One Thing I Never Do Any More

• Video Transcript

  One thing I never do anymore is try to convince people that I'm right about something. In fact, I've spent the last few years not even telling people what I think about anything, really, or sharing anything about my life. Until now. I just reached a point where I thought it wasn't worth it and there wasn't any point to it.

  And of course, this didn't lead to any close relationships because you have to share part of yourself with people to make friends, and I just wasn't willing to do that.

  As I was looking at and listening to the people around me, I often heard them sharing their opinions and ideas about things, but not really listening to each other and then going away with exactly the same ideas that they had at the start.

  And I realized that that was okay. One person's ideas weren't necessarily better or worse than another person's, so it didn't really matter. One thing that did get under my skin, though, was when people argued strongly about something.

  Of course, everyone thinks that they are right, but these arguments were caused by one or usually both of the people trying to push their ideas onto the other person and convince them that they were right. And it's that part that I always had a problem with. Trying to force someone to think like me is fundamentally wrong, and it never works.

  And that's why I never shared any part of myself. I didn't care if the people around me knew what I thought, thought how I thought, or agreed with what I thought. And even when I didn't agree with what they were saying or how they thought, I would always just let it go. I don't feel any need to try to change their opinion or make them see "the truth" according to me.

  But I want to make a distinction here. There are things in the world that most people would agree are wrong, but what I'm talking about are the less serious issues. So with that in mind, it's okay to let things go; however, sometimes it is very difficult. Human nature kicks in, and I want to win. I want to be right. I want to show the other person how wrong they are and how they should think like me. Then we can both be right.

  But I found that this isn't really necessary at all. Doing that doesn't make MY life better. So if it's a work situation, then I'll let it go, I'll try it their way, even if I think it will fail. And once I've committed to it, I'll give it my all. I'll give it a chance to succeed because I'm the one who's chosen it.

  So for a long time, I haven't argued with anybody. I call it "winning without winning." I get to keep thinking I'm right, and I don't have to convince anybody else of it. But that doesn't mean that I don't tell people what I think about something. Sometimes, like in a work situation, it's necessary to have an opinion. But that's all it is. I'm not about to go to war over it.

  And that doesn't mean I don't care about the outcome or that I don't want the best result; it's just that it might be possible that I don't know what the best outcome is.