When you find yourself looking at someone else's behavior and saying, "Why are they doing that?" are you
being tolerant or intolerant?
If you are simply noticing the event but do not consider it as either good or bad then you may be acting in a tolerant manner. However, if you are thinking "I can't believe that someone would do that" or "No one should do that" then you are probably being intolerant.
Tolerance is recognizing that everyone has a right to be, believe, or act differently than you do and that your way of being, believing, or acting is no better or worse than theirs. Intolerance starts when you believe that your way of being, believing, or acting is better than other people.
Intolerance is common, but it is wrong...
I challenge you to find any situation where intolerance is an acceptable response. Intolerance is never necessary and is often dangerous, both to you and other people. Intolerance is often followed by hate and discrimination and you will not find an act of discrimination that does not start with intolerance.
You do have to accept who they are as human beings, whether they are green, blue, or have antlers on their head. Not accepting someone because of a physical feature that they can not change is not intelligent, it is completely ignorant.
You don't have to accept what other people believe or how they act, but you must tolerate those beliefs or acts. Tolerance is the understanding that everyone is different and has a right to act differently as long as they:
Intolerance creates distrust and will infiltrate an entire team and destroy productivity.
Tolerance allows people to work well together and find synergies that they never knew existed. Tolerant
teams are much more flexible and can solve much bigger problems much faster than other teams. When every member of a team does not feel judged it leaves them open to being much more creative and productive.
Tolerance is the foundation of productive relationships and team productivity
The key to becoming tolerant is to realize that we actually have very little in common with the people around us. You may have much in common with your best friend, but you will discover that you have many differences as well. In reality, you only have a fraction of your world in common with anyone else. This means that learning that people can believe very different things and by extension act differently than we do.
Our belief system is like the concentric circles to the left, the inner part of the circle represents our strong beliefs, the outer part of the circle represents our weaker beliefs. When we interact with another people our beliefs will collide. You will find that you feel at ease with people with similar core beliefs and less at ease with those with different beliefs. But if you look, the people with similar core beliefs will believe things that you do not believe in.
Tolerance is recognizing that other people make decisions just like you, they just reason from a different set of beliefs. Remember, just because you believe something does not make it true, and it does not give you the right to try to change their beliefs.
When beliefs collide and people conflict there is an opportunity for learning and a possibility of destruction. Those that are tolerant will learn and grow from conflict and those that are intolerant will sink into a cycle of destruction.
The only way to have a happy and productive life is to have a high tolerance for people with different beliefs.
If you are simply noticing the event but do not consider it as either good or bad then you may be acting in a tolerant manner. However, if you are thinking "I can't believe that someone would do that" or "No one should do that" then you are probably being intolerant.
Tolerance is recognizing that everyone has a right to be, believe, or act differently than you do and that your way of being, believing, or acting is no better or worse than theirs. Intolerance starts when you believe that your way of being, believing, or acting is better than other people.
Intolerance is common, but it is wrong...
I challenge you to find any situation where intolerance is an acceptable response. Intolerance is never necessary and is often dangerous, both to you and other people. Intolerance is often followed by hate and discrimination and you will not find an act of discrimination that does not start with intolerance.
You do have to accept who they are as human beings, whether they are green, blue, or have antlers on their head. Not accepting someone because of a physical feature that they can not change is not intelligent, it is completely ignorant.
You don't have to accept what other people believe or how they act, but you must tolerate those beliefs or acts. Tolerance is the understanding that everyone is different and has a right to act differently as long as they:
- are not encroaching on anyone
- are doing everything that they commit to do
Tolerance and Productivity
The productivity of an group of people can only be high when there is a high degree of tolerance inside the group. Groups with intolerant individuals fail to achieve their potential and produce much less than other groups. The intolerant members of the team inevitably give less than 100% because of their beliefs about other team members and either fail to work well or may even sabotage the work of people they dislike.Intolerance creates distrust and will infiltrate an entire team and destroy productivity.
teams are much more flexible and can solve much bigger problems much faster than other teams. When every member of a team does not feel judged it leaves them open to being much more creative and productive.
Tolerance is the foundation of productive relationships and team productivity
The key to becoming tolerant is to realize that we actually have very little in common with the people around us. You may have much in common with your best friend, but you will discover that you have many differences as well. In reality, you only have a fraction of your world in common with anyone else. This means that learning that people can believe very different things and by extension act differently than we do.
We All Believe Very Different Things
Tolerance is recognizing that other people make decisions just like you, they just reason from a different set of beliefs. Remember, just because you believe something does not make it true, and it does not give you the right to try to change their beliefs.
When beliefs collide and people conflict there is an opportunity for learning and a possibility of destruction. Those that are tolerant will learn and grow from conflict and those that are intolerant will sink into a cycle of destruction.
The only way to have a happy and productive life is to have a high tolerance for people with different beliefs.
No comments:
Post a Comment