Some people give all they can to people, but giving isn't a universally positive thing to do. Still, there are a lot of different approaches to garnering a reputation as a "nice" person. Despite what may be a popular opinion, though, being a respectable person goes way beyond frequent acts of generosity. Truly nice people know to respect other people's boundaries, sensibilities, and self-worth, and that often means letting it be. That's right. Sometimes the nicest thing you can do is to stop drowning us in favors all the time. Maybe don't bring your green bean casserole over for Thanksgiving if I said I could make my own. Maybe don't tell me your tennis serving strategy if I already have my own. Maybe don't give me your advice on how to beat Rainbow Road if I want to figure it out myself! Sometimes, giving sucks, and being generous can be stupid. There, I said it. It's not that I'm a cross person at this party. I'm not. It's just that I have to compete with a host who's provided a veggie tray, a chocolate fountain, a fondue pot, two pizzas, and three different meat selections. And if I add any more to this spread, I'll just add to what's thrown away later on. Your contributions can often be unwelcome if I already have 100% of a perfectly good brain, thank you. (Help when it's asked for is a wonderful thing, but that's a topic for another blog post.)
That weird dinner-party metaphor was a way of saying that offering your goods or guidance to someone may very well seem excessive to someone who receives tons already. But giving to someone who has everything he already needs isn't only extraneous--it can be insulting, because it makes the assumption that the intended recipient was missing something. And some people have insecurities about their own capabilities to run their lives. Still others have an ego about their own levels of generosity--they feel better when they do things for others, as you should, but these people consider it a large proportion of their self-worth.
Thus, some people treat being nice as a competition, but competition involves measuring each other. The easiest way we like to measure people and their levels of charity is through money, but that's not fair, because people are thrown into grossly varied statuses of wealth. What can you afford to give when you work 14 hours a day and still can't afford your own air conditioner? And in any case, I don't think the amount of time, money, effort, or any substance is what determines if you're a nice person. People see generosity as a virtue, but I find that it's often met with scorn or disdain. Giving people stuff is great, but there's an assumption made by the giver that goes along with it.
I grew up under the impression that self-sufficiency was a requisite part of adulthood. So if I am to treat my peers like they're mature, I should treat them as if they're self-sufficient-- in other words, like they can handle their own shit. Though there is a disgusting minority of spoiled people who expect every minute task to be done for them, most people don't like to be treated like helpless babies. To me, allowing others to take matters into their own hands is a form of showing respect. To me, a person with humility is a person who treats other people like they have the power to make their own decisions and take care of themselves. Because no one likes to be told what to do all the time, and no one wants to listen to your bullshit pedagogy on how to live life and make proper choices (I say, as I type my bullshit pedagogy for all to read on the internet).
This works in theory and in practice. You can talk about what you theoretically know and believe; you can give people direction or unsolicited advice in a particular situation. And you offer your expertise because you care and because you want to help. But imagine how the intended recipient of such advice is going to feel. Say your friend is trying to hook up a new TV. If you immediately interject and try to offer your ideas on how to do it, it may sound like you're assuming that your friend has no idea what to do. This can come off as offensive, because, to your friend, it sounds like you have a low estimation of his/her intelligence. Now, if you see that your friend begins to struggle with the setup process, you can offer your ideas, but even then, your friend might have a delicate sense of pride in his or her ability to complete tasks independently. To varying degrees, people want to feel like they are capable--some want to feel like they can conquer absolutely anything. Those who want to get everything done on their own will feel robbed if you tell them how to do it; it's like spoiling the answer to a mystery novel or a puzzle they're trying to solve. Nobody likes spoilers.
In practice, you can do things for people. But sometimes, doing something for someone kind of sends the message that they couldn't have gotten it done themselves. I struggled with this a lot as a kid. My mom cares about me a lot, and always did (hi, Mom). She worked relentlessly to provide my brother and me with good food, a clean home, and activities to enjoy. She would point out chores that would need to be done, but she would take care of them before I thought to do so. Mostly, this was because days would go by before these chores reentered my mind, leading to an admittedly weak series of attempts to show my responsibility. But every time she did those chores that I decided I wanted, I felt something I didn't expect to feel; I felt like something was robbed of me (even though the problem was clearly my own laziness). I felt robbed of the opportunity to prove that I could do it.
So sometimes, when I think of doing lots of things for other people, I begin to feel concerned that I might rob those potential recipients of the opportunity to show their ability to do it themselves. Before you bark out orders to others on how to do things, consider that, maybe the importance of making sure others believe in their own capabilities outweighs the importance of making sure something is done the "right" way. When I have advice to give, I consider that other people might not want to hear it, because they might think I'm a know-it-all who believes I'm smarter than they are. Before I tell someone that I think they should change, I consider the possibility that this person can handle their fucking shit just as well as I can, maybe better--and even if they can't, I can help them believe in themselves by shutting my mouth and letting it be, anyway, because their faculties should be good enough if I'm hanging out with them. (If you need them to fundamentally change themselves on such a large scale that this
Being nice isn't taking the power and making the decisions for everyone, even if you know what you're doing, and even it's for their own good. Being nice is recognizing the power inside of (most) everyone to support themselves and make their own decisions in life, and offering your power to others when they need it. It's very important that we give help to others when it's requested, but shoving it down the throats of others when they don't want it can appear self-righteous, arrogant, and condescending.
This means that making yourself look like a nice person is a delicate balancing act. You need to be someone that others rely on, but you also need to respect others' abilities to handle their own problems independently if they so choose, except in certain dire cases. Even if you believe that you're trying to be charitable, your friend might be nothing more than disgusted by you when you snatch the video game controller out of his hand and beat the boss character for him. Maybe he wanted the satisfaction of conquering the task for himself! On the other hand, there are situations when you should step in and fight, but these are situations of dire need and personal safety. For example, I wouldn't care about my friend's judgment if we were at the beach and we were encountering a stinging jellyfish. My will to keep us both safe would override any will to respect my friend's insistence in doing things his own way, especially if my friend's modus operandae is to go up to a dangerous wild animal and poke it with a stick. But for the most part, a nice person will grant another person enough agency to trust that other person to get things done smoothly and confidently. Succinctly, you can pick your friends, and you can pick your nose; but you can't pick your friend's nose, unless there's something in his nose that might infect his brain and kill him. There's nothing nice, kind, or generous about taking over all the tasks and decision-making for another human being. There's nothing productive about doing all of another person's job so that the other person doesn't have to. There's nothing respectful about overriding another person's opinion with your own. Other people need to develop the skills, morals, and opinions necessary to carry on through life, and doing all the thought and activity for them prevents that development from occurring. Be available and willing to help, but don't just barge in as if you're the only one who knows what you're doing. Offer your services, act reliably, and be someone others can trust. But also respect others' abilities and desires to get things done their own way, and leave them their space if they want it.
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