Emerson Friendship Post

“Every man alone is sincere. At the entrance of a second person, hypocrisy begins.” – Emerson

I thought this quote spoke volumes about friendship. The quote talks about human nature in general and how people behave under certain circumstances. It implies that people aren’t overly sincere to others while still sincere to themselves. We are all hypocrites in one way or another. We chastise others for their blunders, yet we repeat them daily. I thought about this and this holds true most of the time. We get so used to everyday routines that we kind of pass by things with a nonchalant “thank you” or “goodbye”. We point out how somebody else did the work all wrong, yet we do the same thing constantly. I thought about it and decided to become more sincere and less of a hypocrite. I wasn’t going to do things for a period of time just for the sake of it being a formality and to start to do things in an expressive and sincere way. It is difficult to not be overly hypocritical. I didn’t want to continue to say “thank you”, “congratulations”, and “good work” to people as a formality. A great example of this is with my family. Do I really mean “thank you” when I say it all the time? If I felt that somebody did something noteworthy, I was really going to let them know in a sincere way. I’m not talking about being overly exaggerated, but just be more thoughtful. Go into greater depths when congratulating them. This way they feel like you are being sincere and not just telling them stuff because you’re supposed to. I tried this out with some of my friends and family. It was different trying to be sincere not only to myself, but to others as well. Being hypocritical is something that cannot be fixed completely because nobody is perfect.