Friday, November 1, 2024
Nice and polite
It’s great to be nice, to be polite. Everyone prefers to interact with other people who are polite.
Yet when you hide or even deny the truth in the interest of politeness, that’s a problem. Politeness that obscures reality is downright deception.
Sometimes reality is not particularly nice or agreeable. And avoiding it out of a desire for politeness is going to allow that difficult reality to get worse.
When possible, be pleasant and polite, because it smoothes out interactions and adds genuine value to life. But when being polite prevents you from dealing with reality, choose to deal with reality.
When a few people are standing in a parking lot having a fruitful conversation, it’s rude to interrupt. But when they cannot see a speeding car headed their way, it’s foolish and irresponsible not to warn them.
Reality always wins. Be nice and polite as much as you can, while never failing to acknowledge and accommodate what is true and what is real.
— Ralph Marston
Work through complexity
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