Respect Is Like Money: Some Ask For It, And Others Earn It

Respect is a universal value that we should all practice unconditionally.

However, there are people who impose it on themselves without considering others and who claim a right that does not know empathy.

Because respecting others is not exploiting them, and if a person is not able to show respect towards others, then he absolutely does not have to demand it from them.

The etymology of words always teaches us a lot. Here, if we are interested in the roots of the word “respect”, we come across the word “respectus” itself deriving from the word “specere”, which means to look again, and above all, “to show the wisdom of seeing something in its essence or its individuality ”.

If there is no respect, then everything is lost: love, honesty, integrity … Few values ​​are as essential as knowing how to respect each other, with our differences and our particularities.

We’ve all been through that moment when we were not respected in one way or another. Injustices are carried out in all areas: family, school, work, couple …

It is necessary that we reflect a little more on this term, because as Kant said, with respect develops dignity towards oneself and towards those around us.

Respect always starts with oneself

Respect always starts with oneself, because the higher our level of self-esteem, the more we respect others.

It may seem obvious, we know it, but it is not because things are logical that we always practice them, as is the case here in this case.

The ability to respect ourselves with integrity and authenticity presupposes being able to develop the following aspects:

• Have a positive attitude towards ourselves by reaffirming our personal value and, moreover, knowing how to act in accordance with our values and needs.
• Respecting yourself is knowing that you have the right to be happy, to defend yourself against injustices, to have clean spaces and a voice to make yourself heard.
• It is also necessary to feel that we deserve our successes by strengthening our self-esteem, and by being in turn responsible for each victory obtained, each choice made, and even each mistake made.

If we understand and internalize each of these aspects, we in turn will be aware that whoever is in front of us deserves all these things just as much as we do.

Because anyone who is unable to respect himself / herself will not feel anything when it comes to hurting others.

Lack of respect or the inability to “put yourself in the other’s shoes”

Erich Fromm has dealt very fully with the theme of respect in his book The Art of Loving . For this famous philosopher, humanist and psychoanalyst, respect cannot come from fear or from imposition.

If we respect a person, we should not do it out of fear or submission, as can sometimes be the case in a parent-child relationship, or even in couple relationships.

Respect cannot be bought or sold, and neither is it: respect is earned.

Respect should in fact be an attitude emanating from admiration: “I respect you because I admire your way of being, because I feel close to you and that I feel empathy for you” . Obviously, we know that this is not always the case, and that often, we have to face the following type of behavior:

• There are those who think that they have the best values ​​and have the best skills, which leads them to demand almost reverential respect from others as well as to minimize the rights of others.
• There are also those who do not respect themselves, those who lack initiative, self-esteem, and who need others to show them respect in order to have power and fuel the ego of their own lacks. This type of behavior is very destructive.

Respecting others means above all accepting them as they are, and this in our turn being sensitive to their needs.

If a person lacks empathy and is unable to put himself in the shoes of others, then it will be impossible for him to indulge in this rapprochement, this act of humility and tolerance.

Showing respect costs nothing and does a lot

The respect we have for others is the noblest intrinsic value that we can practice on a daily basis.

However, as we pointed out previously, we will never have to offer our respect by submission; every sincere act must proceed from the freedom of the heart itself, not from fear.

To show respect is to tolerate thoughts different from our own, to accept that there are other ways of understanding the world and that all are equally legitimate.

If we do not allow our children to have their own voice and initiative, we will veto their personal development, and as a result, we will act with disrespect.

In turn, the companion who feeds on the roots of equality, honesty and the complicity of small things builds healthy and above all happy relationships.

Because there is respect, because there is harmony, the very one that we must deposit in each person who enters or passes through our life, as well as in each animal and in nature in itself.

Because respect is the essence of nobility, this gift that should always define the human being …