New Year’s Resolution: Nix the Gossip
Thursday, January 7th, 2010
As I sat eating my carefully designed salad at Whole Foods today I couldn’t help but eavesdrop on the conversations around me. They were free for the hearing.
I was surprised and saddened by the similarities of these conversations (three of them), while none of these articulating duos probably knew each other their conversations were almost identical in theme: they were all speaking pejoratively about some absent third party.
As far as I know all three of these anonymous parties were horrid people or just dopey folks incapable living their own lives with any savoir faire. I don’t think that’s the case though, I think that for some reason our first instinct when sitting down for a chat is to talk about other people.
I’m no saint, I’ve certainly talked my fair share of shit in my day, but I guess hearing it so overwhelmingly present in the air around me made think there’s something really sad about that. I think I found another New Year’s Resolution, think before I speak about other people.
I’m going to go ahead and say that Plato was really on to something when he said:
“Be kind for everyone you meet is fighting a great battle”
Judging others is as ingrained in us as judging ourselves, but as a culture methinks we’re all judging everyone a little too much…including ourselves. It’s important to remember that we’re all just human, fallible, funny, humans. We ain’t perfect and neither are our friends and frenemies.
Rene says:
January 8th, 2010
7:46 am
That is a good quote. And a good lesson. And you’re a good person for seeing the lesson while in Whole Foods.