Are We Wrong Or Right?

In the not-so-distant past, I have become an addict of late night “George Lopez” re-runs. George accuses Angie of having “know-it-all syndrome” and by the end of the episode, coaxes a therapist (guest star Richard Lewis) to give Angie the official diagnosis of “know-it-all-syndrome”. Although incredibly funny, this hit me on a serious level as well. I have this syndrome. I always have. I’ve been called a “know it all” my whole life. In elementary school, it lost me many friends. As an adult, it has sometimes been considered a good quality; people seem to consider me a good person to come to for advice. Good or bad, but usually just annoying, I realize I am 100% guilty of this. I have also recently realized that I’m not alone.

Friends of mine were telling a story about a policy they have for parenting. When their kids have a situation that they find too difficult to handle, they come to Mom or Dad before responding. Their youngest decided recently to skip this step and try to manage the problem with her older brother by herself. When that made the situation escalate even more, she finally came crying to Mom. “What are you supposed to do when you have a difficult situation?” Mom lovingly and patiently asked her. This 7 year-old little blonde hair, blue-eyed girl responds, “But I wanted to do it myself!!!” So adorable, and so true. From the time we are young we think that our answer is the best answer. It seems almost all of us have this need to be right…ABOUT EVERYTHING.

Disagree? Let me prove it. Take a second and imagine the last fight, argument, or confrontation you got into. Maybe with your mom, or your spouse, or the clerk at the store. Now that you are imagining these, disregard any that the other person conceded your point and admitted that they were wrong and you were right. And now take whichever one is left playing in your mind. This is probably not the first time it has replayed in your mind. You have probably replayed it in your mind many times, beating yourself up with thoughts like, “Dang it! I should’ve said this!” or, “if I only would’ve come back with that!” Then your imagination builds the rest of the commentary from there.

Now to my point: In this imaginary argument, do you ever lose? NO! You’d be crazy to! I, personally, am undefeated! It is so normal and natural to us that if we have an argument in our mind, we will always win, but the problem is that when we have arguments in real life we are not the only person involved.

Another example: You have someone in your life whom you are constantly nagging (out of love, of course) to do something in particular. For this examples’ sake, let’s say it’s going back to school. You tell them nicely, you ask them nicely, you tell them forcefully, you suggest a school you’ve heard of recently, you mysteriously leave a pamphlet on the kitchen table. You do everything in your power, other than literally placing the fire under their butt. You finally get tired. This is usually a pivotal moment.

You see, it’s usually right around that moment that they will swing open the front door, birds chirping, bright light shining on them, and the biggest smile you’ve ever seen on their face. “That’s it! I’ve figured it out! I’m going to go back to school!!” You sigh loudly and begin to share in their joy! Excited, you exclaim, “Yes!...I’ve been…” and they cut you off with, “You’ll never believe what happened today! I was walking along and ran into my old friend…you remember Joe…anyway, we were just small talking when all the sudden he said how he thought I ought to go back to school and he’s exactly right! So I’m going to do it!” Your joy has drained. You look confused, then start to get defensive, then maybe even a little angry. You decide to take the high road and fake a smile. You say “Well, I hate to say…I told you so!”

To prove that we were right all along, we unknowingly also steal their joy and then rub it in their face further by saying “I hate to say...” No we don’t! We don’t hate to say. If we hated to say it, we just wouldn’t say it. There is nothing that I hate to say, that I spend the whole time I should be listening to someone when I am actually waiting until it’s my turn to speak so that I can say it. Why do we say this anyway? What does it matter who told them so? Isn’t all that matters that they are going back to school? James said, “be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry”. Whatever you believe about the Bible, that’s just plain good advice. Trust me, I know I’m right about this.

All kidding aside, I leave you with a challenge that I have recently been challenged with: Do you want to be right, or do you want IT to be right? Whatever IT is.

-Krystal is a blogger for The Daily Vine. Check out her bio to see where her view comes from.