The Motivation of Being Nice: Some People Are More Nice Than Others.
If we look at any good relationship, whether it is a business transaction or friendship, it will probably have some emotional investment on the part of the other person.
If you notice that a person is always apologizing to you for things that he said that offended you, then you may have a low self-esteem and you have been targeted by that jerk in your life.
The Motivation of Being Nice: Some People Are More Nice Than Others. It may surprise you to learn that this motivation actually applies to all humans. Some people are nicer than others and the secret is to learn what drives those people to be nice.
If we look at any good relationship, whether it is a business transaction or friendship, it will probably have some emotional investment on the part of the other person. Those emotions may be helpful to the persons involved or they may be unhealthy. The true emotional dynamics that cause the relationships to work will be different from person to person and even from time to time.
I have seen people with amazing attitude change into horrible jerks simply because the nice guy was no longer nice. But the real truth is that each relationship will likely have its ups and downs and those ups and downs will come from the motivations of the people involved.
You should know that all nice guys are not jerks. You can’t expect to find a really nice guy who will also be a jerk. The one thing that is needed to help you determine whether a person is nice or not is whether they have the right motives. That may seem like a contradiction in terms but it is true.
Jerks always lack the right motives and in most cases their motives are poor. The nice guy, however, has the correct motives and they reflect his behavior. That behavior will be consistent with the kind of motive that person has.
If you notice that a person is always apologizing to you for things that he said that offended you, then you may have a low self-esteem and you have been targeted by that jerk in your life. It is very common to be sorry when something makes you upset or when you are criticized. We all apologize. What you may be doing now is being polite apology to a jerk instead of building your self-esteem up. By building your self-esteem you will be able to set some boundaries and your jerk will know he can get away with that behavior.
A high self-esteem will keep you from being pushed around by people who have little self-esteem. Sometimes you need to walk away from someone who is very attractive or a really cool person with a great personality, but their actions will not reflect the kind of person that you are.
If you can demonstrate an appropriate respect for your values and your ability to have some communication boundaries with people, then you will see yourself as being a good ally. In fact, that is why nice people are nicer and mean people are mean.
If a person has a weakness or a flaw that hurts them, then they should be nice to show that they care. In order to really build the self-esteem and the respect that you need to become someone that you really want to be, you need to make sure that you are nice to yourself.
I believe that kindness can come from anybody and I don’t think that being nice is a very valuable motivation. The reason I say that is that being nice doesn’t do anything for you. You want to be nice because you like yourself and the nice people like themselves too.
The only way to really build the confidence and the self-esteem that you need to become a better person is to let the jerk go. Be nice.
