Your Desire To Be Right May Make You Wrong

I've been sitting on this blog post for over a month now, trying to figure out the proper way to express to you exactly what I mean by the title. I've come to the conclusion during this month of pondering that I will express to you in the best way I know how what I mean and hope it comes out properly.  I apologize in advance if it doesn't but I really am doing my best. 

This post started with a friendly debate between my fiance and I about proper attire for a wedding reception when it hasn't been clearly stated what should be worn. 

It got me thinking, after our debate got a bit heated (we eventually both backed down and agreed to disagree) that sometimes the want or need to be right can be so overpowering that it will make you wrong in the end. 

Not necessarily wrong about the facts but wrong about the way you've achieved proving your point.  If at the end of your debate, when you're feeling on top of the world because you've proven someone wrong who was adamant about themselves being right, your rational brain takes over and makes you realize that you have, in fact, hurt the feelings of that person, crushed their spirit a bit or even caused their self esteem to drop down drastically then you are in fact in the wrong. 

That is what I mean by the title of this post.  Your burning desire to be right and to shove it in the face of the person who is arguing with you and walk around with your ego inflated and feeling like the champion may in fact hurt the person you have just proven wrong.  And if that is often the case for you, then you need to learn when to tone it down or simply agree to disagree and let it go because hurting someone who's relationship with them you value isn't worth being right. 

I find myself doing this exact thing very often with my fiance since he has always had that burning desire to be right and rub it in your face.  So instead of giving him the satisfaction of victory or making it into a huge argument (remember to learn to pick to your battles!) I simply back down and tell him that I am going to agree to disagree with him and that's the end of it. 

Remember this folks, it's an important lesson in humanity and humility.  Yes, being right is a wonderful feeling and proving someone wrong who is adamant about their opinion or point of view to be right can be a great ego booster, you really don't want to hurt them, hurt your relationship with them or end up losing that person's respect for you. 

In the end, the real question you have to ask is this; Is my desire to be right so much more important than the good thing I have going on with this person? 

If you can't answer an honest "no" to this question, then perhaps you need to sit back and really think things through before you open your mouth and spout something off that can, in the end, hurt more than a knife or bullet wound ever would. 

Just some food for thought folks.