Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Standards? What standards?
Standards, they define us, the protect us, they determine what sort of life we will lead. We should hold ourselves and those we care about to high standards. Doing so improves our chances of leading good lives free of the troubles that beset those with lower standards. High standards keep us safe from conformity, and set us apart from the middling or bottom-dwelling herd. Elevating our standards gives us courage, strength, and bolsters our integrity. If our standards and our lives are in sync, we will find balance, and be better able to weather life's various storms. The opinion of others will become irrelevant, so long as we subscribe to and live by higher standards. What are higher standards? They are a stronger commitment to the common knowledge passed down through our collective history.
I think of higher standards as being a benchmark by which I can measure my own integrity. Everyone knows the core characteristics that define a good life: honesty, honor, generosity, etc. Everyone understands The Golden Rule: treat others as you want to be treated. Living a "good" life is as simple as committing to the basic principles behind The Golden Rule and doing our best to embody the characteristics that we believe to be the foundation of a just existence. I know this is truth because logic, religion, and basic intelligence all validate this opinion. It sounds simple and it is simple, so long as we have a little will power and a bit of personal integrity.
If our standards and our lives are not in sync, our integrity comes under attack and we will inevitably suffer. There is nothing magical or spiritual about it, it is simply a byproduct of momentum. Live one way, believe another, and eventually the opposing forces will begin to cause an imbalance that topples us over. You can only lie to yourself for so long. Lately, I have born witness to another way contradictory standards can topple hopes for balance and contentment. When lives are lived under a double standard, the chances for finding balance and contentment are just as slim. We cannot hold ourselves to one standard, the rest of the world another, and expect to be satisfied with life. The disconnect between what we accept from within and what we accept from without breaks down the validity of our beliefs. If our beliefs are invalid, what can be said for our foundation?
I'm fairly confident on this one, because I have seen the results firsthand, both in myself and in others. Two friends of mine have manifested this contradictory dynamic in their lives and neither seems to be the better for it. One holds their significant other to a higher standard than themselves, while the other does the opposite, lowering their standards to accommodate the behaviors of someone they care about. The results in both cases seem to be disorder, unease, and loads of stress. This should not come as a surprise to anyone! We cannot hold ouselves to a low standard of behavior and expect others to behave at a higher level. It is intellectually and emotionally dishonest to expect better from others than we do ourselves. No matter the justification or rationalization behind such double standards, the repercussions of such a disconnect are inescapable. Eventually such dishonesty comes home to roost.
On the other end of the spectrum, expecting less of others than we do ourselves will cause similar feelings of disquiet and even misery. The only rational outcome is repeated and perpetual disappointment. Someone committed to honesty who makes an emotional investment in a liar will suffer. Someone committed to charity who makes an emotional investment in a person driven by greed and self-interest will suffer. I could go on and on, but the point is simple: accepting less of others than one would accept of one's self inevitably creates a gulf that can only be bridged by a perpetual state of cognitive dissonance, which is really nothing more than a lie we tell ourselves. Again, you can only lie to yourself for so long.
There was a time in my life when I used to steal food from the grocery store I worked for. At the time, I was chronically depressed, perpetually angry, and more interested in my own expiration than in living a decent life. I used my depression and fatalism as a means of justifying not caring about the repercussions of what I was doing. The items I stole were written off, so the store wasn't literally losing money, but the profits that would have been made on those items went down my throat and into the trash compactor. At the time, I thought myself to be an honest, decent human being. Not surprisingly, I was never so miserable as I was during my time as that person. It's fortunate that I survived myself and changed my way of being, though I am still far from convergence with my ideal.
Double standards are lies we fabricate for ourselves to help rationalize or justify unacceptable behaviors in ourselves or in others. It's that simple. When we stop allowing ourselves those lies and start bringing our external and internal expectations in line, we are getting closer to truth. The closer we are to truth, the more valid, solid, and real our existence will be and the better we will feel about existing.
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Labels: life
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It's so fitting that I read this now. Last night I couldn't stop thinking of some issues I have going on in regards to standards. Sometimes I think my standards are set too high now, but then again I keep getting this uneasy feeling that I'm compromising things that I value deeply. Not red flags per se, more like core differences. Or maybe that's just part of dating?
I ask you this, how does one know when their standards are set too high?
IMO, your standards are only too high when you can't live up to the expectations you have of others. If you are genuinely living by a set of standards, then it's only fair to want someone else who lives to those same standards. If you ask me, that's the fairest thing for everyone involved. Don't expect anything more, or accept anything less, than you expect from yourself.
i don't know that i agree with your claim that holding yourself to higher standards than others is a bad thing. no doubt it can be in certain circumstances. but in general, it makes me happy to think i manage to meet a benchmark few others can.
The problem with lowering your expectations of others is that you put yourself in a position to accept less from them than you would from yourself. It only makes sense that such an approach will eventually catch up to you, no?