- tried to stay positive, then misfortune strikes
- tried making friends, ended up ghosted
- tried looking for better job, then scammed
- tried save money, inflation happens
- tried sell product online, fees and tax cut, also less buyers.
- tried theraphy, the solution only dont think about it, its okay (if only it was that easy)
- tried being nice, taken advantage of
- tried being honest, get hatred
- tried religion, yet god let million of nice person suffers
- tried sleep, need regular medication
- tried work hard, ended up surgery and years of rehabilitation
at this point, i am so tired with whatever i do, it always doesnt work.
right now i can relate why some people choose to become evil person, because being good and nice person in this world is just not as rewarding as bad people does. even those people who ghosted and bullied me ended up becoming rich and succesful, and here i am struggle everyday. life is really unfair world.
If it wasn’t, everyone would do it.
agreed, sometimes i think “god” is believed to be almighty but yet so stupid. if i am god, i will simply make system that instantly rewards nice person and punish bad person, then all is solved, world become utopia.
For staying positive, staying positive won’t prevent disaster, but it can help you move past it. For saving money, ideally invest it, either get a high yield savings account at >3% interest which (roughly) beats inflation. Or try an index fund if you can save that money for long term.
yeah i just hate it when disaster happened on innocent people and i do invest yet inflation is just too high. life is just that bad.
Most of these posts assume that the goal for being nice and good is FOR the rewards. Like, “I donate to my homeless shelter all the time, and do I get any thanks? The HELL with them!” That is where it usually fails. The real trick is being strong enough to stay nice DESPITE the lack or rewards, or even inconvenience. You are nice and good because it’s a core of who you are, not just for flattery and incentives.
Yeah, getting to be nice and spreading smiles and just happiness around is all anyone can hope for.
You win some and lose some. Careerwise or monetarily it’s tougher but not inherently. Just capitalism. And I’d rather lose there and win in warmness and having nice and amazing people around
Right, you shouldn’t expect to be rewarded for it.
I expected also more negative things or at least people taking it for granted but to my surprise I got very positive reactions from a few basic kind acts.
When I hear people told my GF I’m always there for them and one of the few people they can count on that means a lot.“What you’re talking about is the theory of Moral Desert Elenor, that we do good things for the rewards.”
“The real question is what do we owe to each other“
“The drinks are on me. Good luck.”I’m nice because it makes me feel good. That’s the only reward I need.
Same. But another thing I add when I don’t feel like being nice is “be nice out of spite.” Spite is against a universe trying to make me mean and bitter. “Oh the Universe is cold and uncaring,” yeah well, fuck the universe, then. I’m not doing for the universe, I am doing it for me.
Try to consider being kind as its own reward, rather than something you do to gain another result
i cannot understand being kind as its own reward, even people that donates and helps people in the street do monetize their content to get rewarded in form of attention and money which is another result
Most people helping in the street are not monetizing it as content. Only the ones you see on YouTube
I was going to say this same thing exactly.
The benefit of being nice is living in a nice place with nice people, not winning some zero sum game of immediate gratification
We live in a world ruled by billionaire pedophiles, so the system rewards behavior similar to that.
On the other side of that - do not worry about being a “nice” person when that means your own well-being is being taken away. Be kind to yourself first (how you can, I know it’s not easy), then try to be around people who have similar ideals.
Society at large can be soul crushing. Life is hard and not fair. I don’t have an answer for you beyond what I wrote but I hope you can find some rest and a small relief in your near future.
thanks, lot of stuff happened to me, so its actually really hard to stay being nice person and i just hope that its better in the future.
Pretty much all of the examples you provided happen to shitty people too, probably at a hiring rate in many cases. The benefit of being a good person on those situations is that at least you can take pride in not being a turd. Take your list, and reverse the logic for each input and see if that would make you feel better.
- Maintained a crappy attitude, then misfortune strikes.
- Spent all of my money, inflation happens.
- Was a jerk, taken advantage of.
- Was a liar, get hatred.
Just a handful of examples.
that examples is what supposed to be happened and totally deserved, what is not fair it also happened to nice person and what is the point of pride if it is not rewarding at all?
Bad shit will happen. Shit happens to everyone. It has nothing to do with who you are as a person. But if you’re trying to do good and be good, that can be a comfort in trying times, because how you feel inside is what matters when it comes to who you are.
Do you want to be a good person? What does that mean to you; how do you expect a good person to behave? How do you feel when you act against those expectations?
When shit happens you can feel bad because shit happened AND feel bad because you were rude about it… or you can feel bad because shit happened but ALSO feel good because at least you tried to be kind and understanding and didn’t yell at anyone or make someone else feel bad.
I’d rather feel bad (about things) and good (about myself) than bad (about things) and bad (about myself). That is the reward: at least you tried.
tbh what i want is become rich, succesful, lucky, have many friends, healthy, and have no problems in life, literally living in easy mode and so far being nice for me doesnt give me those thing i want.
If you’re being honest and nice to be rewarded, then you’re doing it wrong. You do it because it’s the right thing to do.
so basically if you are guaranteed to get lucky and rich, basically having easy mode by become evil, you still choose to become nice and honest person?
Being a genuine good human doesn’t make life easier, but it gives you peace of mind, because it’s the right thing to do.
And if people feel, that you mean it genuinely, they are much more likely to help you back.
i still doubt that “they are much more likely to help you back” when i done plenty of right thing yet either much more likely betrayed or taken advantage of.
Being nice doesn’t mean being naive and letting people taking advantage of you. Some people simply don’t have good intentions, leaning to identify those patterns is a skill you can train.
Being nice is an act of rebellion in a cold, uncaring world. If it is your nature to try to do good, don’t let other people not being there yet stop you being yourself.
unfortunately there is limit for it, i am already at the point i am so tired of being nice.
Many of us feel that way sometimes, I have even recently felt that way after a couple of extremely rough years relating to a couple of friends who have needed a lot of support of various kinds (please forgive me, I would much rather not be specific with any of this, not my stories to tell and not the place to tell them).
Then another situation calls for it (I had a big one just today, possibly even the biggest ever one off example, for the sake of an ex no less- although I was furious until I spoke to them about it all, in truth) and I couldn’t imagine doing anything else.
The reward; although I feel a little dirty calling it a reward; is that when someone needed help they actually got it instead of just getting fucked over for the nth time. I don’t care if my impact is limited or even meaningless, ultimately so am I, and it wasn’t to me.
If you don’t feel like that, that’s okay, you took the step to try anyway and I genuinely respect that. You don’t have to give all of yourself, take a step back and look after yourself when you need it, but the world could always do to be a softer place when you feel ready again!
yeah i dont feel that unfortunately, i feel that is wasted time and energy tbh. i doubt world is softer place, in fact i feel it getting harder.
Honestly, it sounds like you might be depressed, but if so I get that too. For the people you helped it got softer, it doesn’t have to directly relate to ourselves to be better.
i am indeed depressed, i even need medication to deal with it.
That’s fair, then if these things are negatively impacting you, which it sounds like they are, there is definitely no shame in stepping back or finding other ways to engage, or whatever works best for you.
I really never liked the idea of medication (for myself I mean, different people need different things), the idea of a medical intervention to a rational response to external realities just feels like burying my head in the sand. The three times I have seriously tried them despite this only reaffirmed it to me, they never actually solved anything, they just numbed me into only passively caring.
Instead I sort of drag myself through, getting by on the occasional chances I get to let someone not have to worry about those external realities that chafe against me so badly for once.
I hope that is expressed clearly enough for you to make some more sense of my perspective on all of this.
Happy to talk further if you would like to, but I would prefer via message rather than openly if I am/we are going to go into any real detail about anything.
Do no harm and take no shit.
Most of the things you listed are not moral things.
- staying positive
- making friends
- looking for a better job
- saving money
- selling online
- therapy
- religion
- sleep
All of these have nothing to do with moral good or evil. An evil person can stay positive that their plan to steal credit from coworker will result in their promotion. An evil person can make friends and take more than they give from the relationship. An evil person can take a better job that exploits vulnerable populations. An evil person can hoard wealth… And on and on.
It seems like you are saying things aren’t working out for you financially, socially, etc. And for a lot of that cognitive behavioral therapy can certainly help you reframe bad thinking and patterns to make things better. That doesn’t mean all your problems are solved, but it can make things better.
Many of the things you listed are wise things to do rather than morally good. And even if they don’t result in your idea of “success” they almost always result in something better than having not done them. For example saving money. Let’s say you save 10,000 and inflation makes it only have the purchasing power of 8,000. You find yourself in a spot where you are unemployed and that 8,000 is going to be a saving grace. It will help your life way more than if you had blown it on 10,000 worth of vacations or consumer goods.
It’s less financially rewarding because most of the developed world exists in the context of late stage capitalism and / or oligopoly.
yes those big corpos can run away with anything even its bad stuff.
Moral and ethical behavior ultimately results in fewer problems and a better experience over all.
I’ve seen plenty of selfish people (whose actions often harmed others), and they ultimately destroyed their own lives through their folly.
I’ve known a lot of selfish wealthy people and most are pretty miserable - paranoid, lonely, etc. I also know a handful wealthy people who are kind, generous, and humble - they have amazing lives.
I know people who have led very simple lives, who worked hard, just did without when they couldn’t afford something, and avoided the greed and materialism of mainstream consumerism - that takes self-discipline and a special kind of consciousness. Ultimately their legion of friends and neighbors helped them when they got knocked down.
What you are seeing when evil men prosper is not their own work or evil designs; it is the safety net that has been given to them to prevent accumulating the consequences of their actions. donny, Musk, and their peers all were raised in extremely privileged circumstances. They have been protected from the consequences of their evil deeds their entire lives - you don’t have that. You won’t get away with anything because you don’t have a rich father to pay your bail, hire a top lawyer, or buy a Supreme Court Justice a million-dollar RV.
Material things do not guarantee happiness. Try reading some Epictetus, Seneca, or my favorite, Marcus Aurelius. This is a topic of frequent dialogue among the Stoics.
You’re going about this all wrong. Morality is similar to religion in that it’s make-believe. Good vs. evil discourse is unserious, despite most people in bourgeois states taking it seriously, as well as corporate media.
This “evil/not evil” metaphysical dichotomy is a moral framework. There are no intrinsically ”evil” people, and I would drop that moral framework.
Philosophy professor and YouTuber Hans-Georg Moeller:
I agree that no one is “intrinsically” evil.
However, sadly, I’m personally convinced that we are all defacto evil by a secular definition. That definition being that evil is any action that causes unnecessary suffering to any other being.
Now, one can ask nuanced questions like, is any suffering necessary? But such lines of thought commonly degrade into silly trolly problems that are just dilemmas which only arise in pre-existing systems of unjust social order based on domination of others.
Nevertheless, it seems inescapable that most people live their lives within societies which require a tacit complicity in crimes against humanity. This appears to be the case at least in the Imperial core and most of the empire’s vassal states.
“Escaping” such systems to preserve not just one’s own dignity, but also one’s own humanity and innocence seems like the only reasonable course of action. And yet almost no one seems to be actively engaged in such escape. One can deduce likely explanations for such an observation. It is probably really difficult to escape such systems. It is also probably really difficult to even recognize that we exist within such systems, given that those systems are often characterized by their saturation of simulacra and consumerist hyperrealism.
But perhaps the simplest explanation is that the ideologically individualized subject living in such states are simply too inured by the treats offered by their so-called civilizations, and selfishly choose to continue participating in these societies – which, I will be honest, seems pretty deliberately evil to me, so long as the consequences are easily enough visible.
This just sounds like life. You sound like you’re in a depression slump because I start to view things the same way when I get in these slumps.
Being a helpful person is actually more rewarding to your well being than being a scammer. Read or listen to the YouTube audiobook, “The Art of Happiness by Dalai Lama”
Practicing these things
- Honesty
- Responsibility
- Kindness
- Generosity
- Compassion
have yielded me wealth beyond measure. Idk about “good and nice.”
