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“If you look for the bad in people expecting to find it, you surely will.”—Abraham Lincoln

There is both some good, and some bad, in every person on this earth. We are all a mixture of both good and bad, and most of us tend to use ourselves as the yard stick with which we measure others.. However, the fact that a person thinks and behaves differently than we do does not necessarily make that person either good or bad. They are just different. A large diamond may have flaws, but it is still beautiful if we just look beyond the flaws. The same is true of people. Just because we observe some flaws in individuals doesn’t mean that we should throw them away. If we look closely, we will almost inevitably find some good characteristics as well.

I believe that we should try to see the good in people instead of looking only for the bad. To a large extent, when it comes to judging other people, we tend to usually find whatever we are expecting to find. There are some people who manage to see good in almost everyone. Unfortunately, however, some other people have a tendency to try to build themselves up by tearing other people down. By finding faults in others, they mentally diminish their our own faults, if indeed they are willing to acknowledge having any faults.

I once read about a realtor who had a ready answer for potential home buyers who wanted to know what the neighbors were like in the area where they were considering buying a new home. The realtor would ask his clients what the neighbors were like where they currently lived. Then, regardless of their response, he would say, “I think you’ll find the neighbors here very much like those from your former neighborhood.” That realtor was right on target. People who complain about their former neighbors will almost certainly complain about their new neighbors. Similarly, people who have succeeded in making friends with their neighbors in their previous community are likely to do the same in their new neighborhood.

Efforts to find faults in others is a waste of time and effort because there is nothing we can do to eliminate the faults we find. It is simply impossible to change another person unless they also have a desire to be changed. However, we can change ourselves if we recognize our own faults and make an effort to correct them. So if we want to make this a better world by changing people, we should analyze our own faults and then work toward self-improvement. Think about it.

“A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs. It’s jolted by every pebble on the road.”

—Henry Ward Beacher

The road of life is strewn with pebbles of various sizes, and there will even be a few boulders along the way. We can wish that it weren’t so, or wish that we could travel a different road than everyone else travels, but wishing alone never accomplishes anything. To use the words of author, M. Scott Peck, M.D., “Life is difficult.” We must take life as it comes, but there are some things we can do to help buffer the jolts

The one characteristic that provides the greatest armor to protect us against the hazards along the road of life is a strong, well-developed, sense of humor, and those people who lack this characteristic are at the mercy of everyone else. According to William Arthur Ward, “A well-developed sense of humor is the pole that adds balance to your steps as you walk the tightrope of life.”

When we experience frustration, we are bound to have an emotional response. That response will either be humor or anger. Anger is a negative emotion that hurts us and others. If we can replace it with humor, everybody benefits. When I was young, I took things a lot more seriously than I do today, and as a result I was all tensed up much of the time. As a young high school teacher, in a school where the principal had allowed discipline to almost totally break down, I became so upset that I had to begin taking doctor prescribed tranquilizers.

Among other things, I was assigned to morning hall patrol duty to look out for problems and report them to the principal. The boys delighted in pushing large file cabinets in front of the girl’s restroom door, effectively locking the girls inside. I would rush down to the principal’s office to inform him of the problem, but when I returned with the principal, the boys would have removed the file cabinets making me look like a real fool. That was one of many problems I had trying to maintain discipline in the unruly school. The principal’s advice to me was to just try to laugh off the problems. It sure didn’t seem funny to me at the time, and I still believe the principal could have done a better job in quelling the anarchy that reigned in his school. However, as I look back at the situation, I realize just how much I needed a better sense of humor at the time just to survive.

Humor doesn’t solve problems, but like the shock absorbers on an automobile, they sure can make the ride a lot smoother. The next time you become badly frustrated, why not try to see if you can find any humor in the situation that is frustrating you? Think about it.

“Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best you are capable of becoming.”—John Wooden

Success is not to be measured by the position we have reached in life, or even by whether or not we have reached the goals that we have set for ourselves. Success comes from working hard to become the best that we are capable of becoming.

We all have a unique set of talents and opportunities in life, and our goal should be to make the most of what we have. If we are born with the wings of a wren, we cannot possibly fly like an eagle, no matter how hard we try. On the other hand, we can’t know whether we have the wings of a wren or those of an eagle unless we test our abilities to the limits. However, once we have determined our limits with a reasonable degree of certainty, how much sense does it make to continue to strive to exceed them?

We live in a very competitive society, and I think some parents put too much pressure on their children to reach goals that may be beyond their reach. In an effort to meet the expectations of parents and others, some individuals continue to over-pressure themselves throughout their entire lives. Life is a journey, but it is not necessarily a race. If we rush through life, always focusing on unreachable goals, we don’t have time to stop and smell the roses along life’s pathway, and the so-called “sweet smell of success”, if we do experience it, may not compensate for the aroma of all those roses that we never took the time to enjoy.

It is difficult to know just how much pressure we should put on ourselves and others to achieve. Some of us have a natural tendency toward laziness which we should not condone. I believe we have a responsibility to make the most of our God-given talents for the benefit of ourselves and society as a whole, and nobody is entitled to a free ride through life. However, having said that, I also believe that some people live miserable lives because they are always striving for goals beyond their reach.

Competition is crucial to the proper functioning of a free-enterprise economy as well as to the success of individuals. However, some people are better equipped to compete than others. Success is the result of a combination of hard work and the talents and opportunities that we have, and it cannot be assured by hard work alone. If we have the wings of an eagle we should certainly fly like an eagle. However, if we have only the wings of a wren, we should be content to just be the best little wren on earth. Think about it.

“I’ve learned that you shouldn’t go through life with a catcher’s mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw something back.”—Maya Angelou

Life is a two-way street, or at least it should be. There are times when we are so down that we need a lot of support from others just to keep on going. But, during times when life is going pretty smoothly for us, we are in a position to be givers and to do everything we can to help others who have faltered get back up and resume their journey.

We are all natural receivers, having been born as helpless infants and having had to rely on others for our very survival. However, our role as givers must be learned. As we gradually mature over the years, most of us learn to empathize with the suffering of others and feel a desire to do what we can in an effort to reduce that suffering. Unfortunately, however, not everyone chooses to be a giver.

It is natural to love ourselves and to look out for our best interests, and nobody can be faulted for doing just that, as long as they recognize the suffering of others and try to do what they can to relieve it. However, some people become so obsessed with themselves and their own problems that they fail to see and care about the problems of others. Such people are called narcissists. Narcissism is a personality disorder named for the mythological “Narcissus” who fell in love with his own reflection. Narcissism is characterized by extreme self-absorption, an exaggerated sense of self-importance, and a need for attention and admiration from others.

We must recognize that we are all traveling the same journey, and we should work together as a team to facilitate a successful trip for all. Problems are like a contagious disease, and nobody gets through life without experiencing them. When we have serious problems, ourselves, we often become so self-obsessed that we do not see the problems of others. That is understandable. However, during periods when we are fortunate enough to be free of imminent major problems, we should make an effort to help others who are not so lucky.

The road of life has many stumbling blocks and none of us can avoid all of them. However, none of us need to travel alone. As we make the journey, we should try to empathize with our fellow travelers and hope that they will empathize with us. When others stumble, we should extend them helping hands in an effort to assist them in getting up and resuming the journey. When we, ourselves, stumble, we should reach out for the helping hands of others. By doing so, we increase the chances of everyone making it to the finish line. Think about it.

“It must be borne in mind that the tragedy of life does not lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy of life lies in having no goal to reach”—Benjamin E. Mays

One of the most important sources of both happiness and accomplishment in life is having meaningful goals. They give us a reason to get out of bed each morning, a sense of direction, and a perception of our purpose in life. To be meaningful, goals must be challenging, but potentially within our reach. We must be able to feel that we can attain our goals if we work hard enough and long enough.

In order for them to serve as a compass with which to navigate through life, goals must be fairly specific. To want to be “as successful and productive in life as possible” is not a specific enough goal, because there is no standard with which we can measure our success or failure in reaching the goal. On the other hand, to set becoming president of the United States as our goal would, for most of us, be dooming ourselves to fail. It would be more reasonable to aspire to become a member of the state legislature or the U.S. Congress, at least as a first step.

We need to have both short-term and intermediate-term goals as well as long-term ones. A journey of a thousand miles is taken one mile at a time, and we must focus our attention on what lies immediately ahead of us while still keeping the ultimate, long-term goal in the back of our mind. Probably the most successful people are those who set attainable goals, work hard to reach them, and then, when a goal is reached, they set a new, higher goal.

Although persistence and perseverance are very important to achieving our goals, so is flexibility. We all make mistakes in judgment and learn from experience. We should not blindly continue to pursue a goal that new information tells us is not in our best interest or the best interest of others. It doesn’t make sense to keep on climbing the same ladder if we discover that the ladder is leaning against the wrong wall.

We must also be careful that our goals are not totally selfish. It’s alright to become rich and famous, if that is a by-product of our efforts to make this a better world. It is not alright, in my opinion, to aspire to goals that are based solely on our desire for fame and fortune. Service to others is the rent we pay for our space on this earth, and we want to make sure that we don’t get behind on our rent payments. As I have written in this column many times before, I believe that our primary purpose on earth is to help reduce the suffering of those around us and to make this a better world for both the present and future generations. Think about it.

“The word ‘happiness’ would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness.”—Carl Jung

Happiness, like so many things in life, must be viewed relative to its opposite, sadness. There is no such thing as pure and complete joy, just as it is not possible to experience pure and complete sorrow on a permanent basis. At any given point in time, we will all be experiencing a mix or blend of happiness and sadness. The mix of sunshine and darkness in our lives determines which pole we are closest to--happiness or sadness. It is only because we have experienced darkness that we find sunshine so wonderful.

Nobody can experience complete and perpetual happiness. Trouble makes its way into all our lives from time to time, and we can’t be completely happy during times of trouble. On the other hand, we should not allow ourselves to experience only sadness no matter how many problems we have. We all have reason to be thankful as long as we continue to breathe. The gift of life alone should prevent us from collapsing in total despair no matter how bad things get. As long as there is life, there is always hope.

The happiest people are probably those who realize that none of us can possibly experience pure and total happiness all the time. Into each and every life some rain will fall, and none of us will experience continuous sunshine. If we expect, and try to prepare for, the adversity that we will all experience at times in life, once we get through the rainy periods and sunshine once again warms our hearts and bodies, we can enjoy that sunshine to the fullest.

Life is difficult, and none of us get through it without at least a few bruises. Some adversity is unavoidable, but it can make us stronger and lead us to appreciate life even more when things are going well. We can all be somewhat happy some of the time, but none of us can be ecstatically happy all the time. We must accept this reality. But life can be absolutely wonderful for most of us much of the time if we will focus on the big picture. There are pluses and minuses in all stages of life but, on balance, overall life can be a huge plus.

We may have only limited control over what happens to us in life, but we have a great deal of control over how we react to life’s events. Our attitudes toward life probably play a bigger role in determining whether or not we will be happy than the actual circumstances of life. It is a matter of whether we view our glass as half full or half empty. Those of us who see our glass as half full can anticipate that the filling process will continue. Those who think their glass is half empty are likely to expect the emptying process to continue. Doesn’t it make a lot more sense to view our glass as in the process of being filled than in the process of being emptied? Think about it.

“The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.”—Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) grew up in poverty, and his father died when he was only eight years old, leaving his mother to raise five sons. Two of his brothers suffered from mental illness, and Emerson, himself, suffered from poor health, including a lung disease and periods of temporary blindness until he was 30. In addition, Emerson’s first wife died young, and his first son, Waldo, died while still a child.

Emerson certainly did not have an easy life, and some people growing up under such circumstances would have developed a bitter attitude toward the world. By contrast, Emerson developed a moral philosophy, based on optimism and individualism and became an American literary giant who had an important influence on the writings of Henry David Thoreau, Herman Melville, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Henry James, and Robert Frost.

Emerson advocated living life in such a way as to be “useful”, “honorable,” and “compassionate,” with the goal of making a difference in this world because you have lived and lived well. What a profoundly loving attitude this is, especially coming from a person who had more than his share of suffering. What a different world this would be if everybody sought to be useful, honorable, and compassionate.

There is such a strong need in the world today for the traits emphasized by Emerson. Examples of less than honorable behavior in both government and the private sector seem to be proliferating in today’s world. And the very concept of compassionate behavior is becoming less popular with some arguing that acts of compassion, especially those that are government sponsored, are more vice than virtue. Furthermore, our society has become more cutthroat with more emphasis placed on looking out for oneself than on looking out for others and society as a whole.

There seems to be a tendency for some to forget that we are all traveling on the same boat and we should all be working to keep that boat afloat both for the sake of others as well as for our own sake. I fear that our society has in recent years shown less and less concern for the disadvantaged members of our society. I don’t think that history supports the notion that what’s good for big business is also good for the average citizen. I believe that the philosophy under which our government has been operating in recent years is at odds with Emerson’s view on the purpose of life.

Although Emerson did not believe that the purpose of life was to be happy, people who focus their lives on being useful, honorable, and compassionate, will almost certainly end up being happy. In the words of Sir James Barrie, “Those who bring sunshine to the lives of others cannot keep it from themselves.” Think about it.