[March 24th] Quality Exchanges: Do you bring your awareness to each exchange you have? How about those that you wish you weren’t having? Think: if you’re interrupted on your way to work by an activist, are you mindful in your exchange? Or do you blow them off?
Because I work at a major university, I am consistently being bombarded with information regarding a plethora of issues: politics, religion, special offers, etc. I have come to take the policy of never making eye contact. The second you make eye contact, you are doomed. They will offer you a flier, and you can either accept it or decline it. I always feel like a heal either way — did they really need to print that out? do they think I’m horrible for not taking the darn thing? Obviously, I’m being mindfully avoidant. However, I have been in those shoes before. For about two weeks, I was once a telemarketer trying to earn a living. To make a long story short, I learned a valuable lesson about the people that always seem to call during dinner. They aren’t doing it on purpose. They are trying to pay bills. They are trying to go to school. They are trying. They are human beings who don’t necessarily want to be telephone sales pitchers for the rest of their lives. They are human beings with dreams and goals that far surpass anything a career in telemarketing could ever afford them. They are just trying to live their lives, and they don’t mean to offend you. They are being paid by someone else who’s got the agenda to call you, and they are just doing their job so they don’t lose their job. You listen to your boss, too, don’t you? So, when they’re trying to build a repoire with you, remember that you have that same human commonality, and be a little kinder when you ask him or her to take you off the list. When you see that person handing out fliers, you don’t have to feel obligated to take it, but that doesn’t mean you should be rude. A simple “no, thank you” will do. When they are ranting about a charged topic right in your face, smile, wish them a good day, and remember they are still just a human being like you. We are all human, after all.
It isn’t easy. We had a door-to-door salesman the other night. I took one look at his name tag…Kirby…and said, “no thank you.” He tried to get me to let him clean something, but I wasn’t in the mood for a three hour demonstration. I kept saying ‘no thank you.’ He kept trying to get in. Finally, I just said, “Go that way.” And I pointed back down our sidewalk. He paused and looked at me. And I said, “Go on.” (I was using my little kid/pet voice. Kinder, gentler, but firm.)
I closed the door and turned around. The rest of the family burst out laughing.
I tried to be nice…