Looking outside the bubble — the real reason why we need to help our peers more

Around two months ago, I was attending a massive get-together, where I met a person who would always approach me with his problems. Let’s call him X, in order to respect his privacy. It felt weird to me at first, but later, it became clear that I can choose multiple ways of reacting to it, and I decided to deal with it the best way I could. Here’s how:

I first needed to develop an understanding of who I was and who I was meant to be in the situation.

This person, X, would come and sit next to me, and once he started talking, nothing — ideas, worries, thoughts, you name it — would be prevented from being turned into words. That’s exaggerating, of course, but yet most of my peers had already given up on him as annoying. This personally reminded me of what people have done to me all these years, and I was determined to do better than that, and I allowed my good heart to drive me on. I was reluctant at first, dismissing him as he approached me, but every time I did or got close to doing that, I reminded myself that I am different, and refuse to do what most others naturally would. To my delight, it turned into a virtuous cycle: the more I did it, the easier it became. I soon became close to him, and the bonding I created with him was so strong that he felt bad to leave me later on. All that just because it gave me a chance. I didn’t do anything to X to solve his problems or really impact him in any big way. All I did was give X a chance before I instinctively knocked him away, and if that was enough for him to become that close to me, then I am saddened by how rarely he most likely gets to experience that. You are only in control of yourself, but that should be more the reason to do what others aren’t — use the power to control yourself to put effort in others around you. Humans are social beings, not solitary beings, and we should not let the modern egocentricism-encouraging times strip us of the basic need to socialize. If you are reading this, I implore you, use your power to make a difference and show some care to this world, regardless of what others are doing. The only way you can hope to change them is by demonstrating.

I noticed that we seem too focused on ourselves and our instinctive reactions and fail to realize that there is a world outside of our bubble.

We fail to question our beliefs from time to time. This has never been a reality that was particularly difficult for me to accept, but it might be for people conditioned to live in this bubble. Now, showing some effort to bond with a normal friend has become rare. I have another friend, let’s call him Y, who was discussing what side jobs he was doing. When he inquired, I told him, and he didn’t give much of a reaction, yet when I inquired back, he closed it off as being confidential, with the supposed reason of “he doesn’t want to add more competition.” I instantly felt bad that he couldn’t see past his bubble. Y didn’t feel the need to share his experiences with his own friend. However, as my experience with X shows, it only becomes easier the more it is done. And that gives me hope. One day, the world will be mostly be collaborative, with a hint of competition. Right now, the scale is not balanced like that. If collaboration and brotherhood are the cake, competition is merely the topping that makes the cake more delicious. A cake filled with 80% toppings would taste awful.

This made me reflect on the concept from a philosophical point of view, noticing how many problems are occurring in society due to our lack of care for our peers.

As a society, we need to all be helpful and supportive of one another, and it disappoints me that it isn’t as common as it should be. We often compare ourselves with each other, seeing one another as different players in the same game. While our beliefs may be different, and we may not always get along or have the time to work things out, I find it fascinating that we are still yet to acknowledge the wonder that we are all in this together.

This thought changed the way I talked to any other person whom my old self would instantly reject.

A week ago, I talked to another person who complained to me about his problems and how he feels completely stuck in life, let’s call him Z. He talked about how he is having difficulty handling the pressures of life and feels trapped in a journey he doesn’t want to be in. I told Z exactly what I said above — both him and I are together in the same game we call “real life”, and that should, at the very least, act as a source of comfort. None of us chose to be here, but we are all in this together, and we must bring back the same desire to socialize that we are losing if we are to make the game worth it. We share this world, and we don’t each own it as our own individual. Rather, each individual is merely a part of the whole we call the world.

Of course, like I mentioned above, this worldview has some practical limitations. We live in a world far from utopian, and we all have our reasons — sometimes very valid reasons — to not help our neighbors. Yet, I think we can all benefit from trying to help a few people around us and giving people more of a chance than we seem to give at the present moment. It might as well change the way you see the world.

Thank you for reading this entry.

-Vishal Janamanchi