I know a guy, let’s call him Phil, whose mantra is “people are stupid.” He goes around saying it all the time. Anytime someone disagrees with him or doesn’t fully buy into what he’s saying, instead of going back and examining what he said, he just repeats his mantra “people are stupid”, complains about them for a bit and moves on with his life.
To be fair, when I spent a lot of time with Phil, I did tend to see a lot of stupid people, but I can’t help but think that saying “people are stupid” is a cop-out. If you think with all your heart, that people are stupid, you’ll begin to notice all the people who do stupid things (because that’s what you’re looking for). It’s called confirmation bias. You see what you’re looking for and then use it as proof to confirm your theory that indeed, you’re right after all. This reinforces your original idea and pretty soon you have a snowballing view of pessimism towards people. Even if you’re right, it’s not a very fun way to go through life.
I have a different theory. I think people are awesome. Most people are good and are capable of doing amazing, impossible things.
The cool part about this is when you expect people to be awesome, they usually are.
- When you challenge a few people to jump out of a plane with you, you might end up with 40-some people signing up to do it with you.
- You might find some guy walking across the United States and decide to do a road trip with him.
- Or a meet a guy that flies all over the world finding out the prices of xyz and abc.
- Or some girls trying to upend the fashion industry.
- Or maybe you’ll meet a guy that loves the paleo diet as much as he loves pushups and gives talks at Google for fun.
The more you expect people to be awesome, the more awesome people you’ll find. When you challenge people to do the impossible. They somehow manage to do it. You almost always get what you’re looking for.
People will be exactly what you expect them to be. If you’re looking to be disappointed by them, you probably will be. If you’re hoping to be pleasantly surprised by them, you probably will be.
There are plenty of awesome people in the world. If you’re not noticing them, maybe you need to change the people you spend time with.
What impossible things are you expecting the people in your world to do?
This goes wider. I’ve seen this about cars! I thought I was the first one in my area/work to have variously a classic Range Rover or a Toyota Prius. However, the moment I serious got into getting/having one the more I realized they were around once you had your eye in!
Ha, I noticed this too with my Honda :). If you’re looking for something, you always find a way to find it.
Met Karol last night. He was expectedly awesome.
Yes, but unexpectedly tall! And I was expecting him to be really tall! That Karol, always exceeding expectations.
Dig your way of thinking Joel! You’ve got it right! Whoo hoo!
Blue skies always,
Elena
Blue Skies (that’s what they always aid at the Skydive place) 🙂
Love this! It’s a type of self-fulfilling prophecy as well.
Definitely true for a lot of things. When you’re pregnant (or thinking about it), all your see are pregnant women.
Will try to keep this in mind – great outlook on life in general
I don’t know bout the pregnant thing, but I’ll take your word for it :).
Agreed, brother. Attitude almost always determines your altitude in life. Saw that on a motivational poster once. Thanks for the shout!
Anytime. PARKOUR!
Well said my friend. This so true. When you have certain expectations of any person or situation those tend to turn into reality. This great quote in this book the three laws of performance was
“As you label an object or situation, so you behave towards it”
People are capable of damn near anything. It’s good to surround yourself with those that see the same potential.
That said, sometimes people make sucky decisions. But they can also make inspiring, creative, exciting, passionate decisions.
I’ll sign up for the good please 🙂
You gotta take the good with the bad, but you get more of whichever one you focus on.
Love this post! Question: can you please provide a link for the person who flies around the world finding out the prices of things? That sentence linked to Nate Walks America again, and I’d be very interested to learn about all of these people. Thanks!
Ah got it. Fixed! Thanks for the heads up. His name is Alan Perlman at the 9 To 5 Alternative. Very cool guy.
A friend and I had this very talk a few weeks ago and we both discussed how at this point in our lives we want to spend most, if not all of our time with positive, inspirational people. Not that we have to totally cut out the negative, complainer, glass half-empty folk, but rather that we choose to be in the opposite group and if people don’t want to join us, we move in different directions. Sure there are a lot of bad things and bad people in this world, but take a look around at what things and people are absolutely jaw-dropping incredible. Why not focus there instead?!
People can be absolutely jaw-dropping.
Everyone has a choice, if people choose to be negative & complain, why would they expect people to want to be around them?
I am with you on this, 100%. I have friends that are more on the pessimistic side of things, where I give more people the benefit of the doubt until they prove me wrong. My opinion, I would rather hold everyone to a high standard and be let down every once in a while, rather than have an attitude that people will let me down, and be surprised when they dont.
Oh, and check your link to the guy who flies all over the world pricing things, links back to Nate.
<– Really good quote. Like the way you think here Justin.
Here’s the thing: your friend is totally right.
People ARE stupid.
That has always been one of the most sure facts in life. But the trick is to be who you are in spite of that fact – not BECAUSE of it.
I respectfully submit that you have a worse grasp of reality than your friend does… but you’ve got a better attitude. And maybe this is one of those things where attitude is more important?
I would say “some people are stupid” and people make “stupid choices” but I wouldn’t say “all people are stupid.”
For what it’s worth, “being ‘right’ is overrated.’ I’ve never understood this. It’s like the people that are planning to make financial gains betting that the world will end. Why would you want to be the ‘winner’ in a world that sucks? Similarly, so what if my friend is technically ‘right?’ I’d rather be able to believe in people and see the great things they do than sit on my butt and cry about how everyone in the world is dumb except for me (but maybe that’s just me) :).
I think the same can be said about life. I’ve heard so many of my friends say how much their life sucks or put on their facebook profile “today sucked” or some such debby downer statement (cue waa-waaaa background music). Life and people synergize with our outlook. If we see people as stupid or life as sucking, taa-daaa, that is what will appear.
Not bragging at all, but I still have a life-threating illness, I’ve was on dialysis for 3 1/2 years, I received a kidney transplant last fall, and during that whole time, life was mother spankin’ awesome! Still is. Sure, it was hard (still is at times) but I choose to have hope and see the best in life and shazam, it happens. And not necessarily on my timetable.
I don’t want to expect people in my world to do anything, I’m focusing on what I’m doing to help them. I dig the essence of what you are saying, thanks for the post brah.
The only person you can control is yourself. Good on you for having such an upbeat attitude through your trials. That’s an amazing story. #props
p.s. I like your animated noises 🙂 *shazam!*
Hi Joel,
I completely agree with you. It reminds me of when I am with ‘Jane’ who SWEARS everyone has an angle and most people are not good and only looking out for themselves. For example, someone might say something completely harmless to me and I don’t think anything of it. If ‘Jane’ is with me, it is brought to my attention of how rude the comment was and I am left sitting wondering, what the hell?? Is THAT what that person meant??
I since have come to a similar theory as you – expect the best and you get the best. I don’t have NEARLY as many problems with people as ‘Jane’ does. I am always hearing stories of how things went wrong and so and so did this. Luckily I have not had that many problems with people and I truly believe it is because I am not LOOKING for a problem and part of me thinks that if you think it will happen, it will! (Thoughts are very powerful!)
Anyways, I really enjoyed reading this and glad you put it out there 🙂
Thanks Julia :). I think your friend should read the piece by Chris Guillebeau – “Most people are good.” Might give her a different perspective.
I think my dad has almost exactly the opposite mantra to Phil – whenever he and I talk about what’s going on in the world and why people do the things they do, he always repeats “most people aren’t stupid”.
Meaning that there’s some deeper, rational-in-some-way-even-if-we-don’t-understand-it-yet reason why this person is doing what they’re doing. And if we dig deep enough, we can figure it out and understand the person better.
Hey Sylvia,
I think people usually do things that make sense to them. Maybe they’re not logical to “us” but they usually have a reason for doing it, even if it’s because “they didn’t know better.” I think the answer is to try to understand and help them…not tell them why they’re stupid. Your dad’s a smart guy :).
See for emotional syncronisation
http://www.scienceofrelationships.com/home/2011/6/23/i-learned-it-by-watching-you.html
If you keep company with a cynic you will become cynical, etc
I’ve also hear the adage “you’re the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with.” Who you surround yourself with has a huge impact on who you become.
He who walks with the wise grows wise, but a companion of fools suffers harm. Proverbs 13:20
Once you are “on this message” it is of course everywhere you look, just like all the Hondas, Range Rovers, and Toyota Prius that had seemed as rare as common sense.
Good quote 🙂
A stranger arrived in a town.
“What are people like here?”he asked an old man.
“What are they like in your home town, stranger?”
“Ugly,miserable,envious.”
“The same kind you will find here” the old man said.
A second stranger arrived in the town.
“What are people like here?”he asked the same old man.
“What are they like in your home town, stranger?”
“Beautiful, vivid, friendly.”
“The same kind you will find here” the old man said.
=)