"What do you believe about people?"

This has become one of my favorite questions in the world!  I started asking others to fill in the blank on this one and here is some of what I heard:
 
..."People can not be trusted" 
..."People are only out for themselves"
..."People are flawed"
..."People will do what you want only as long as you are watching"

So what did I learn?...that what we believe about people says a lot about us - not "other people". 





Recognizing this truth, and recognizing that all people share certain truths (we all live, breath and feel), maybe we could agree that all people have strengths?  Maybe if we look for the strengths in people, we will see them. Maybe seeing people's strengths would change our beliefs and we'd say things like...I believe: 

People want to be understood, not judged
People want to be asked and heard, not told and dismissed
People want to be allowed their emotions - not to be told to suck it up, be factual, be unfeeling
People want relationship, for others have their back, to not feel alone
People want to be included, not excluded
People want to be believed in
  
We're all human. 
We all struggle.
We all have strengths.
We all want to be believed in. 

What if we practiced believing in people?
What if we started seeing people's strengths? 
Maybe what we believe about people would change.      

 

What do you believe about people?