One of my pet hates is people who drive big fancy Chelsea taxis into parent and child spaces in supermarkets when they have no children.
This happened to me again this week on Tuesday when a ‘gym guy’ pulled up in the children's spaces outside the Aldi that I was going into. Even though there were multiple spaces all around the car park, he got out of his car with his bags and went into Aldi.
He looked like he really fancied himself. I wanted to speak to him, to ask him where his kids were and why he thought it was alright to park there, but I didn't, and the reason I didn't is - see below.
Chris Barrow told me years ago that you shouldn't wrestle with pigs and s**t, because the shit stinks and the pigs love it, and that's why you don't confront someone in the supermarket.
Karma will get to him, probably, and that's enough. I don't have to be a crusader for parent and child spaces (there were several others that were free); it's just a principle. It's like the guy who parks in the disabled space; it's wrong, but that's, but something will get them.
The reason that you don't react is wrapped around the principle of the ‘opposite of love’.
Bizarrely, this is another Chris Barrowism that was taught to me years ago when I was in the middle of a huge conflict with one of my best friends. Chris had asked me, “What's the opposite of love?”Instinctively I had answered hate, and then he replied by saying no, the opposite of love is indifference.
Think about that for a minute; that's what it is.
We were at the dentistry show last week. The Campbell Academy Group, Ellie and Ibby, were with us for the first time at a show, and they were outstanding and amazing, but for the second year in a row, we were confronted by a ‘competitor’.
This is someone who is also providing a similar product to us, although less extensively.
I think it's fair to say these guys are intimidated by us, or at least they very much dislike us, and although there is some sort of feigned politeness across the show, there is an underlying tension that exists.
It doesn't exist from our part, because the truth is, I don't care, but that's certainly not the part on the other side of this small relationship.
Last year, one of the people who worked for this organisation waited until the stand was quiet and confronted Tom in the most aggressive and horrible way.
When I returned from having gone for a coffee and came back, Tom was on high alert, and it looked like he was ready for a fight, such is the way that he was spoken to and intimidated.
When we turned up again this year, the same people were around; this time they waited until the stand was empty and only Ibby was there.
Ibby would be one of the youngest members of The Campbell Academy team, and the person again tried to intimidate and upset him.
You have to know Ibby to understand that he's not for being intimidated or upset, and he handled himself beautifully.
We discussed how we might manage the situation or whether I should go over and speak to the individual, which was my overriding urge, but then I remembered that the opposite of love is indifference.
The problem with the person in question was that they are intimidated by us, and we are not intimidated by them; the problem is that we were giving them no attention whatsoever, because we are completely indifferent.
They hate us, which means that they still have feelings for us, so they're a long way, a long way from the very evolved position of indifference.
In the supermarket, I decided to be indifferent to the guy that I parked there, and for many other people who do things which are kinder to my values, that is now the approach.
I only have a limited amount of emotional energy to give to all the things I want to do; better not to waste it on di**s.
Blog Post Number - 4577
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