The price of a teeny weeny bit of self-esteem

INCIDENT 1.

Where : Somewhere in US.

Once while returning from the office, a person, lets call him A, was walking along with a friend of his, back from the nearby rail stop to his home. On his way, along the footpath was group of 7-8 "Afro-American" boys roughly aged between 12-17. As A approached nearer, one of them offered his hand and said "Hi dude". Well looking at him, A thought that he did not exactly look friendly. Hence, ignoring him, they walked forward. It was then they passed some comments, which A conveniently ignored (probably his friend as well).

What followed was a couple of moments of silence and then resumption of the discussion that was going on.

INCIDENT 2.

Where : Somewhere in US.

Well, a few days back, A along with a few friends of his were returning from their shopping of groceries from the Indian Street, a guy again in an SUV was waiting at a traffic signal. He, too, was not what he could call as "friendly". They passed him on their way to the bus stop. He, too, passed some comment, which the guys conveniently chose to ignore. Obviously looking at the excitement of the guy in SUV, A and his friends were not expecting him to enquire about how well they were doing in US and whether they had any problems.

Again, what followed was a couple of moments of silence. But this time they did not resume our discussion. Instead, one of them (not A) replied how tame they had become, how they should have gone back to the guy and give him a mouthful back. Instead, others decided to keep walking on.

INCIDENT 3.

Where : On a famous street in Bangalore.

This was when A was in Bangalore early this year. A was thugged on what is probably one of the busiest and happening places in Bangalore. Two rowdies approached him saying that they were looking for a guy who had slashed their friend with a knife and A resembled like him. At the end of the whole talk during which A was desperately trying to get out of the "mis-understanding", A lost his cellphone to them. The guys maintained the "Fear Factor" throughout and hence were successful in pulling out the whole thing on him.

Two days later, A had put the incident behind him. Many people advised him that he should have gone to the police and lodged a complaint. But he did not.

Well that brings me to the question whether what A did was right or wrong.

Basically in such a situation, there are two ways that one would react.

The idealistic way

• Tit for Tat. Wherein you defend your self-esteem. You go back, return the "compliment" back to the person.

The submissive way

• Ignore them as if they have never happened to you. But you always know that it did happen and you are not comfortable with your own reaction to it.

So on paper, to put it in black and white, the second way appears much greyish compared to the first one.

Then why do most of us opt for the darker option?

Well the answer probably is that we are not ready to pay the possible price for being a HERO.

In the three incidents mentioned above, it could be simply that you could simply make the 'other' person keep quiet by giving a word or two back. But there is a chance that things could go worse. And that is where most of us falter and take a step backwards. We are more worried about the 'WHAT IF THE WORSE HAPPENS?'. So, is it wrong?

That takes us to another question.

What is the price of a teeny weeny bit of your self-esteem?

Now a confession. Yes, the above three incidents occurred with me.

Well, I don't feel like a hero after these things.
I know I have compromised.

So what did I gain?
Possibly saved on some physical damage to myself by avoiding confrontation.
And hence, some hospital bills.
But the most important, A litte peace of mind.

It requires a small spark to ignite a huge fire.
A huge fire that can possibly damage everything.
Hence, its always better to never to let the spark out in the first place.

I have always wanted to live my life peacefully with minimal troubles.
I've got only one life and am very careful about making the most of it.
For me, my peace of mind is much pricey than probably squabbling with some person for almost no reason.

So am I wrong?
Well, I think 'No'.

I think I may have just got a fair deal...