Rules

This isn’t really that hard of a rule given I really do try my best to be kind to everyone.  I find that there are people that don’t deserve me being kind to them, but in the spirit of the rule I will continue to try and be kind to everyone, even when someone is yelling at me for no reason.

Rule #2 Help Others

This can be as simple as making another persons life a little better, by given them tea or coffee and giving them a comfortable place to sit for a little while.  Give someone a lift when it’s not really on your way, or any number of little things that don’t really inconvenience you and are a simple way to make life better.

Rule #3 Keep work and Personal Separate

This is a rule that I have I had a hard time breaking until recently.  This rule came from having worked and lived with someone for a long time, and when it ended we couldn’t do either together.  Since arriving in Doha, I’ve been pretty successful in following this rule until someone made me re-think it.  Keep in mind my social circle here is entirely made up of people I work with; we don’t really have a choice given the environment.  Yes there’s an ex pat community, but they don’t really like us very much and it’s nice to be able to work and play with people you know.  But like I said I’ve been forced to re-think this rule and I’ll get to that later.

Rule #4 Don’t mess with someone else’s personal life

When I first met my now ex-wife she was more or less dating my friend.  I can’t even remember what happened for the most part but we were young and dating is pretty fluid, or at least that’s how it’s supposed to be when you’re young.  Except for someone like me, who didn’t really think dating was for me and went with more long term relationships.  Anyways I digress, the rule came from my having lost a good friend when I started dating my now ex-wife and eventually got married to her.  I never asked my now friend about this, but I knew how he felt having had the same thing happen to me.  I was blinded by my emotions and now I’ve lost both people from my life.  One would call in Karma; I would rather call it fate.  It’s not that I don’t believe in Karma, I just would rather know that fate had more of a role, maybe I was meant to come to Doha and then travel Thailand and Australia, which I wouldn’t have done if I was still married.

Rule #5 Don’t hate people

This is a relatively new rule, it came from my discovering I don’t really hate people, I hate the decisions people can make.  It’s a much easier way to live life then hating someone, you simply hate the thing they do or the decisions they make.  Let’s look at the US president for a moment, it’s hard to hate him as a person, after all he’s learning disabled, and you can’t hate someone for the bad genes they get.  Instead I hate the decisions he makes as president, which have gone from bad to worse, but again I hate the decision not the person.