It’s mid-December, which means that no matter what religion you are, it’s highly likely you have some sort of holiday coming up in the next few weeks. With some quick Googling, it can be deduced that about 95% of America celebrates something in December, and celebrations can make stress levels insanely high.
Even though it might be easier to try to finish what you need to finish and move on with life, it might be a good idea to try being nice to others this holiday season, something that surprisingly few people actually do.
The majority of religious groups (and by “majority”, I mean that I think it’s all of them, but I may be missing something. I’m not perfect.) have some sort of commandment, slogan, rule, whatever you want to call it, that can pretty much be summed down to “Be nice to people.” So, why is it that many people seem to forget that during such an important time of the year?
Imagine for a second that you are out late, trying to get last minute presents for your family, and you accidentally walk into another person. The person might glare at you, curse you out, or just ignore you, but will most likely just end up walking away without much in the way of understanding. You continue on with your shopping and because that’s such a typical occurrence, it is forgotten by the time you get home.
However, what if the person didn’t act like that? If someone you walked into actually smiled in understanding, wished you a good night and left without making you feel awful, that might stick in your head.
Another example, not related to the holidays. One of my high school English teachers gave me a book on the last day of school. We had used an excerpt from it for a worksheet earlier in the year, and I wrote a note on the bottom of the paper. I wanted to know what the book was called so I could try to find the rest, and instead of telling me, she just gave it to me. It was very sweet, and to this day, she is still my favorite teacher from K-12.
I had quite a few other teachers, some who I know didn’t like me, and none of them made an impression the way she did. I think this can be used to show that in the long run, people who go out of their way to be kind to you will affect you more than those who choose to be rude.
Since everyone is stressed this time of year, we really need to just be nice. You don’t have to be excited about the crowds at the mall, or the line to let your child see Santa, and you seriously don’t have to be happy that the one toy your daughter wants is out of stock everywhere. However, I ask that you try to be understanding. It’s nobody’s fault that these problems exist. Don’t blame people you don’t know.
