There’s this habit that I will never understand as long as I live. Some people, it seems, take delight in getting others all worked up. I detect this mainly in the male of our species, but it’s not exclusive to them by any means. They find it funny to push other people’s buttons. They actually feel as if they’ve achieved a lofty goal if they make someone upset.
Why is this? Where does it come from? It’s not unlike bear-baiting, which was popular for about 300 years in England, and only stopped due to an act of Parliament in 1835. A bear would be chained up and set upon by dogs to the delight of the cheering crowd. This bloody sport has suddenly become popular again in Pakistan, thanks to some warlords who own fighting dogs.
There is a barbaric streak in the human race, and it is not only reserved for helpless animals. We turn on each other with amazing frequency. Bullying and teasing are not restricted to the school yard. People are downright cruel to each other.
This behavior befuddles me even more given the fact that so many of us claim to be members of one religion or another. No religion on earth that I can think of advocates making others feel miserable and causing your friends and neighbors to feel worse about themselves. If you can think of a creed that says, “Ruin the days of as many people as you possibly can,” please let me know.
If you walk through the world practicing loving kindness, you leave improvements in your wake. If, on the other hand, you drop little grenades of destruction and nastiness as you pass through this life, what you leave behind you is a trail of toxic waste. It’s all so unnecessary.
For the life of me, I will never get why negativity appears to be the default position, and we have to work to overcome that instinct. It would be very easy for me to be like this, too. It’s not particularly hard to spot the sore spots in others and then stick a fork in them, but on the rare occasion I have done this, it’s left a very bad taste in my mouth.
Case in point, if I ever wanted to make my late boyfriend’s head explode, I could simply send him a meme like this one:
He really, genuinely believed all these dire predictions about our president. Oddly enough, his opinions seemed to become even more entrenched in the face of cold, hard facts to the contrary. It was kind of sad, actually.
I could have exploited this basic flaw in him, but really it would have done no good. He was not going to change and much as I would have liked him to. Instead I tried to avoid all political discussions with him. Strangely, it was he who would often drag me into one debate or another, and we’d both walk away supremely irritated. I used to say, “Why do you want to do this? What does it accomplish? Does this feel good to you? It doesn’t feel good to me. Why is this necessary?” But he couldn’t seem to resist.
I wish all my memories of Chuck were happy ones. Most of them are, but the bad ones will always slightly taint my recollections. But really, in retrospect, we were simply acting out an age-old ritual that seems to be in the very DNA of every human being. Bear-baiting writ large.
If only for today, think about the legacy you are leaving behind. Is it uplifting? Do you leave people feeling better about themselves? It’s really not that hard to do. Try it.
Namaste.
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