EPTRemember; these are rules of my life, not in general and only towards things that affect my life personally (and should you apply these rules to your own life, they should be only with whatever directly interacts with you, not in general).
Welcome.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KID8HAU2eBA&feature=related
Rule #2 is a tie for me. I know which one I usually go with, but the other one also has a more resounding worth that's stuck with me for the longest time. The current one I'm referring to is a lot younger, but a lot more core to my once pessimistic outlook on a life. I'm not some optimistic upbeat with the capacity to tolerate everything and everyone. I'm not a social creature, extending himself in every direction to make sure I touch you in some way or another (the forums might dictate otherwise by my activity, but I assure you, I like my sanity and sometimes my solidarity [especially when I'm writing these sort of dialogues]). Rule two stems from the question: "Why?" and has probably the biggest clashes of arguments and in the end: grudges. I have fumbled a few times with it and now I no longer talk to these people. Once I strike you off, I cut off all communication, I don't talk to you, read your e-mails nor do I even mention your name.
Of course, to get there, you'd have to be unbelievably malicious.
Rule 2: Is simple. You cannot hate anyone entirely and by that branches the idea that you can never know someone entirely. The issue with rule 2 is that you let people off too easily or justify their actions for them, which enables them. In most cases it works quite well for me. By agreeing that you can never hate someone's entirety, you account that they are a multifaceted human and thus you've only encountered a part of them you don't like or enjoy being around.
This is increasingly hard on the internet, especially with a lot of stupidity going around (no offense). But if you combine rule 2 with the question "Why?", you unknot the intentions, motivations and views of people into something that's sound, rational or properly emotionally-based. That's not to say that what they're doing is right nor even acceptable, but it helps you understand why they do what they do and thus perhaps help you in accepting a part of them while rejecting another. Acknowledging they're human is obvious, too obvious, but in the midst of our emotions, assessment of the person as we first get in contact with them, somehow we forget just how human they are and how human they can or would be under the right circumstances, maybe they're acting this way because they've forgotten how human you are? You ever see someone, just for a moment, you try to feel what they're feeling or you look at them as someone with a thought-process and their gestures, expressions and facial changes are all in their mind, morphing at incredible speeds. That person is thinking just like I am, etc. etc.? It's a scary feeling when I do it for too long.
I've been doing this since high-school and it's helped me a lot through the joking racism where an olive-skinned guy was the closest to an African-American they've seen in real life [(despite knowing I'm Egyptian, Ecuadorian, Italian, Swiss and American) just to clarify, they know I'm not black, but everyone else was pale-ass white. Whiter than snow!]. When I realize that they're not saying these words to hurt me, but because they don't know how to properly talk to me (given that my French was rather poor and I was a very comedic guy [since I couldn't express myself as clearly as I can in English] and because I would enable them by joking punch them and insult them back, it became an established way of "bonding". Granted they got more out of it than me, but it helped me be friends with many social circles I would typically never be a part of and it helped me get through three high-schools of varying private-levels (public school to prestigious private to sports-school semi-private schools).
I've hated the actions people have done or some of their personality that rubs me the wrong way, but I would realize that these people aren't who they are if they didn't think it worked in one way or another (and perhaps it does and creates a confident circle of friends that allows this sort of behavior or perhaps it doesn't, but it isn't my place to correct them with my own faults [Rule 3]). In this particular situation, this person is acting this way, but how would he be in another situation. Would I respect him or her if she acted differently in a similarly social occasion amongst different people, scenario, environment? If I hate them, I dismiss them and I miss out on an opportunity to meet them, their associates or their way of life and I don't get to express a diverse way of seeing the world, seeing my peers or learning something more from someone I would typically dismiss. Why waste a chance at something more? If the person turns out to be even more with what you aren't pleased with? Walking back is quicker than moving forward with the person; just turn around and walk back.
You hurt your chances by hurting others.
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