I try my best to remember that everybody has a story.
It doesn’t always work out. In moments of extreme frustration or pettiness — or, hell, even when I’m really tired, or I didn’t get a chance to eat lunch — it just becomes simpler to pretend that I’m the only one who’s a real human being. I’ll start defining everybody else through the prism of me — “girl who is taking too long to order her damn coffee” — and think that their existence, as far as I’m concerned, begins and ends with me.
It’s the easy way out, to be sure. After all, it can be tiring just trying to stay aware of my own thoughts, feelings and experiences when trudging through an off day. Processing the fact that other people also have thoughts, feelings and experiences going on — and the possibility that they, too, could be having an off day, for reasons that could be more painful than my own — can be emotionally exhausting.
So I get it when people seem to act somewhat self-centered, and I’m hoping those around me don’t judge me too harshly when I do the same.
I still try, though. Because all empathy comes from this: that everybody has a story, that everybody has context. Nobody just pops up out of nowhere; no one’s just a character in your story.
And when it works out correctly, remembering all this is almost a spiritual experience — the sort that quietly connects all of us with a deep sense of commonality, even if all we’re doing is being a little patient with each other at Starbucks.
OK, maybe you can’t follow me to “spiritual.” But if you’re reading this out in public, consider this: Everyone you see right now has likely fallen in love and had their hearts broken at least once, and probably several times. Each of them, if they chose to open up, could tell you about small moments that, although meaningless to most everybody else, still resonate in their minds when they think about the happiest they’ve ever felt or the worst day they’ve ever had. Each of them is likely feeling worried, anxious or insecure about something in their lives right now.
And each of them probably has someone in their life — a parent, a sibling, a significant other, a friend — who’s really hoping they’re having a good day today.
And although that might not strike you as spiritual per se, looking at someone and then seeing him in this way is, some days, the closest we get to feeling something resembling a connection to the strangers who flit in and out of our lives.
I don’t believe we all need to learn each other’s stories or anything, but I do think we have to at least think of them every once in a while: to take in a moment of perspective; to breathe in a moment of understanding; to think that maybe the girl who’s taking too long to order her damn coffee just got a call from her parents that her brother’s surgery didn’t go well, and although it seems trivial, the decision between a Caramel Macchiato and a Cinnamon Dolce Latte could, in some small way, determine whether or not she’s able to stay composed enough to not burst into tears.
The informal pact we make with each other by virtue of stepping out into public is that we all promise to do our best to respect each other’s stories. It’s something more basic than selflessness or kindness. It’s just the minor dignity of gentle understanding: that I can’t pretend to know how you feel, but I know how I feel, and that’s close enough for now.
And that maybe you need those two minutes to mull over your coffee choices more than I do, and that’s really OK.
Joe Dellosa is an advertising senior. His columns appear on Tuesdays.
