Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Easy Being Mean

Photobucket

Why is it so easy to be mean? It's far easier for me to wake up on the wrong side of the bed than the right side. Why is this?

My friend recently told me a story about her trip to Disney World. She took hundreds of pictures and made wonderful memories. One memory sticks out clearly in her mind. She explained how she waltzed up to the Wicked Queen from Snow White asking her to take a picture with her and the Queen flipped her cape up and refused, indicating quite clearly she was not interested in getting her picture taken.

You might be thinking, "How rude?" That wasn't my first reaction to my friend's story.

I said, "How fun!" There was something in me that initially thought it would be exciting to go around all day being rude and mean to others on a whim. Ah, to have control and power to be mean for the sake of meanness.

You can stop worrying about me. I didn't stay in that thought long. If you know me, you probably guessed that already and were surprised by my admitting my desire to be cruel. I'm confident it wouldn't be the heartless treatment of others I'd potentially enjoy, it would be the freedom to vent, to not have to make efforts when effort-making gets hard, when loving becomes hard...which is as you know pretty much at least once a day.

Once the idea of enjoying being mean wore off, I then began to contemplate why being mean is so easy...and how people influence others with their ill-tempered attitudes. I even thought about Heath Ledger. I remember how some interviewers claimed he became so engrossed in his role as The Joker, he slipped into a darkness. I couldn't help but wonder if that influenced in any way the way his life ended.

We have choices to make every day. Some are much more simplistic than others. What if we thought about how we treated others more? What if we made concerted efforts to be nice, even when we don't feel like it?

Or you could always be mean and see where that path takes you.

1 comment:

  1. Interesting post, Wendy! I love that Evil Queen story. I think it might be fun playing her for a day, just to see what it feels like not having to filter or think of other people--as long as everyone knew it was play acting!

    I love your quote on grace from Anne Lamott. So true!
    I'm glad to meet you Wendy!
    Becky

    ReplyDelete

Taking Time

college applications                 homecoming                            flag football                basketball             SATs   ...