The ones who care!

I've been thinking about the people who have played a significant part in making me the person that I am today. I realized that some of these people were actually quite hard on me. For instance the head-master of my school was really hard on me. Quite frankly I hated it then. Fifteen years later, I've realized a very simple fact. He did so because he cared.

Clearly not all people who give me a hard time do so because they care. There are some assholes in the world who are giving me a hard time because they can do no better. It would be nice to be able to tell the two kinds of people apart.

The ones who care will probably not hesitate to let me know what they think when I have screwed things up. That should be one good rule of thumb to use to decide if one wants to be around such people. I can easily see why such people would help you grow and be a better person.

The wrong kind of people to surround yourselves with are the ones that will offer you a lot of sympathy when you fail or make mistakes. It should be obvious that such actions don't really help and have the effect of perpetuating our misery and limiting our ability to act on the circumstances that cause us to fail or make mistakes. I don't mean to say that such people are evil and/or should be avoided. They do so with the best of intentions. We tend to like people who sympathize with us and not like people who are pragmatic. That might not be in one's best interest.

The ones that care would also be of the kind who will be "truly" happy for you when you do succeed. One can usually detect "jealousy", "flattery" etc in the wrong kind.

In short, there is a case for one to be grateful to the people who give us a hard time because they care. Just something to think about.