YOU HAVE TO REINFORCE THE GOOD

in fact, you have to do this often. if you want to change someone’s behaviour, telling them what they’re doing wrong is less effective than reinforcing what they’re doing right.

if you’re constantly berating an individual for every mistake they make, this individual is going to become conditioned into thinking EVERYTHING they do is wrong. and they’ll then become scared to make a mistake, thus ensuing they make more mistakes.

humans need praise. if you see something that someone has done well, tell them. this is in fact much more important than notifying them of their mistakes. if you listen to the greatest coaches of all time and you dissect their communication, you’ll find that only 6.6% of their communication is criticism. it’s information, not criticism, that will get the most out of your employees and players.

humans aren’t stupid. they know when they’ve fucked up; they don’t need you to tell them. but often people struggle to see their strengths, to see their successes, and that? that’s what you need to tell them. be the kind of person that builds people up, not breaks them down.

LOVE

loving someone isn’t about saving them. it’s not about changing their circumstances. it’s not about changing who they are or how they feel. loving someone means meeting them where they are. it’s about creating a space in which they feel safe. seen. validated. it’s about helping them realise they are enough, as they are, where they are. to love is to accept. love isn’t about change. it’s about safety. it’s about presence. it’s about empathy and openness. love is creating a space for them to just be. in whatever colour or shade of grey they choose to be for however long they choose to be it.

COMPASSION

through most of my life, people have told me that i think too much. that i analyse too much. that i can be “too much”.

but here’s what i think. we all think, all the time, it’s just that i choose to concern myself with trying to understand things that have happened in not only my life, but in others’ lives too. because to understand, is to have compassion. it’s to be more open. loving. forgiving.

any time i’ve been “hurt” - i put my feelings aside and i try to consider why the other person might have done what they did. it’s easy to blame, to degrade, to state that this person is selfish, an asshole, a prick, but what’s not easy is to empathise. what’s not easy is to consider why they did or said what they did. this is not about excusing behaviour, it’s about explaining it.

sometimes though, you might not understand. you might not be able to explain their behaviour. how then, can you still choose to forgive? to let go? to love?

when i read the art of happiness by the dalai llama in 2012, it profoundly changed my heart. the fundamental lesson in the book is that we, as humans, all want the exact same thing. we all want happiness and we all want to avoid suffering. and if we could see each fellow human as just that, as individuals seeking happiness and avoiding suffering, we would feel connected in ways we never have before.

we are all human. we all want happiness. we all want to avoid suffering. but we also all want to love and be loved. and loving comes from understanding. it comes from forgiveness. it comes from compassion.