"When our outward actions mirror the thoughts and feelings of our inner souls, only then are we being true to ourselves and keep faith with the world around us. It is one of life's self-evident truths that mankind cannot live happily in isolation, without the capacity and opportunity to love. To love self and others, besides having others love us in return, is essential to feeling a worthwhile human being.
The 18th century English writer and essayist, Samuel Johnson said, 'Life cannot subsist in society but by reciprocal concessions.' When we look at how we function and how society manages to get things done in an orderly fashion, we discover the true significance of reciprocity. Imagine a large crowd of people in the London Underground at the end of the working week, each one eager to get home and put their feet up. It seems impossible at first glance to see thousands of people rushing in all directions like busy bees, without colliding every moment and accidentally shoving someone beneath an arriving train on the overcrowded platform. Thanks to reciprocity, however, a bit of give and take as they approach each other enables each person to instinctively step aside as required, thereby allowing the other person to continue on their way unhindered.
Love is a condition to which the happiness of another person is essential to our own. Love signifies the importance of 'sharing', of giving and receiving. It helps to keep one's account with our fellow being in the black. It is perhaps the most beautiful of human compensation, for it is impossible to help another without benefiting oneself. Reciprocity forms the basis of all social relationships. When we cooperate with others we discover that others are more likely to cooperate with us. Even in our love life and our relationships with significant others, reciprocity becomes the banker of our emotional investments; the basic currency of our dealings with each other.
It is both unwise and represents bad judgement to ever treat another person less than oneself. It makes no sense to make bad Karma; to destroy the very principle through which social influence is believed to operate. In order to receive what we want, we give out what we need.
Every person we ever meet is a mirror of reciprocity's truth. Just as a loving person lives in a loving world, a hostile person lives in a hostile world. If you like people and get on with them easily and naturally, then people will naturally like you and you will become ever popular. If on the other hand, you are suspicious of strangers and are uncomfortable in their presence, then they will naturally be uncomfortable in your company.
It is far better for one to live in the knowledge that they have been created in the image of God, and to do everything we do in the knowledge it will eventually become known. You will be and do as others naturally see you; expressing outwardly what is reflected inwardly. You will be and do as it says on the tin; a good egg all round!" William Forde: November 8th, 2017.