we can all agree that we can be nice,
but I asked myself:
Why can’t we treat others nicely?
What is stopping us?

The “answer” I got back is:
How are we treating ourselves?

Each of us has a brewing internal conflict within us, where an inner drill sergeant inside us wants us to be disciplined and driven and ambitious, and it tries to beat us up into those perfect men and women it wants us to be. Meanwhile, those binge-watching, booze-drinking, addicted and hypersexual parts wait for a split second where the drill sergeant goes to rest, and prance upon us and make us do things it thinks will make us happy, but leave us drained and sad.

We think to ourselves, like St. Paul:
“I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.” (Romans 7:15)

We don’t even know what is happening within us, and both the drill sergeant and those deviant parts are in an eternal conflict. The parts keep on becoming polarized, the conflict rises even further, and we become more and more unhappy. And yet we think we can abuse and beat ourselves up into perfection.

We never think those “deviant” parts have a reason to do what they do: perhaps it is to turn our focus away from a bigger problem that they think will destroy us. perhaps they think we’re in an unsolvable mess and they’re trying their best to soothe the pain.

if this is the way we treat ourselves,
then how can we treat ourselves with kindness?

(if you resonate with this, then please, please don’t think i’m blaming you. i understand you.)