What's the easiest way to become a nice person?
It's really quite simple, change your way of thinking:
Think of the world no longer as the world being everything on the outside and you being everything on the inside. When your hand stops, that doesn't mean you stop. Imagine the air you're walking in and the chair you're sitting on as a part of you. And not as a kind of 'thought experiment' but in a way that the chair being a part of you and you being a part of that chair actually makes sense. Because then again, why shouldn't it?
Isn't it my brain that forms all these images and smells and sounds I'm experiencing. I have no idea what that chair looks like in the real world, I only know what it looks like in my own head. My own world. So everything I see is essentially a part of me and I am a part of it.
If the whole concept of you not seeing the actual world but only the way your brain interpreters it is new to you, then this might be a bit much but maybe thinking of it like this will help: I once read an article about a certain type of bee that was almost going extinct because they couldn't distinguish a beer bottle from a female bee. Evolution had taught them to look for something brown and shiny to mate with. So for us a beer bottle looks nowhere near a female bee (it's way bigger, different shape, etc.) However because that bee doesn't see the actual bottle only the brown and shiny aspects of it, it is unable to see a difference. Now what does this tell us? Evolution is able to alter the way we see our world in order to enhance our survival skills. So we can distinguish a beer bottle from a bee but who knows what evolution has thaught us and what things our mind leaves out or adds in.
Coming back to the real question however. How does all this help me to become a nice person. Once you realise that everyone you interact with is a part of you and you are a part of everyone it gives a very different feel to it. It's no longer I and you. It's we, or better yet, it's us.
Try and remember that next time you see a shady character or heck even when you just go grocery shopping.
But for now,
Enjoy your day.
