March 29th - Actions

~ this post was brought to you by 72 degree sunshine, an iced latte, and a new spring playlist ~

You can do nice things but not be nice. I say, looking up from the table crumbs I’m playing with.

Yes, Austin agrees. But doing nice things makes you a nice person.

We’re toying with a frustrating ‘what came first, chicken or the egg,’ type of concept. I’m standing by the idea that your core character is what impacts your actions, while Austin is adamant that actions are all you should and could measure human character off of. He believes that your actions describe and impact your core character.

All of this stemmed from a conversation surrounding compliments. He finds compliments such as “you’re smart” or “you’re funny” to be devoid of any real meaning, always. He instead will say something like “I love that I can have conversations with you and neither of us has to win”. I get his point and for the most part I agree. However, I think that hearing “you’re smart” or “you’re funny” or “you’re kind” from someone that really, really knows you is meaningful. I think that when someone knows you really well, they’re complimenting your core by using an over-generalized statement. They’ve assessed all the parts of you, they’ve seen your actions, and they’ve decided: “you’re a funny person”. I tried saying this to Austin and I was met with: “seriously? You want me to compliment you with a thesaurus?”

What would be more meaningful to you, he asks me now, and pauses a second, trying to carefully piece together his point. If you went over to L’s house and he told the rest of his friends before you got there: ‘Oh, Larkin’s nice.’ Or would it mean more if he said: ‘I was just with Larkin and she gave up her bus seat for a little old lady’.

The answer’s obvious, he and I both know it. Actions are how we make a point, are how we describe a person’s core. There’s a reason anecdotes carry so much weight.

Think about it this way. He’s really on a roll now. It’s been proven that if you tell one group of kids that they’re smart and the other group of kids that they’re hard-working, the hard-working group will be more successful because you’re telling them what to do. You’re giving them an action. In a way, you’re helping them become a ‘hardworking’ person at their core.

That point gives me some pause. Helping create someone’s core through actions wasn’t an idea I had factored into my argument. But that also wasn’t the original point I was trying to make. If you tell one group of kids you’re smart and telling the other group of kids you’ve memorized the entire periodic table, the second group will be definitely be way more wowed. But that doesn’t mean that the action comes first. It just means it’s a more important, telling description for the given audience.

Exactly. Just saying someone’s smart doesn’t actually mean anything. Describing someone’s intelligence, though, that’s what’s important. Austin says.

I don’t think today’s the day we’ll agree on this one, but I think a lot of important points came up.