Because I was so sure everyone wanted to be a good person, I wouldn’t listen to them.
They would say, “I don’t like people” and I would think of course you do…how can you not like your own kind?
Or someone would say, “I am a jerk, or I am better than him”. And I would either laugh it off or disregard it because we all have our faults and we all have our strengths.
Then I heard Oprah Winfrey talk about Maya Angelou one day, and Oprah spoke about her favourite piece of wisdom from Maya… “when someone tells you who they are, believe them the first time.”
I started trying to apply this to my life.
I started paying closer attention to who someone said they were.
I began to understand that people know themselves better than we can possibly know them, and if we listen to their words we will find out so much about them.
They behave in direct proportion to their belief about themselves because words and labels are so powerful.
I stopped trying to mentally change them.
You know what happened?
When I let go of the battle of perceptions inside myself and began to accept that people really are who they say they are… I’ve been able to find my kind of people easier and faster, and let go of the ones who aren’t my kind of people quickly.
“Surround yourself with the dreamers and the doers, the believers and thinkers, but most of all, surround yourself with those who see the greatness within you, even when you don’t see it yourself.” ~Edmund Lee