I am a good puppy
No
When I was in my early 20s I would have said yes without a doubt.
Now, a TBI turned me into a manipulative being lusting for satisfaction never to be found without dropping personality continuity from when I genuinely was better. I go to weekly therapy, am heavily medicated, and try not to step on anyone’s toes anymore. I have fallen so far there’s not many toes around to step on anymore.
I’ll help the elderly neighbors out with their potlucks, moving furniture, and bringing in groceries. I’ll stand up and defend LGBT rights and groups otherwise disparaged. I’ll befriend those who might be misunderstood like myself and give them company when others might shun them.
All of this serves me though, and being a “good person” was not something that took this much active effort to think about before developing these mental/personality disorders from the head injury.
Heck no for several reasons. First of all, I straight up knew something was wrong with me since I was 7, I just didn’t know what. Had nightmares about it.
I was selfishly oblivious, never had many friends, and was inconsiderate to others. I mostly spent my time playing videogames. When my parents were struggling, I fussed about small things, took up the toilet all the time, I didn’t study much at all.
Because of my fear of people, I didn’t believe I could ever get a job, so I almost never tried to get a simple cashier job, and lived off my parents. I would go between trying to learn programing, absurd projects, and just going back to videogames.
I hurt many people, many insults, unjust accusations, made many enemies. I could never stick to rules or promises, I was always a coward, and never able to stick with anything.
Just some of the best people I meet, not wanting to be around me, how little I contribute to communities, and friends, is proof enough that I am a fundamentaly bad person.
I doubt that can ever change, so my goal is just to prevent others from being the same, if at all possible.
I understand that I don’t deserve the things that normal people do, and I don’t expect them anymore.
On deserving anything - none of us deserve what we get. There are so many who work so hard and get nothing, so many who do nothing and get so much. I often think I am lucky because I’m not in pain constantly, can see and hear and feel, and that is more than many people get, but I don’t deserve it more than they do - that just isn’t the way things work.
I do think you can earn things and deserve them (sort of) in that way. Like wages.
🫂 There will be causes for you hurting people. Heck, it is not easy keeping friends with a fear of people I recon. I am not saying that what you did wasn’t hurtful, but maybe it made sense. Maybe you didn’t know how else to act at the time. But the fact that you reflected on it and know you could have done better, that you try to prevent others from being like you; do you think that’s what a bad person would do? No.
You are not a bad person, you are struggeling. If you can, seek therapy or counseling. You deserve the things everybody does. You deserve happiness.
My moral compass operates on the principle: “If everyone else did what I do, would it make the world a better or worse place?” If the answer is worse, I generally don’t do it - with a few exceptions. I think this way of thinking also gives some perspective on the true impact of even small things. Throwing a candy wrapper on the ground might not seem like a big deal but if everyone does it we’ll drown in trash. Or conversely, if everyone picked a single piece of trash from the ground and put it in the garbage even once a week, the world would be litter-free in no time. Me doing the little thing is doing what can realistically be expected from one person.
Also my job entails locally reversing entropy so you could say I’m taking concrete steps to make the world a bit better every day. And my customers are thankful for it.
I don’t like the person I used to be. I’d like to think i’m a descent person now.
Yes, I try really hard to do what’s right and I think deeply about that that means. However I do have some negative emotions that can lead me astray in the moment at times. But not so much as to outweigh the good things I’ve done.
I do think I am, but I never congratulate myself for it. My conscience punishes me if I don’t try my best
Like must people I have kneejerk opinions and reactions, though I analyze them before I let them loose. I ask myself “what would a good person do?” and then I do that.
I feel like I’m an asshole 99% of the time, but that could be my anxiety and disgustingly low self worth talking. Yes I see a therapist about both and other things.
I’m the worst person I know. And because I’m such a bad person, I don’t even care.
Mostly, if self-loathing behaviour is any indication.
I have at times in my life acted in horrible ways and done things which upset others, or were just horribly dickish things to do.
But when I lie in bed at night my thoughts are sometimes about how I regret those things, and don’t want to be like that to anyone again.
I hope that counts for something.
No. I’m barely even a functional organism for about 90% of the day.
(But hey, I’m not a politician or a vacuous online personality, so I’ve got that going for me)
I think I put more good into the world than bad. Whether I put in more good than I’ve consumed, I wonder about that a lot. I’ve been very fortunate in life.
