How I’m Training Myself to See the Humanity in All People

Something I spent much of my life believing was that people are only one thing.

They are their worst action, they are their best action, they are something in between. They are one person they associated with, or they are one person they didn’t work with. In school, we’re oftentimes taught to think about things in terms of absolutes, and while it is easy to understand as a child, ultimately ingrains in all of us this sort of sentiment that denies the very innate part of being human: that we are all people with nuance. We should look towards understanding people from many perspectives to gain a further, more complete picture.

Like most kids, I usually had the highest of opinions of people when I grew up. Whenever I saw someone not live up to that high standard, I was heartbroken. It didn’t matter whether it was a family member or a role model, it would hit me like a truck every time this happened. I’d lose any sort of trust with someone or isolate myself from interacting. This sort of trend resulted in me keeping my distance as I got into middle and high school. I didn’t want to ever have strong praise or a stronger connection with someone (whether I knew them personally or not) because I never wanted to be let down. I never wanted that feeling of severe disappointment…