by Kristina Wilder, M.A.
During the winter break as part of my commute home I had to call for a shuttle to take me to my apartment. When the shuttle finally arrived, I ran to it as quickly as I could and found the only remaining seat. After I was seated, someone else came to the door but was told the shuttle was full and he would have to wait. “But I waited forever already.” Now, feeling somewhat guilty about having snagged a seat, I commented to the rider outside the door “I was waiting for 45 minutes.” “I was waiting an hour” he responded. “I didn’t see anyone else waiting here” I responded. The driver reiterated that he couldn’t let him on the shuttle without a seat and that he’d have to wait. As we drove away I found myself feeling guilty that I did not do the nice thing. The nice thing would have been to abdicate my seat to the other passenger.
I was born and raised in Minnesota, a place where the phrase “Minnesota Nice” often rules. I am happy with my upbringing and the cultural values it has instilled. By not giving up my seat, I violated that cultural value of “niceness.” Reflecting on it today, I notice that such cultural values can often become internalized demands. Having lived away from Minnesota for over five years now, I’ve thankfully gained some insights into Minnesota nice. While it is perfectly okay to value niceness (or any other trait), that does not mean that the value or preference is a universal law or requirement. In my case, I find that I demand “I must be nice” and also “Others must be nice to me and to each other.” When I am not nice, I feel guilt and have difficulty tolerating it. Rationally, I might prefer to be nice, but that does not mean I have to be nice.
I could rationalize my non-nice behavior and say there were exigent circumstances: I wasn’t feeling well, I really don’t think he was waiting longer because I didn’t see others waiting, all kinds of justifications for my behavior. BUT, it is more important, I think, for me to learn to tolerate when my preferences (in this case my preference for nicety) are not met than to justify why it is okay to not be nice in this circumstance. He may have been waiting twice as long as me. He may have felt sicker than I. Maybe he really needed to be on that shuttle. I’ll never know if I was justified, if I was “nice” or not. I was on that bus and he was not, and that was “not nice.” And I need to learn that I can tolerate that. That just because I value and prefer niceness, does not mean that it has to be so.
So I challenge you to look at your own values. I don’t suggest you disregard a value or something you feel is important in your life. But I do challenge you to consider if you (like me in this example) have demands about your values – that you always behave in a way that matches that value or that others have the same values. If you have similar demands, think about them, think about how your preference does not equal a demand that the world be the way you prefer. And, also importantly, that you can tolerate it when it is not how you prefer.