Seeking the Dignity

The world has reached a point where everyone is special. And truly, like snowflakes, we are all unique, with different points of view, talents, knowledge, and inner beauty. But like snowflakes, which largely look the same at a glance, and can overwhelm us at times—winter storms—we need to look very closely at them to see these qualities. In the case of snowflakes, under a microscope in a chilly laboratory is the best way to see these characteristics. What about the people we see daily, or work with, or perhaps encounter for the first time? Do we see their singular traits? Or do they get labeled and lumped into a category in our mind that is easier for us to navigate? Perhaps both, or neither.

In my work life, I deal with clients, trying to fulfill their needs and wants, and overall, I feel I do my job pretty well. It’s really disconcerting, however, getting criticism from the people I am trying to help, especially when I’ve made a great effort to do so, and then I get nothing but objection and dissatisfaction. In my mind, I’ve really tried to do all I can, and the rebuke comes as a slap, largely to my ego. We all go through life with expectations, not only of ourselves, but of others in our lives as well. From expecting certain ideals and behaviors from your spouse and children, to the assumption that your co-workers and clients will behave in a certain way, it is when our hopes are shattered by them that we defend ourselves. In many cases, particularly with our work, we keep our defense to ourselves, saying to ourselves they’re just ‘ungrateful,’ or ‘uneducated ‘about the subject at hand, and put them into that ‘problematic client’ folder, which is then filed in our memory for future use.

And we have just fallen into the trap of seeing only the dissatisfaction, anger, or disappointment they are feeling, and completely forgetting why we are even at work. This is a common thread in a soup kitchen, where the cooking or service is often criticized by the clients, who very much need this assistance. Many volunteers in this situation are not looking under that microscope for the dignity each of us has, but it is sometimes difficult to see immediately. If the expectation is gratitude, for time, for service, and so forth, we need to remember that we need to look at these others, many of whom we will never encounter again, as guests in this space and as guests in our lives, and treat them, criticism and all, as well as we would invited guests in our homes. When we are able to do this, the entire experience at work, while volunteering, while coaching, while teaching, becomes about using our knowledge to create a better situation for others. When we look at strangers and acquaintances as guests, the paradigm changes drastically, and allows us to summon and show our better instincts and actions, all in the name of hospitality and love of our fellow humans.