In this episode, we discuss how if you do the right thing, you will astonish those around you.
Full Transcript
Hi Everyone, welcome to the You’re Daily Cup of Joe Podcast, with your host Joe Bautista. In this podcast, my goal is to give you quick lessons that you can reflect on in your journal so you can grow yourself physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually and have a better career, better relationships, and better personal finances while you enjoy your morning cup of coffee.
I’m also the author of the book “More You Know, More You Grow: How to Get Better Every Day”. In this book, I wrote down over 30 tips to help you grow in those four cornerstones. I’m also the founder of Grow With Joe, where I combine self-development coaching and financial planning for Latino Professionals.
At the end of today’s podcast episode, I’m going to give you a prompt question to reflect on in your journal. The idea is to take one to five minutes to reflect on today’s lesson and write a minimum of one paragraph on how you can apply the lesson in your life life. You can use an actual journal, a word document like on Google Drive, or your note-taking app like Evernote. The idea is that you’re actually thinking about how to process the information to help you improve your life.
In today’s episode, we’re are going to talk about the Mark Twain quote, “Do the right thing. It will gratify some people and astonish the rest.” Now there are times where I didn’t do the right thing in the past like letting things pass when I should have stepped in, but I know internally I should have done the right thing. It would have made the situation better.
When you don’t do the right thing, then you think about what you should have done and now you have your conscience weighing you down and you start to doubt yourself. When you do the right thing, then you feel proud of yourself and sometimes the right thing will make you look like a bad guy at the moment.
Life has a lot of decisions where you can do the right thing or you can do the wrong thing. There are shortcuts you can take that degrade the quality of the thing, there are people that you can screw over without them knowing about it, and there are just evil things that people can do. And to do these things can be easier to do than the right thing.
But when we don’t do the right things, it just makes the world worst off where there are less trust and more content towards others. I remember in the Marines, I wanted to do the right thing but I felt trap to just fall in line with the group thinking because it would only make my life harder. When you’re in the Marines, you’re under a contract and you just can’t quit.
I think that experience is a big reason why I crave autonomy so much. I don’t want to be put in a situation where my livelihood is put into someone paying me because if something is wrong, then I want to make sure that I can say something and my family is still taken care of. There were somethings at my last company that I heard and saw that made me want to quit but I was trying to survive so I didn’t say anything.
I hated that feeling and I don’t want to be put in a situation where that happens again. I’m watching Silicon Valley and Richard has the same dilemma with his business and it’s because he has to depend on other people to get his business off the ground. Overall he is doing the best he can and he does do the right things like turning down money from shady people. He then astonishes people around him even though it can suck for them in the short run.
Life is very gray though, it is not black or white and you can’t please everyone. Sometimes you have to upset one person in order to do the right thing and that another person believes that is the best thing to do. There are no rules that say we should do these specific things, there are social norms that tell us that we should do things and that’s what we follow.
To the right thing, you might even lose a lot, but at least you didn’t lose your conscience. But if everyone did the right thing, the world would be a better place. So you have to set the standard so others can follow your example. This is why others will be astonished. And you shouldn’t be doing the right thing for vanity, you should do it because it’s the right thing to do. We want to feel like we belong and we want to get recognized for the good work we are doing. But if you think about it, no one is going to remember those good deeds ten years from now. But the effects of those good deeds can be felt for decades. There can be a tiny thing that makes the future better.
I’m reading the People’s History of the United States and the history of the US is filled with a lot of shady things but there have been tiny changes that have made things a lot better for folks. Change takes time, but we can get everyone in the right direction, then I believe change can happen a lot faster. When we leave this world, we should leave it a little bit better than how we entered it, and that will come from doing the right things. You don’t want your grandkids to have a crappy future, do you?
That’s it for today’s episode, to summarize it, do the right thing. It will gratify some people and will astonish the rest. We should strive to do the right thing and avoid doing the wrong thing. It will just make the world a better place and we can have a clear conscience. It can be hard to make the right choice though when your livelihood is dependent on someone else who is incentivizing you to do the wrong thing. This is why it’s important to build up your social, human, and financial capital so you don’t have to do something you don’t want to do. If you make the wrong choice, you can make it up by owning the mistake and then taking action to do the right thing. Life feels better when you’re not holding on to the guilt of not doing the right thing. So start astonishing people with your good choices, and if no one is astonished, then it doesn’t matter, just do good things.
So in your journal, ask yourself, are you doing the right thing? This could be with a relationship, it could be at your job, or it could be something else. How can you get back to doing the right thing? If you have trouble with doing the right thing, go read Marcus Aurelius’ book Meditation and see what he had to go through a ruler. Try to get back to doing the right thing. If you can’t, then go seek some professional help.
Thanks for listening today! To get a free copy of my book “More You Know, More You Grow: How to get better every day” just go to my website growwithjoe.me/book and only pay for shipping and handling.
I have a quiz on my website that grades your inner circle, so if you want to find out if your inner circle is an A, B, C, D, or F, you can take that quiz at growwithjoe.me/quiz
I’m also trying to do a feedback Friday episode, so if you have a question that you would like to have my answer on the air, just e-mail me at [email protected]
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Thanks for joining me today and remember if you go with Joe, you can grow with Joe, cause Joe knows Dough.
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