It is amusing where thoughts can take us sometimes…I’ve been pondering about how other people influence our life. Some in a positive way, others – not so positive and some push us off the tracks rather harshly. Over the last almost two years I’ve been finding my way back I’ve built a strong belief in self-power. No matter how the presence of others might affect me, it is always up to me to choose how I react to them. My own state of peace is mine and I give no power over it to nobody. When I thought about it in reaction to something I’ve read, my mind took me further and I began to wonder just how many times I have been forced to make choices about which way to react. How many people on average do we meet over our lifetime…and by “meet” I mean not just pass by on a tube or car boot sale, but actually be introduced to the point of remembering them so that no second introduction would be needed next time. How many people would make us sad or happy; would bring us joy or pain…
So I asked my best friend google. And I must say it wasn’t an easy search. I’m surprised at how little information is out there on this particular matter…as if nobody cares…well, perhaps, they don’t, why should they. But I was too curious to give up and eventually I found some sort of an answer that satisfied me by credibility. Apparently, research shows that the average person knows about 250 people in their lifetime. Of course, when we are young, we tend to meet more new people then our chances decline…or is it – willingness? Yet we do meet other people regardless if we want it or not and every time we do, they change the way we perceive the world around us, even if ever so slightly.
Even an average 250 seems a pretty big crowd, eh? (if you think it’s not, imagine all of the people you’ve known in your life gathered together in a one big party!) And like in every big crowd it is difficult not to get pushed and pulled in different directions and like in every human crowd, sometimes it gets too crowdy and you can’t stand the next to you person anymore and you start to push hard too, affecting other people not intentionally, just because they happened to be too close to you. And if your mood has been altered by one person, you tend to pass it over to the next one, they do the same within their “circle of 250”, and so on…The chain reaction. I know from my own experience when I come across a person being upset by somebody else, other then me, I still can feel their mood and still m unwillingly affected by it. The understanding of this sure helps not to fall into the trap of catching “moody flu”, but sometimes when you happens to get in the middle of the “wrong” polarity, you can’t help but be charged with the negative set of mind. And the question is really: what is better – to get involved and try to change theirs into the better or to preserve your own peace by moving out of their way and let them pass their negativity elsewhere…
So I asked my best friend google. And I must say it wasn’t an easy search. I’m surprised at how little information is out there on this particular matter…as if nobody cares…well, perhaps, they don’t, why should they. But I was too curious to give up and eventually I found some sort of an answer that satisfied me by credibility. Apparently, research shows that the average person knows about 250 people in their lifetime. Of course, when we are young, we tend to meet more new people then our chances decline…or is it – willingness? Yet we do meet other people regardless if we want it or not and every time we do, they change the way we perceive the world around us, even if ever so slightly.
Even an average 250 seems a pretty big crowd, eh? (if you think it’s not, imagine all of the people you’ve known in your life gathered together in a one big party!) And like in every big crowd it is difficult not to get pushed and pulled in different directions and like in every human crowd, sometimes it gets too crowdy and you can’t stand the next to you person anymore and you start to push hard too, affecting other people not intentionally, just because they happened to be too close to you. And if your mood has been altered by one person, you tend to pass it over to the next one, they do the same within their “circle of 250”, and so on…The chain reaction. I know from my own experience when I come across a person being upset by somebody else, other then me, I still can feel their mood and still m unwillingly affected by it. The understanding of this sure helps not to fall into the trap of catching “moody flu”, but sometimes when you happens to get in the middle of the “wrong” polarity, you can’t help but be charged with the negative set of mind. And the question is really: what is better – to get involved and try to change theirs into the better or to preserve your own peace by moving out of their way and let them pass their negativity elsewhere…