A Walk in Someone else's shoes

     I have often wondered what life would be like from someone else's perspective.  There are so many different personalities that I'm sure life would be drastically different from what we know. Although it's not perfect we are comfortable with our own personality and feel justified in the decisions we make.  Any changes to your life can be difficult, so drastic changes to your comfortable current lifestyle would be enlightening maybe even scary.

     Along with personalities, there's upbringing, education, experience, social status, religious background, abilities, looks, etc. All these things affect what we think about ourselves and how we react to others.  So if our world was turned upside down and we no longer lived the life we know but were thrown into a new life we never experienced how would we react?  It's likely this would be a shocking experience that may change our outlook on life.  Suppose your new life took you from a wealthy lifestyle in a safe environment to a indigent lifestyle in a war torn country.  Would your understanding, compassion and generosity change?

     We are all products of our environment; different life experiences sculpt your beliefs & personality in every way.  I know we all have free will to make choices in life but this free will can be tainted by our upbringing and our expectations.

     We live in a judgmental society; people are always judging others while at the same time claiming they are being unfairly judged.  Many people are judged for their lifestyle, occupation, religion, race, physical attributes, the list of trivial reasons is endless.  This is not only unfair but wrong to think that your way is the only way.  I struggle with this daily making every effort to judge people only for their bad actions toward others not their lifestyle choices.  Yes, I believe judging people for their actions is necessary.

     If we all had a chance to experience some other persons life I'm sure we would look at things differently.  Celebrating the trivial differences in others would build better relationships and allow us time to address the real evils in life.  "Just Saying...."