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Proyecto Visión 21

Negative people do not like used cars or a medium-size bass

Francisco Miraval

Many years ago, soon after I bought my first car in the United States, we (my wife and I) went to visit a family we had met at church. Almost immediately after parking in front of the house, and seeing the old van I was driving, the owner of the house came to me and, even before greeting me, he began a long monologue about all the defects and problems he saw in my “new” car.

The man spoke without stopping for several minutes, listing not only all the expensive repairs the van would need (he was not a mechanic and he did not test drive the van), but also all the fines police would give me due to malfunctions with my vehicle, for example, brakes failing at a traffic light.

After saying what he wanted to say, and without including a single positive word, the man went inside his house, showing no interest in listening to my side of the story. After that day, I never saw him again.

I thought that event has been erased from my memory a long time ago, but the memory came back to me after a recent incident when I was fishing at a local lake. I like fishing, and one of the main reasons is that, if you are careful and with a little luck, you can return the fish unharmed to the water. That is what I do most of the time those few times when I catch a fish.

A few mornings ago, a hungry bass decided the nightcrawlers at the end of my line were good enough for breakfast. Using the line, the bass telegraphed the decision to the rod. I respected the request and a couple of minutes later the medium-size bass was in my hands.

Suddenly, an old man came to me and -without greeting me- he began to tell me all the problems I would have with the park rangers and the fines I would have to pay for keeping the bass. Obviously, the old man never asked me about my intentions of returning the bass to the water. In fact, he left without waiting to see what I would do. (The bass was safely returned to the water.)

Indicating with his hands that he would notify the park rangers about the illegal action I was about to commit, the old man walked back to his car and left, leaving a cloud of negativity floating around me, that I dissipated when I realized the whole episode was irrelevant.

However, there are indeed people unable to control their negativity. They feel obligated to share negative comments, even if they do not know what is going on. They are sure everything will be bad. They rejoice in attacking their surprised victims with negativity grenades.

There are few true defenses against those people, because dialogue, smiles, and “Thanks” are not effective. However, we should not allow them to ruin our day or our lives. We do not deserve it.

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