2167: If Kindness and Generosity Is So Good for Us, Why Are We So Suspicious of It? by Charlie Brown of Simple and Straightforward

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[00:00:17] This is Optimal Relationships Daily, episode 2167. If kindness and generosity is so good for us,

[00:00:26] why are we so suspicious of it? By Charlie Brown of simpleandstraightforward.substack.com.

[00:00:33] Hello everybody and welcome to this weekend edition of Optimal Relationships Daily,

[00:00:38] the daily show that is all about sharing information that can help you build better

[00:00:41] relationships in your life. I'm Greg Audino, your host, and today we've got a really

[00:00:46] effective article for you, one that I think we can all relate to and understand.

[00:00:50] So let's jump into it now and optimize your life. If kindness and generosity is so good for us,

[00:01:01] why are we so suspicious of it? By Charlie Brown of simpleandstraightforward.substack.com.

[00:01:09] I'll only let people interrupt my runs under very special circumstances. I am a headphones in,

[00:01:15] run on my own kind of exercise. I try to give out don't bother me vibes and normally it works.

[00:01:22] This guy did not get the message. About one minute into my run, I felt a car pull up beside me,

[00:01:29] a middle-aged man wound down his window. Hey you! An American accent in the middle of Porto.

[00:01:37] Oh Lord, what do you want? Directions? Me? I hope it's not the latter. After all,

[00:01:43] every woman who is stopped in the street by a strange man always makes a lightning quick

[00:01:47] risk assessment. Is it safe to engage? We've all seen silence of the lambs. If you trust too much,

[00:01:54] you could end up in the hole rubbing lotion on your skin. Do you drink wine? This stopped me.

[00:02:00] Anyone who has followed my work here will know that yes, I absolutely drink wine. It is my job

[00:02:05] to do so. I'm on my way to the airport and I don't have room for this wine I picked up

[00:02:10] at a winery yesterday. Do you want it? I assessed the guy was telling the truth. Sure,

[00:02:17] he got out of the car, opened the trunk, did not try to bundle me into it,

[00:02:22] and pulled out a bottle of white wine. Do you live here in Porto? He asked. Yes,

[00:02:28] but I'm originally from the UK. Whereabouts? Wales. I'm half-welsh. And what do you do

[00:02:36] for a living? Actually, I work in wine. This is fate. You're Welsh, you work in wine, and you're running.

[00:02:45] My daughter's about to take part in the New York Marathon this week. I'm so happy I got

[00:02:49] to give this bottle of wine to you. It just feels right. I agreed. It was a happy coincidence.

[00:02:56] But despite the pleasant interaction, I couldn't stop this nagging feeling that there was an

[00:03:01] ulterior motive to his generosity. I even checked the bottle after he left. Could it be tampered with?

[00:03:08] Because it seemed weird he wouldn't try to squeeze it into his luggage,

[00:03:12] especially as it was quite a fancy bottle. Why was this guy being so nice?

[00:03:18] It turns out I was asking the wrong question. I should have been asking,

[00:03:23] why are we always so suspicious of the kindness of strangers? My mother always told me to

[00:03:29] trust no one. She scared my younger self with stories of strange men and vans offering candy to

[00:03:35] unsuspecting kids. My poor mom had her own reasons not to trust strangers. She was indeed propositioned

[00:03:42] by men with candy when she was a child. In fact, I was too in a busy, pigeon-filled

[00:03:47] Trafalgar Square one afternoon in 1992. When you're 10, being suspicious of strangers is probably

[00:03:54] not a bad thing. But as you grow older and wiser, you realize that not all strangers have bad motives

[00:04:01] and that just because you don't know someone doesn't mean they're dangerous.

[00:04:05] After all, they don't know you. And I hope you're a trustworthy person.

[00:04:10] Despite being fully aware of this, and that many people actively engage in random acts of kindness,

[00:04:16] we tend to be suspicious of them. Perhaps it's an innate part of being human,

[00:04:21] the pack mentality that kept us alive when we roamed the earth and tribes.

[00:04:26] But we're not so tribal anymore. We don't have to rely on them to keep us safe.

[00:04:31] Perhaps it's our ongoing march towards hyper-individualism. We increasingly live in a world

[00:04:36] whose cultural slogan may as well be, what's in it for me? This plays havoc with our empathy

[00:04:42] levels, which are far lower than they were 30 years ago. Alas, that means we are less

[00:04:48] likely to A. Give kindness and generosity, and B. Take it with grace and good will.

[00:04:55] A great example of this is the Free Hugs movement. When it started back in 2004,

[00:05:01] the police threatened to ban it. And nowadays you don't have to look far for a social media post

[00:05:06] making fun of it. But here's the catch. Society might like us to believe that accepting the

[00:05:12] kindness of strangers is bad for us. But the reality is entirely opposite.

[00:05:18] When you're generous, you're happier. There's even evidence to suggest you're healthier too,

[00:05:22] because giving to others lowers your stress levels. That helper's high is pretty sweet.

[00:05:28] It doesn't matter if you're rich or poor. If you give, you're going to feel good.

[00:05:33] And as a receiver, you might get a nice bottle of wine out of it.

[00:05:37] I want to believe that if someone is being generous or kind to you,

[00:05:41] it's not for nefarious reasons. It's because they're doing something that sits at the very core

[00:05:46] of being human. If that guy knew I was suspicious of his generous gift, I think he would be disappointed

[00:05:52] in me, his Welsh sister. I know I would be if I were in his shoes. In fact, I was once. A winery

[00:05:59] had given me far more bottles of wine than I could take in my luggage. And instead of paying

[00:06:03] for an oversized bag, I gifted the bottles to airport workers before I went through security.

[00:06:09] If they had been suspicious of my intent or inspected the bottle for signs of foul play,

[00:06:14] I would have been downright offended. Because people can just be kind without a malicious motive.

[00:06:21] They can just be generous without wanting anything for themselves.

[00:06:25] Deep down we know this. Generosity and kindness are traits that are etched deep into what it

[00:06:30] means to be human. It's why people reported wanting to cry after receiving a free hug.

[00:06:36] It's why, once I had told myself off for being disproportionately suspicious,

[00:06:41] that bottle of wine and the generosity of the man who gave it to me made my day.

[00:06:47] Humans haven't forgotten how to be generous. They just deep prioritize it sometimes.

[00:06:52] But it still exists. I recently saw an old lady fall over and a whole crowd of people helped her.

[00:06:59] People still give up their seats for pregnant women in the elderly.

[00:07:02] People still pay it forward. And people still give out bottles of wine whilst asking for nothing in

[00:07:07] return. To be generous is to be human. We crave it. It nurtures us. To tap into its power, we must

[00:07:15] remember that. We must remember that most people aren't being kind or generous because they think

[00:07:21] there's something in it for them. They do it because they crave the benefits of it just

[00:07:25] as much as you do. As much as we all do. Remember that the next time someone is good

[00:07:30] to you, it'll make you both feel better. You just listened to the post titled,

[00:07:39] If kindness and generosity is so good for us, why are we so suspicious of it?

[00:07:44] By Charlie Brown of simpleandstraightforward.substack.com

[00:07:49] And be sure to stick around for my comments in just a minute.

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[00:08:53] And thank you so much to Charlie for this post. I love a post like this.

[00:08:57] A post that reminds us of the other side of our biases.

[00:09:01] But as she was going through the article and mentioning the reasons that she and her mom

[00:09:05] both have to have become more suspicious of people over the years,

[00:09:09] I do hope that you leave this episode today being patient with that side of yourself.

[00:09:14] Whether due to your own experiences, what you've heard about from the news or from others,

[00:09:20] your imagination, or simply how abnormal society has made it to feel immediately

[00:09:26] trusting of someone, it's perfectly valid to feel scared to trust people right away.

[00:09:31] But I think Charlie's point today is that there is room for both.

[00:09:34] And while we shouldn't completely drop our defenses,

[00:09:38] we would probably do all of us some good to remember that there are still people worth

[00:09:42] trusting. And if we rely too much on our bias not to, we lose touch with them and

[00:09:48] we lose touch with that piece of reality which just so happens to coincide with optimism.

[00:09:53] But that's going to do it for today everybody. Thanks a lot for coming over the weekend,

[00:09:57] I hope it's going well for you and I hope this post added to it.

[00:10:01] And do be sure to join us again tomorrow for more. That's where your optimal life awaits.