"respect"

i do workshops and one of the concepts i have to facilitate was "respect". for that, my first question to my learners was always "how do you feel when someone does not show you respect?". and often, responses would come in fast and furious. all responses were invariably very negative energy ones. and when the response slow down, i would pause with a moment's silence, look into the eyes of my learners and ask "why? why did you have such negative responses?". and the class often go silent.

it is difficult to answer such questions. such questions require some critical thinking and soul searching, something that we adults have learned not to do. something that perhaps kids are very good at, but have learned not to be as they grow up. that's another story altogether. back to the workshop. following the silence, and with some facilitation, the class always gravitate to one answer. and that is...

"self-worth"

that unconsciously, all of us have all accorded ourselves an unstated "value" for ourselves. a value that defines our self-worth. and we feel negative when we perceive ourselves to be disrespected because we interpret it as an attack/ not recognizing our "value". we need to therefore recognise this interesting fact: that when it comes to "respect", there will alway 2 entities - one of self and one of the other, which may be a person or an object. and in the context of a "person", it invariably point to the whole idea of "reciprocity". 

this, therefore, leads a few other imperatives when it comes to respect:

• "act of giving/ showing" is important, but what is perhaps more important is that the other person must feel it. 

• for the person to feel it, it is very important that us to be conscious of the mental models/ context of who we are dealing with and to conduct ourselves in a manner that allow him/ her to feel that we value him/ her. 

• the onus therefore, lie with us to know the difference in mental models and agreeing that there are more than our way of seeing things. and once we can do this, we can then adopt an open-heart to show the other person we value him/ her. it boils down to seeing things from the other persons point of view, agreeing to disagree, accepting the differences and connecting. it applies to customer service, culture, religion, gender, sexuality, etc etc etc. 

so, back to the fundamental point - the concept of respect starts with valuing people (and object) and responding to them in a manner that helps them understand we value them.

ok, i am ranting at the start of the weekend.