TWO STEPS FROM HYPOCRISY

I feel like I live constantly two steps away from hypocrisy. Part of the reason is that I'm very good at giving myself advice, and then I'm also very good at not following it at all.

What happens is that I persuade myself that this advice is really good (step 1) by dishing it out to others. But then I hear myself saying things to those people that I can't seem to do (or haven't done) myself (step 2).

Winners asked me a question via WhatsApp today. I said this:

When people get annoyed it's worth remembering that they are often annoyed at:

(1) themselves
(2) the situation

Plus, you get annoyed too; we all do. Does it change how you really feel about the person you're annoyed with? Don't take it personally.

He was gracious enough not to point out that 'taking it personally' is often my exact reaction to frustrated people.

So, does everybody live this close to hypocrisy?

In another Twitter exchange recently, I suggested that 'jobs are transient and life is so much bigger than the boxes we confine ourselves to,' at which point my friend pointed out that I had confined myself so much to mine that I was literally counting the hours I'd been there.

My only glimmer of hope, living two steps away from being a steaming hypocrite, is that it's hardly ever intentional, and in that regard, the etymology of the word is helping me out. I looked it up.

Hypo-krites meant a stage actor, a pretender or deceiver in Attic Greek. To hypokrinesthai was to play a part, quite deliberately disguising your true self in a cloak of artificial virtue.

If I say one thing and do another, it's not deliberate; it's usually because I'm also refreshing that advice for myself, and reminding myself that I need to do it too.

I still think it was good advice not to take frustration personally. I also think it's easy to be confined by our desks - and I am trying to do something about both of those things. You can have good ideas about how to get out of a hole, even if you're at the bottom of it, I suppose.

The problem, of course, is how all of this is perceived by others. A stage actor is a deceiver, if the audience genuinely believe that the drama is really happening.

And I am a hypocrite if I say one thing and continually do the opposite. Plus, the more I do that, the less you can trust me, even if it's not deliberate.

So, whether I'm two steps away from perceived hypocrisy or two steps away from actual deliberate hypokrisis, I don't want to be either.

Hopefully, my words will match up with my actions. If not, I'll do better or say less. And if I become frustratingly duplicitous, my advice would be: 'don't take it personally'. I'm still kind of learning, just like you.