“There are no evil people; there are perfectly good people who are off the track, but they do not need condemnation or punishment; they only need to get upon the rails again.” —Wallace D Wattles.

It’s a great reminder that shifting perspectives is so important. So I thought about how I can apply it to everyday life.

Last weekend, a guy next to me started sneezing. I felt a wave of annoyance. Then a funny thought came to me:

What if we replaced the word annoying with sneezing? Instead of saying, That guy is annoying…we can say, that guy is sneezing.

Because then we’d bless him, feel compassionate towards him because he couldn’t stop sneezing, wish him good health and be grateful for our own good health. Or, maybe next time a brand annoys us, instead of ranting about it, maybe we can just bless them, feel compassionate that they’ve gone off track. We can be grateful for the lesson, to find ways to improve ourselves, or to offer them helpful feedback, especially when they ask.