Take care of funny human behaviour causing unhappiness!

In the happiness discussions, I often hear the followings:

I am being mistreated by my friend.
My family is not good to me.
My senior doesn’t respect me.
My husband doesn’t care for me.
My neighbour doesn't behave nicely to me.
My children are not good to me.
My grandchildren don’t care for me.
My parents did not give me much attention.
My siblings are not nice to me.
My wife cheated on me.
My friends backstabbed me.
….and so on. And that makes me unhappy.

This is both sad and funny.

Sad because relationships should not be like this. Relationships are so much fun and fulfilling! Relationships are the backbone of living a happy life.

And funny because, when we discuss more, and discuss with honesty, many of the people who are complaining about someone else not being nice or not treating them well, or not showing respect, or not being nice, or not being good, or not paying attention, are also doing the same to others!

The funny part of human behaviour is we want others to be nice to us, care for us, give us attention, give us respect, and so on, but we don’t reflect on our own behaviour! Many times, when we reflect and be honest with ourselves, we can find we make some of these mistakes, maybe unconsciously!

To tackle this issue, first, lets take a pause in our busy lives. Reflect on ourselves. Reflect on our behaviour with others. Reflect on how much time, energy and attention we are investing in our relationships. While doing so, be honest.

Second, once we have done that, let’s take the learnings and forget the anger or grudges or guilt.

Third, start working on our behaviour and start giving time, energy and attention to our relationships with ourselves and others.

By taking care of the funny human behaviour, we can have better relationships with ourselves and others and can have a happier life.

Let’s start the process from today, from now on.

(This article is written by Dr Rajesh K Pillania, Professor, Management Development Institute, Gurgaon. This is an opinionated article; EPN has nothing to do with this editorial.)