Sometimes, the hardest things to see are the ones that are right in front of us.
Like the time I took my family to our favorite restaurant for dinner.
Our server was unusually busy and 10 minutes later, when we were still waiting for our drinks and hadn’t yet ordered, I started to get concerned.
After 30 minutes, my kids were getting hungry and restless and I was becoming frustrated.
When our food order finally arrived, roughly half of it was wrong.
Now I was mad.
As I was considering whether to complain to the manager or to leave a 2 cent tip to communicate my displeasure, I heard a loud crash.
Our server had accidentally dropped another customer’s order and the floor was covered with shattered dishes and food.
The desperate look in her eyes snapped me out of my anger as I realized, for the first time, what a difficult night she must be having.
A quiet inner voice finally broke through my irritation and asked, “Isn’t there a better way to handle this?”
In the end, I swallowed my pride, thanked our server and gave her an extra generous tip while wishing her a better evening.
From that day forward she was our dearest friend whenever we went to this restaurant.
The lesson here is that sometimes we need to put ourselves into the other person’s shoes.
Breaking out of a selfish mindset starts with remembering that we’re not only people who matter.
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