There’s No Repairing Some Folks’ Misery

The greatest joy of being a person is the unselfish capacity to interact with others. Still, there are some who seem to want no part of it.

A friend’s newsletter got me to thinking. He told a brief story of a man who complained to his doctor that he was so unhappy. (Interesting, huh, how doctors are supposed to have a pill that will fix ANYTHING.)

“Go out and make three new friends, then come back and tell me about it” the doctor advised. The man left the doctor’s office not too pleased with the “prescription.”

He was back in a couple of weeks.

“Did you go out and make three new friends,” the doctor asked?

“I did,” the man replied. “But it didn’t help. Now I’m STUCK with these three new friends!”

It’s interesting, isn’t it, how folks who are depressed and down often get that way when they shut themselves off from others. They “sour” and soak in self-pity until they are all but paralyzed. At that point, any action at all is a major effort.  

You can see it in children as well as adults. They might not be content in their misery, but they are COMFORTABLE with it. 

It’s not the making of friends that brings the most joy in one’s life. It’s the BEING a friend, the magical capacity to make another person (or even an animal), not myself, the object of my kindness and effort. It’s the stepping down from center stage and putting someone else up there for awhile. And it’s getting BEHIND the spotlight instead of in front of it.

Kids today are no better or worse than they were a century ago. They are simply the results of the cultures that rear them. The day they truly learn the world doesn’t revolve around them is the day the best of life gets going.

James Sutton, Psychologist   www.docspeak.com