You don’t always need to be nice

I wrote a blog the other day where I said one good piece of advice I’d been given was You don’t always have to be kind / helpful / nice.

This got a few comments and messages saying always be kind and I think maybe I didn’t explain this very well!

Not being explicitly or overly kind or helpful towards someone doesn’t mean you be unkind or mean. There are behaviours in between, it’s not an either / or thing.

Being kind or helpful to someone doesn’t have to mean someone reciprocates or even acknowledges it, and I agree its nice to be that kind of person, I’ve always tried to be. But. It can mean that you can be taken advantage of because not everyone will think in the same way as you. With some situations and people it becomes too much if you give and the other person doesn’t acknowledge, care or their actions have a negative impact on you. You could of course carry on being overly kind and nice and helpful and ‘the bigger person’ but often that’s at the detriment to your own well-being. So at points like that it is perfectly ok to not be that nice kind helpful person anymore and step back.

That is not being unkind it’s just not giving your energy to people who don’t appreciate it. It’s neutral as opposed to the being the polar opposite and I think that realising that is a good lesson which was why it was a good piece of advice. Life doesn’t have to be lived in extremes where everything is either totally one thing or another which is a concept the world isn’t great at these days. Whilst we can all try not to be arseholes in day to day life that isn’t to say you need to be a door mat.