The burden of being observant and kind

There is incredible burden that comes with being simultaneously observant and kind.

For starters, you're always noticing great ways to help others.
For another, you notice all the time how very often, you're the only one.

I'd argue that this combination can be exhausting. Ones who share such a burden think, "I'm always the only one noticing the old lady with the groceries and helping her cross the street," "How come I'm the only one who thinks to send the thank you note?" "Why am I the only one who understands how freaking loud that ridiculous Dyson air blower is in this bathroom and some people who might have sensitive ears like I don't know maybe this infant in the room might be bothered if I use it to dry my hands for an exceptionally long period of time?"

First of all, take a deep breath.  If this is you, you aren't the only one. I swear! There are tons of people like you! And there is hope!

I've deduced that there are four types of people in these possibility-of-helping-another-if-only-someone-was-paying-attention situations:

1. Kind, but not observant.
2. Kind and observant.
3. Unkind, but observant.
4. Unkind and unobservant. 

Situations:

Type 1: A pregnant lady gets onto a crowded subway. This person, seated, does not observe the pregnant lady's situation and therefore doesn't think to give this lady his or her seat. (Perhaps someone taps her on the shoulder and points out the pregnant lady. Then this kind person will give up his or her seat for the pregnant lady.) I believe there are lot of people who just don't pay attention, no matter how big their hearts are.

Type 2: A pregnant lady gets onto a crowded subway. This person, seated, notices the struggle and invites the pregnant lady to take his or her seat.

Type 3: A pregnant lady gets onto a crowded subway. This person, seated, notices, but does not want to give up the seat to anyone, as getting a seat is hard. Perhaps person type three will justify not giving up his or her seat because they had to stand the last time, or perhaps they let an old lady sit there once before. It's someone else's turn to give it up. Being unkind also doesn't mean you're conniving, it just means you don't want to go out of your way to do nice things for strangers.

Type 4: A pregnant lady gets onto a crowded subway. This person doesn't notice because they're too busy pickpocketing the old blind man in front of her.

I'd also like to point out the bystander effect. Perhaps we see someone in need of help and assume someone is coming for them. For example, a car blinking on the side of the highway. We assume, "they've got a tow coming" or "someone else will help." I'd argue that the widespread use of cell phones has helped millions of Americans escape the perils of a flat tire or a dead battery, but it has also created an alternative scapegoat. I don't think it's right to assume "someone is coming," however, I do see its justification.

It's fair to say that these four people "types" are fluid. For example, you may be an observant person, but if you're always looking at your phone or stop practicing your observation skills, you become less observant.

There is the possibility a person started out as kind and observant, and over time, became a little hardened by noticing general disregard all of the time. This is the burden I'm talking about. It is exhausting to constantly notice how shitty people treat each other. It can lead to some serious cynicism.

On the other hand, you may be very kind, and decide you want to help people more often, but you rarely know how. Being alert and on the lookout for situations where you can lend a hand helps. Keeping the thought on your mind gives you a greater awareness of those around you.

Being a thoughtful and observant person has its burden.

Yesterday as I was walking up to Starbucks, I noticed there were two entrances: One was a double door — the kind where you walk through a small room to get to the actual entrance — the other went straight into the Starbucks. I noticed the doors and I thought to myself, "hmm, it's furiously cold out. I should use the double door because then people won't get as bad of a chill."

I posted up in Starbucks and spent the next hour being blown in the face by one hundred people using the single door. Some even threw open the door and it didn't shut behind them.  I am one of four people who used the double door during the entire hour I was there. Even the Starbucks workers didn't think to put a sign up that says please use other door because it's cold.

It's not that people are bad, or trying to make everyone in the Starbucks cold, it's that they just aren't making this observation and applying it to possibilities for the future. Kind people walked through the single Starbucks door, obviously. Unless you're a supervillian, I really doubt any conniving ass holes walked through the door thinking "I'm going to make everybody freeze!" Unlike me — the freak of nature —  people just didn't think about it at all.

Nonetheless, If you're one of these people — the thoughtful, observant and kind — it is imperative that you not give up hope.  Surround yourself with the kind of people who take pleasure in the amazing people around them. Surround yourself with the kind of people who would give their seat to the pregnant lady on the subway. 

In the end, I would rather be the kind of person who thinks about doing nice things and does it, than someone who thinks about it and doesn't?

I'd rather pull up close in traffic so the person behind me isn't stuck in an intersection, even though nobody will ever know that's why I'm pulling up.

I'd rather see my neighbors garbage bin rolling down the hill and put it back in its place, even though they will never know it wasn't properly put back by the garbage collectors.

I'd rather notice the little boy with the armful of books who's about to walk into the library behind me and push the wheelchair button . (I also have an empathy theory that refers to how a kid in high school pushed my books out of my hands and pushed me on the floor  (I know wtf?!) but this blog is getting long.)

I believe that cynicism is a horrible and contagious disease of the heart. I don't think it does any good for anyone.

Subsequently, I believe doing nice things for people is good for your heart. It makes you feel good, even if nobody ever sees. Because you see.


I am not good at distracting myself on a train, so I will likely remain observant until my brain fails me from observing. I don't see avoiding observation skills to be a choice. If I'm going to be observant for the long haul, then I'm stuck deciding between two options: Am I going to be unkind or am I going to be kind? Am I going to open my heart to the places it needs to spread or am I going to avoid eye contact and cynically justify the shear numbers of how little helping one person could make on the world?

The answer is obvious.

College Principle #2: I did not let myself be a selfish student.

When I was little, I used to play a game we called The Never Ending Game. It sounds a lot more intense than it is. It was just a game of Make Believe where my friends and I always played the same characters and picked up where we left off playing the last time. We would play that we were in college or high school because we could never remember which one came first in an older person's life. (I blame Boy Meets World... sometimes they were in high school on reruns, sometimes they were in college and they always had the same principal/administrator/whoever Mr. Feeney was). We'd have lockers and always hung out at them. Because that's what you do at College High School. You hang out at the lockers. But like many young suburbanites, college was never not an option for a kid like me. Both my parents went. Their parents went. It's what you did.

College today is a lot different than when my parents went in 1904. It was cheaper, for one. It wasn't rare to NOT go to college, which meant that what you studied made you a smartiepants in that field, which meant you got a job more easily. I knew this going in. I realized I was going to be in a lot of debt, I was going to be one of millions with degrees in my field, and getting a job was going to be pretty hard. I went through a great program where the other students were super competitive and everything but humble about their internships and published works. 

It would not be fair to categorize college students into those who are selfish and those not. There are so many different kinds of people attending university every year, and thanks to hundreds of student organizations, they can be passionate about all different kinds of things. It's never quite accurate to classify people into two categories (cough, politics, cough), but I'm going to anyways.

 And to be fair, I think the act of going to college in itself, is partially selfish: I AM the one attending college in hopes to better MY life, to better MY opportunities, to become a more educated human being. I struggled with this for a while. 

My freshman and sophomore year, I spent a lot of time feeling bad. Feeling bad because there were people who didn't have the opportunities to attend college, and here I was having an amazing time, meeting amazing people, getting excited about discussions in my classes (I am that girl). I wanted to help others and college seemed like four years of putting that off. 

But the reason I did it was the idea that, without it, I could only do so much to help others. With an education, my opportunities would be greater to do something bigger for others down the line. And just because I wasn't starting a Non-profit-world-saving-hunger-fighting-disease-curing organization right after high school graduation didn't mean that I couldn't do things to help the people I was around. That's the beautifully brilliant thing about helping others: It can be done regardless of where you are or what you're doing or what your job description says. 

College was hard for me. When I was in high school, I never studied and I never did my homework, but I got good grades because I got grades on tests to make up for my laziness in other areas. Then I got to college and learned material more complex than memorizing a lecture on the first try and I actually had to study. But it quickly became apparent to me that I would be doing far more learning and living outside of the lecture hall. I met people from very different backgrounds than mine. And I fell in love with them. Being a good friend to them meant more to me than an A on a paper (although writing papers was my strong suit). I learned that Athens, Ohio was but an island in the middle of a rural area, struggling with things I hadn't experienced much as a kid. I became a mentor to high school students in the area through a thing called Young Life, which meant more to me than shmoozing a bunch of visiting news executives to hire me. I fell in love with exercise and adventure and learned that I could push myself to do things I'd never have even considered-- getting over my fear of heights rock climbing and backpacking on the Appalachian Trail. Inspiring others to get healthy and active meant more to me than setting the curve on an exam. 

[sidenote: Don't think what I'm saying is that working hard in classes doesn't matter because you're learning more important things elsewhere. It isn't right to put off your studies and cheat yourself out of a good education because you're busy having fun. My parents worked their asses off to get me through college and I respected them enough to maintain a substantial grade point average. But it wasn't the only thing that mattered.]

When I was in the classroom, I made a point to know the people in my class. They mattered to me. They weren't competition. I'd give people my notes when I noticed they had been absent, I made conversation with them about their lives that consisted beyond what they did that weekend. 

Outside the classroom, I made a point to care about people. Because I did care about people. It wasn't very hard. 

My priorities were different than other students in my program, but I also know that I experienced a sort of whimsy they will never know. There are a lot of ways to be a student and not be a selfish student. You can go out of your way to help people and get involved in organizations, or you can just choose to not be a douche bag and hold the door for somebody every now and then. I chose the former. 

Principles I lived by in college, Part One: I took extra classes that challenged me and had absolutely no importance towards my graduation.

Part of the fun in being a writer is that you don't have to settle on one specific topic-- you become a jane of many trades, a renaissance woman of sorts, not necessarily staying in any particular industry, but writing about people who have. I liked being in journalism school because I liked learning how to comb out my grammar and learning how to make All the President's Men relevant material in all of my classes. J-school classes were very great, but my favorite subjects I studied were the ones I took for nothing more than the hell of learning something new. (There's only a couple of us at every institution who actually appreciate learning, but here I am, a rare breed!)

It took some extra caffeine, but I let myself take classes in subjects irrelevant to my graduation.

At the bottom of my transcript there's a miscellaneous category that should be titled "GPA ruiners that your optimistic little heart still enjoyed despite all odds."

I took some great stuff: dance classes, SCUBA class, some other easy one-credits. I also took some really hard things: histories, exercise science and personal training classes, philosophy, myrmecology, siphonapterology.

Unfortunately, my expression of interest outside my major field was never rewarded the way it should have been. For example, one particular class I enrolled in last winter left me with scars on my transcript, GPA and my soul.

I'm going to refer to this class as Nazi Germany. This class featured a subject that I was quite interested in. We were assigned weekly papers on various readings and grad student graders were assigned to tell us our work sucked based on the alphabetical location of our last name. There were three graders: Cute little curly-blonde mother-figure-type donning a blue daisy sundress (floppy hat included), tall brunette with earthy shoes, tie-dye headband and colorfully-patched backpack, and Ben.

My grader was Ben.

The first paper I turned in, I got back with a big fat zero written on it.

I went to his office hours after class, introduced myself and attempted to understand my grade (or lack of). There must have been a mistake!

Ben, so thoughtful as he was, assured me that there had been no mistake for I had used too many sources. Granted, I had two sources, but I was only to use one.

I explained to him, "Mr. Ben, I am sorry, bear with me. I'm a journalism major taking this class out of sheer interest. Where I come from, MORE sources is a good thing. Next week's paper will be the less-credible standard of your liking. Promise."

The next week I improved.

D!

I went to Ben's office hours after class, introduced myself (again) and attempted to understand my grade. This time as I approached the closet they must have accidentally assigned him to instead of an office,  another girl was leaving the room crying. I assumed it was because Ben was just such a funny guy!

"Mr. Ben, I used fewer sources like you wanted. But I'm still confused why I'm only getting a D. There must have been a mistake again."

Ben, in the respectful way that he was, told me there had been no mistake. I had, in fact, received a D, this time, because I had used too many quotations from the cited reading.

Again, I told him I was a journalism major. We are taught that more quotations, more citing of credible source materials = good job. His response: "That would explain your ridiculously short paragraphs."

When I asked Mr. Ben what I could do to get an A, what made an A paper, he told me it depended on the paper, which I assume really just meant on his mood that day.

I told him he was a great guy. Then I silently farted in his closet and left him for dead.

I was determined to prove Ben wrong. I spent a lot of time on this Nazi class writing papers with as few quotes and sources as I could not find.

In the end, I pulled out a C-.

What's sad about my C- is that my intentions of the class were so good. I wanted to learn. In the end, I learned a new way to think, I learned how to use criticism to better my writing and I learned that some professors are going to treat you like a fart in a closet office.

I am so glad I took this Nazi class. I am so glad I took extra classes. I am hopeful that there is a professor out there who sees the value in teaching people outside of his or her field of study. Instead of the mentality that the 101 class is a bunch of stupid freshmen trying to fill their basic requirements, it is as an opportunity to get a bunch of stupid freshmen interested in the topic in which one's devoted to his or her life's work. My favorite class was a 100-level plant biology course. Not because I'm really interested in leaves. But because the professor made leaves really interesting.

If you have the extra time, take a class that isn't going to fit anywhere on your graduation requirements. Especially if you don't mind a little C- action every now and then. You'll learn a lot about something new. And maybe you'll meet somebody as outstanding as Mr. Ben. And if you're lucky he'll make you cry.

(Author's Note: You can take classes pass/fail. Do that. I wish I had known this sooner)