Showing posts with label loyalty. Show all posts
Showing posts with label loyalty. Show all posts

Saturday, October 9, 2021

Why Doing Right By Others Matters So Much.


"It's a dog eat dog world and that ain't no lie!" That's a line from the song Cloud Nine by the legendary soul group, The Temptations. The song Cloud Nine came out way back in 1968, which was way before my time. However, this particular lyric from the song holds a lot of weight; even today. Most of us would probably agree that we truly live in a world where it's hard to put a lot of trust into others. It's not because we don't wanna trust other people. I personally believe that it is in our innate nature to see the good in other people. However, so many people have been used and screwed over by others to the point where trust has become rare and invalid with a lot of people. I believe it's one thing to be with way with complete strangers. It does take a level of comfort and familiarity to develop trust for someone that you may not know well. However, it's another thing when we have this cloud of suspicion around people that you shouldn't have to. Yes, I am talking about friends and family here; the very people that you should always be able to feel comfortable around. My logic behind this does not apply to every single family and friend dynamic that exists. That being said though, we cannot just ignore the fact that sometimes the people that we should be doing right by are the ones that we use and abuse the most. I personally do not agree with this, and I think it is indicative of how much our society has decayed over time. It's an age old adage that you should always do right by others that do right by you, but those are principles that our society has seemingly forgotten about. 

 

Hey, what's good folks! This is Brad H. here to once again bring you all another installment of 'Brad H.'s Perspective'! I am here to hopefully bring a bit of inspiration that can hopefully serve us all on our life's journey. I hope you all have been doing good since the last topic. So for my soapbox this week, I'm going to give my perspective on the MLB Playoffs that started this week. I am currently watching game 2 of the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Fransisco Giants. We had some pretty exciting wild card games earlier this week with the Dodgers and Boston Red Sox winning their games. I'm just going to really quick give my thoughts on who I believe will be winning these first round series. Though the Giants are currently up 1-0 on the Dodgers, it looks like the Dodgers will have it even after tonight. I believe the Dodgers will win this series. The Milwaukee Brewers are currently up 1-0 on Atlanta Braves after their victory today. The Braves are good, but with the injuries they have I believe the Brewers will win this series. The Red Sox and Tampa Bay Rays are currently even at 1-1. This is a tough one, but I think the Rays win. Finally we have my Houston Astros taking on the Chicago White Sox. The Stros are up 2-0, and I believe that they will sweep this series. At least that is the hope anyway. The coming weeks of the MLB Playoffs should be pretty exciting, and I'm looking forward to how it plays out. Now that I've gotten on my soapbox for a bit, lets go ahead and talk about why it is so important to do right by others. 


Before we get into why doing right by other people matters so much, I have to begin by giving a disclaimer. Though it may seem as if I am implying that everyone in the world has the qualities of the people that we're going to be talking about in this post, this is not the case at all. I am coming from a generalized standpoint, and I am also using experiences in my own life as a backdrop for this topic. The goal for this week's topic is to hopefully inspire those that may not always be doing right by others to work towards changing their ways. I talked earlier about this world being a dog eat dog world. In a sense it is understandable to see how this world has is exactly this. The world has always been competitive since the beginning of time, but I personally believe that competition among people has grown exponentially over time. I believe that competition can be a good thing when viewed in the right context. However, as with anything else that can be overdone, too much competition can turn people into savages. Hence is why we get the phrase dog eat dog being thrown out there throughout the course of time. So the point here is that we have to acknowledge that a dog eat dog world is just something that we have to accept. However, with that being said, at what costs does living in a dog eat dog world come at? This is what I am exploring when it comes to doing right by other people. 


So right now I'm going to probably go on what will seem like a bit of a rant. Ranting is not what I'm aiming to do here, but in order for me to get the point that I'm trying to make across to the readers, I feel that I have to point out a couple of things here. The truth is that some of us right now have good people in our lives that we mistreat. We take their kind hearts for granted and always assume that they're going to always be there for us. There may people that care for us that we look straight into their eyes and lie to them. Some of us have people that will give us their very last to help us through a tough situation, but when they need us we're ignoring them. Things like what I have brought up here is what people do when they have a dog eat dog mentality, and the sad part is that most of the times the people that do these very things play the victim role when the tables flip on them. Now I stated earlier that competition is a good thing, but it should never come at the expense of someone you supposedly care for. Good people in general are hard to find nowadays, and if you're blessed enough to have a good person in your life, you should always do your best to reciprocate goodness back to them. It's really not that hard to do, but so many people over complicate things to the point where they cannot be fixed. I believe that this is where the potentially hazard lies when it comes to why doing right by others matters so much.  

 

Now I went on in the previous paragraph about how many of us take people that we should be doing right by for granted. What happens when a person that has been long-suffering with you decides that they are tired of dealing with the way you treat them? Yes, you are correct if you said that they will no longer want to be a part of your life. From my perspective, this is why doing right by others matter so much. See I believe that when you treat people right that you rarely have to worry too much about them. Anyone that has ever owned a dog before will know that if you treat the dog right it will return its loyalty to you. I believe that people in general are the same for the most part in the sense that if you do right by a person, you never have to wonder where their loyalty lies. However, being that we're in such a decayed and dog eat dog world, finding true loyalty among people has become increasingly rare. The main point with this week's topic is for us to realize that the people you don't do right by may someday distance themselves from you because of your actions. If you are someone that is taking advantage of someone that you claim you care about, do the right thing starting right now and appreciate them. Don't wait until it is too late to the point where the relationship can't be mended. Finally, just because we're in the kind of world that we're in doesn't mean we have to be savages like so many other people. You always have a choice to do the right thing, and to do right by those that do right by you. 


That's what I got for you all this go round, so I'm going to go ahead and sign off for now. I thank you all once again for joining me for another installment of 'Brad H.'s Perspective'! I hope that I was able to present this topic in a way that had meaning and understanding for you all. As always, if any of you have any feedback to contribute, please do so in the comment box. You can also hit me on Twitter if you'd like @BradrickH. I hope you all have a great rest of the weekend. A lot is happening all across the world so be sure to keep those heads on a swivel. See you all on the next topic! Peace and blessings to you all!


©2021 Bradrick H. All Rights Reserved.

Thursday, October 16, 2014

Nobody Should Be Above Criticism.

In life, there is always going to be a person or group of people that we pledge our loyalties to. Often times, loyalty is normally attributed to our family members, however, there are also friends and people that we meet throughout our lives that we deem worthy of being loyal to. In essence, the true meaning of loyalty can be viewed as something universal; not only limited to family and friends, but it can also be given to nearly anything regardless if it's a brand, entertainer, or city. The concept of having loyalty or loyal individuals in our lives is a crucial aspect of life, as we always desire to have those people that will be in your corner no matter what life brings. With all of that said, I think there are too many of us allowing people to get away with certain behaviors that could be considered as wrong, but because of our loyalty to these people, we tend let them off the hook so to speak. This is another edition of 'Brad H.'s Perspective'.

What's good people? Hope all is well with everyone. It's me Bradrick coming back at you again after another long hiatus. I know my being on these hiatuses seems to becoming a common theme, and I apologize for that. It's just that sometimes in life, there are other priorities that must be taken care of ahead of others. At any rate, I'm back again with another topic that has been on my mind as of late. For some of you, this particular topic may not make a lot of sense, or you may view my thoughts on it as being wrong. There are some people that believe there's no in between when it comes to being loyal to something or someone, and if that's your belief, that's totally fine with me. While I believe that there is some truth to that, I also believe that no one single person should be above criticism, or being called out for certain things they do.

Picture this scenario; you've been friends with someone for many years, and you both are extremely loyal to one another. Whenever you need each other to be there, it's not even a question. You both have a tight-knit, close relationship with each other. Now lets say that your friend does or says something that you disagree with. I'm not going to go in-depth and come up with something that the person could have done, but lets just say it's something bad and deep down you disagree with what they done. Maybe something this friend said doesn't necessarily align with your personal beliefs. As a friend you want to have their back and give them support, but on the other hand, you want them to know how disappointed you are with them. What's worse is that you know if you reveal to them how you really feel about their actions, you know that they'll lash out at you and say that you're not being a real friend to them. Get where I'm going with this?

This is a dilemma that we all find ourselves in from time to time. The situation of having the choice to do what we feel is right in our eyes vs. supporting something or someone that we feel loyal to. Well from my perspective, and this is a perspective that I've developed in the last few years or so, nobody; regardless of who it is, should be above criticism. See in most people's eyes, being loyal to someone means supporting them no matter what they do, even if it's something that we don't agree with. No matter how close you are to someone, disagreements are bound to happen eventually. I believe it's very important to be loyal to those we feel are worthy of having our loyalty, however, being a truly loyal person also means having the ability to call out those we care about on the things we feel they're doing wrong, even if they don't necessarily like it. We've gotten to a point where we allow others to use the word "loyalty" as a handicap to make people feel bad for saying what they truly feel.

This is a trend that we're seeing a lot of in politics, sports, and many other areas of life. Now in my opinion, lets use a good example of what loyalty truly means. One situation that I can think of is while we were growing up as children, didn't our parents get on us whenever we done something wrong? It didn't mean that they didn't love us or care, it just meant that they were trying to teach us right from wrong. Even as adults, the learning process will always continue, and sometimes it takes a close friend or relative's perspective to call us out on certain things. It doesn't always mean that they're not a real friend, nor that they're not being loyal to us. Criticism can sting sometimes, and I'm in no way saying that anyone should be constantly criticized. All I'm saying is that regardless of how close we are to someone, nobody should be above criticism if it's necessary. Loyalty has nothing to do with, nor should it be limited to not criticizing the actions of someone if they're wrong. You can be loyal to anything, but that doesn't mean you have to agree or co-sign all the time. Again, regardless of who it is, in the end, right is right and wrong is wrong.

Alright, I'm going to go ahead and sign off for this edition of 'Brad H.'s Perspective'. Like always, I appreciate those of you who stop by and read these posts. As with all of my posts, everything that I mentioned applies only to myself and how I strive to live. I'm in no way saying that my perspective or way of thinking is how anyone else should think. If any meaning and understanding is gained from this, that's always an added bonus. Well I hope everyone has a great rest of the week, and I'll see you in the next post. Peace!