Friday, January 30, 2009

Things you learn

I was in a training class all week called 7 Habits for Highly Effective People. Well it was very interesting. We had a lof of group activities and I really learned a lot about the other people in my group.

I will preface this by saying that I grew up in a very sheltered home. Not sheltered like my parents tried really hard to keep the good in and the bad out, but sheltered like I lived in a small town where there was not a lot of diversity. My parents also taught me to keep things to myself and not ask probing questions. This was not a lesson that was taught in a sit-down session or anything like that, but just a learned lesson by watching them. They never talked politics like who they voted for, pay grades, religion (other than that we were Catholic) but never that everything we did was right, but also that other people weren't wrong.

So, we were sitting in class and we were supposed to give examples so the other people in the group could talk about empathic listening. Where you seek to understand before you talk to be understood. Anyways...one of the groups members situation was that people would ask her about her religion and then when she told them what she believed in (she didn't tell us) they would tell her she was wrong. I could not believe that people would be so rude. Then of course the next person went and she talked about how she would like to talk to her co-worker about religion. Now if this wasn't awkward enough, she went on to say that she saw how her co-worker was living and was afraid that if she didn't tell her about what she believed then she feared for her co-worker when she died. So there was a clash just between the two members in my group and I can only imagine what would happen if this 60+ year old woman tried to tell her coworker about what she believed would happen to her if she didn't listen to what she said.

So yeah, I am glad for my keep it to myself attitude then these people! My situation was that I was annoyed at mi esposa because of something silly, not anything so serious like religion!!!!

1 comment:

Super Mom said...

There are some things that I don't openly talk about, like religion, to avoid akward situations, but I WILL talk about it if someone else brings it up.

And I don't think that anyone has the right to tell the other person they are wrong in what they believe. Just because someone's views are not the same as yours, doesn't mean they are wrong - they just have a different belief than you.

The Zealots need to apply their own principles, like "Treat others how you would want to be treated." They wouldn't want someone telling them THEY were wrong and gonna die if they didn't change their ways...

I'm just saying...