What Gandhi and Michael Jackson Have in Common

Good Advice

My favorite quote is one from Gandhi. "Be the change you wish to see in the world." It's a great quote for two reasons. First, it empowers us. It tells us that if we see something that needs to be done, we should do it. And second, it reminds us that we can't wait for someone else to do it because we can't control another person's actions. 

Michael Jackson's advice to "start with the man in the mirror" is really saying the same thing. Don't wait for someone else to do the work that needs to be done. Do it. And don't wait for the world to be perfect because it never will be. Go ahead and start working on yourself. Strive to become the person you wish everyone else would be. 

Living our Ideals

We all have ideals, right? We all have values. We all have an idea of how we think everyone else should live. But, the thing is, we can't force other people to live by our values because their values may be different from ours. 

I'm not trying to say truth is relative. I'm saying no one is perfect, and we can't make them perfect. If we try, we'll only make them resent us. We'll come off as being self-righteous, and no one likes that. 

A Practical Example

I'm going to use environmentalism as an example, mainly because it is a scientific one. It is easy to see which activities are beneficial to the environment and which are not because the scientific evidence generally speaks for itself. I say "generally" because there is a fair degree of interpretation involved in empirical analysis. Think of a murder trial. The evidence is there for all to see, but what the evidence says depends on which spin the attorney puts on it. Science works the same way.

So when I say a certain practice is beneficial, what I'm saying is that the evidence seems to point that way.

Perhaps I should have been a lawyer. I seem to be good at this disclaimer business.

But I'm rambling. Back to the question at hand. How do we live in a way that is not detrimental to the environment?

There is pretty convincing evidence showing that a vegan lifestyle is the best choice for healing an ailing world. Notice I said "pretty convincing." Since we've never lived in a world where everyone was vegan, we can't know what kind of effect it would really have. And I'm not vegan, so I'm certainly not promoting that lifestyle above all others.

My inner lawyer is coming out again. Sorry.

Let's look at three people with three different lifestyles.

Bob is a vegan. He chooses to live this way for multiple reasons. First, he has a love of animals and can't imagine consuming animal flesh. Second, he feels that this diet is the best thing he can do for his body. But his primary motivation is his disdain for the modern meat industry and the damage he feels it is doing to the world. Because of all of these ideals, he can't bring himself to put even one bite of animal protein into his mouth.

Teresa is not vegan, but she, like Bob, is wary of the meat industry. While she does eat meat, she tries to buy from local farms that raise free-range chickens and grass-fed cows. Like Bob, she feels that these choices are the most humane for the animal, the best for her own body, and the most beneficial to the world as a whole.

Shirley would like to be more deliberate about her diet, but she's a young mother trying to feed herself, her husband, and their three kids on a tight budget. She won't go vegan because she knows how hard it is to get her kids to eat vegetables and fears that removing meat from their diet will deprive them of the few nutrients they're actually willing to eat. And she can't do the locavore thing because it's just too expensive. So she buys the cheap cuts of meat from the supermarket. She occasionally serves up a plate of frozen chicken nuggets. Being a mom is tough, but she does what she can.

Avoiding Judgement 

We can all look at Bob's lifestyle and applaud him for his efforts to live according to his values. But what if he tries to force his values on others? What if he sees Shirley bending over the meat counter at the grocery store and takes that opportunity to inform her of the horrible consequences of her diet? Now Bob has gone from being a respectable man, who knows his own heart and lives his life accordingly, to being a bully. And no one likes a bully. Even if that bully has a good message. Even if, in his mind, he's only trying to help. Do you know what happens when you try to bully people into doing what you think is right? You actually have the exact opposite effect. You make them want to dig in their heels and refuse to budge from their position. 

Basically, if you think being vegan is the best possible thing to be, then be vegan. Because you can control your own choices. You can control your own diet. But don't expect everyone else to agree with you because they won't.

The same principle can be applied to nearly every decision we make in life. How much television we allow our children to watch. How much time we spend in the gym. Whether we go to church or not. Whether we drink alcohol. What kind of car we drive. 

In the end, all we can do is live our own lives according to what we feel is right. Even if we firmly believe that if everyone agreed with us the world would be a better place, still we cannot ask others to share our values. Doing so will only push them further in the other direction. 

Okay, so I got a little philosophical this week. Hope it didn't get too heavy for anyone. On a lighter note, I'm taking part in a group promotion right now. Amelia's Children and eight other mystery/thriller eBooks are available for only 99 cents. Check them out at this website: 99 Cent Mystery, Suspense, and Thrillers. All of the books are available from Amazon. Amelia's Children is available from all major online retailers.