Hacker News Reader

Comment by carlosjobim | Hacker News Reader

I've met several people in my life that are like you, at least from what it sounds like in the description you give. Constantly anger and bitter. Probably for good reason, at least initially. And these people were smart people, hard working, honest.

But here's the secret: If you behave like this, then people will only interact with you when they want something from you, leading to an even more bitterness and unfriendly demeanor, leading to even worse interactions with other people.

Instead fake being nice and friendly and people will be nice and friendly with you and after what might feel like forever you will become genuinely nice and friendly. Giving you the possibility to enjoy better people and the better side of people.

View on HN

This advice basically is "be fake and people will eventually like you" which is one of the reasons im constantly pissed off about other people. I respect authenticity and I do not need people in my life preferring a version of me that's not authentic. Im content with being alone a lot, its preferable for me to having a lot of acquaintances. I have a good circle of friends which is enough.

You don't need to be fake in order to be nice. Become nice, then you won't have to fake it.

One way of becoming nice is to act nice. A nice person is a person who acts nice towards other people.

You can act different than how you feel, and that is not being fake, it's being nice.

If we all acted how we felt, we'd all be dead already.

The advice is to embrace positivity and you will change yourself fundamentally. Why is it in your mind dishonest to be nice and friendly, and authentic to be angry and maybe cynic? You can get a lot of stuff done and get your way by being friendly, without being in the slightly dishonest or a pushover. Especially when dealing with strangers such as in business or dealing with "authorities". It's the easiest way to get what you need, because people don't want to help somebody who is not friendly.

As for getting mad at stupid people on the internet, you're only getting mad because you expect them to be better. Accept internally that most people on the internet are deranged freaks, or just don't amount to much and the tension disappears and you don't have to be mad. Would you be angry at a cow for being simple minded?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com