Have you ever considered how people often have an unintentional impact on others? I am really passionate about people being aware of how they impact other people.
I’ve recently had some experiences that serve as and analogy that shows what an unintentional negative impact is like.
I have been training with my new guide dog for just over two weeks. On several occasions, some of my classmates and their guide dogs have been confronted by uncontrolled dogs while training out in public. The following is not an uncommon experience:
Working with the dog along the sidewalk, a dog on a flexi-leash rushes up to the guide dog, gets up in its face, snarling and growling and being threatening in at least half a dozen different ways.
Then the owner exclaims something like, “Oh my goodness! He’s never done that before!” Or, “Don’t worry, he’d never hurt anybody.”
Just a thought, as a blind person that’s a pretty darn scary experience. It’s very unsettling coming to realize how many people are pretty much not in control of their dog out in public. Then we get to feel anything from unsettled to terrified as we work through the experience.
If you think about it, it’s not so different when we let loose on someone around us. We end up having an unintentional impact like the other dog owner with the uncontrolled and frightening dog, We might, for example:
- grump at someone because were in a bad mood
- tear someone down because we feel insecure about ourselves
- dwell on negative life experiences and share them with other people so their minds go to those dark places, too
- share our limiting thinking, causing other people to limit their own thinking
And have you ever noticed that we tend to hurt the people closest to us? Their proximity and familiarity provide many opportunities to have an unintended impact that’s negative.
Self-control is a real blessing to other people. I’ve mentioned it before, but I recommend the book, Emotional Intelligence 2.0, to help increase personal awareness and control. One thing that’s cool about emotional intelligence is that it’s great for everybody and everyone has room to improve.
After all, none of us really want to have an unintentional impact on other people that’s negative. Let’s be careful to minimize unintentional impact as much as we can so we can maximize our intentional and positive impact.
