It Works Both Ways

A friend of mine shared the following quote (attributed to Aagam Shah) with me today:

If you know me based on who I was a year ago, You don’t know me at all. My growth game is strong. Allow me to reintroduce myself.

This is a good affirmation to keep in mind, but I’d like to add the following:

It works both ways.

A former coworker once told me “we judge ourselves based on our intentions, but we judge other people based on their actions.”

In our own eyes, we’re complex evolving beings and everyone else should consider a multitude of factors when making judgments about us. When it’s our time to sit in the judgment seat, however, it’s easy to reduce others to whatever image that best fits our memory of them. This is why we want people to quickly forgive us when we cut them off on the highway, but we also want to see them eternally punished when they do the same to us. We’re just human beings doing our best. Others are evil androids sent by the devil himself to torment us.

It takes a little work to remember, but it’s well worth the effort: Just as we have the right to move on from our own past failings, so does the next person.

While you’re busy demanding respect for your own growth, don’t forget to extend that same consideration to others.