Join me for a short experiment. Someone, person A for clarity, comes to you with a problem, they are having a disagreement with someone else, you guessed it, person B. This disagreement has caused person B to avoid A. Person A asks your advice about why B is avoiding them, and you point out their treatment of person B. They then ask if you are saying it because of them. Essentially, this is probably what you mean, but this is my experiment so I want to bring up another angle. You instead tell them that it is their fault only if they are using their bad attitude as their identity.

I know that is at best, splitting hairs and at worst, coming close to trying to absolve people of any wrongdoing. My goal is to make myself first, and others who might see this, think about their attitudes. Most of the time, our arguments are caused by us being angry, prideful, whatever. They are caused by something we shouldn’t even be.

Let me try it this way: would you walk up to someone and say, “Hey there. My name is Angry?” I’m guessing not, but we do that in a manner of speaking. If we maintain a bad attitude, even to just a small group of people, that attitude becomes our identity. They know us by that, and will share that identity with others. We might as well be wearing one of those name tags that have become so famous from meetings.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t like that idea. I don’t mind being called a nickname, but I don’t want to be introduced to others as, “Angry,” or “Prideful,” or some other undesirable trait. That just doesn’t sound good.