As someone with a love for learning and a need for understanding how things work, it’s very easy to fall into the trap of appearing to be a know it all and always needing to be right. At times, that can be a fine line to walk. For myself, my younger years were spent compiling enough evidence to prove that I didn’t know shiz through my countless mistakes. My young adult years were spent gathering enough evidence to prove that I was not as dumb as I appeared to be by the actions and choices of my youth. And as I hit my stride into my middle years, into adulthood, okay, once or twice I tried adulting, I can’t say as I enjoy it that much, but none the less, here I am… I am working hard at not being right, as much as I am working on being helpful and more important than that, I’m working on being happy.
Recently, I have found myself the subject of other peoples’ need to be right or even worse, their self-righteousness and gossip. Everything from, “Who does she think she is?” to “Why does everyone think she has the answer for everything?” All the way to the, Jesus quotin’, look, guys, I’m doing the right thing, even though other people don’t know what’s going on and I’m going to talk about it to everyone except the person that can do something about it, person.
Don’t be that last person, I know I’m right when I say that’s just not a nice way to be.
True Story.
I’ll admit, it’s hard not to get pulled into what other people are saying and doing, especially when its triggering your own need to be right, to defend yourself or even worse, prove someone else wrong. Who hasn’t been in any of those positions? We’ve all experienced one variation of all of these stories. When I’ve been caught up in these situations I have found that while I was busy judging the person or the situation, I wasn’t using the opportunity to really understand on a deeper level, I was filling in the blanks with my own thoughts and judgments, and some of the time, they were not “right”, they were so very wrong. I was missing the opportunity to learn and keeping myself trapped in some narrow ass thinking.
The key is understanding that people are going to do what they are going to do, and truth be told, what they say and do says more about them than it does about you.
As I fumble around in my middle years, with more of a desire for peace and inner balance than being right, I am learning to ask myself better questions when faced with the decision of how I will react when my need to be right is triggered or when I’m triggered by what others are saying and doing.
Asking yourself questions like: Is it better to be right than to be happy? Is it better to be right than to protect my inner peace? If the answer is no, then you will know that you’re on the path to creating the peace that you deserve.