via weheartit
Do you like reading pop psychology? I found a new favorite website for you! Here is: You Are Not So Smart.
I love pop psychology, it makes me feel like I've just learned a secret way to solve the entire world, when I should really take it like this website shells it out: Sorry dumbass, you can't do anything because your brain got in the way.
The life lesson I learned today was from the post titled "The Benjamin Franklin Effect." The jist of it is this: You think that you are nice to people you like and mean to people you hate because you are a reasoning creature with a brain. Cause and effect, etc., etc. Problem is, cause and effect probably aren't what you think they are, because your brain is this weird black box that makes you do things you don't think you do. Instead of being nice being the effect of liking someone, sometimes liking someone is the effect of being nice to them. It's the result of "cognitive dissonance" which means the short circuit happening in your brain when you do something that you don't believe in. Your brain can't handle the incongruity of action and belief, so it changes the belief. So you do something nice for someone, and then you convince yourself that you must like them, because you only do nice things for people you like.
Moral of the story: Be nice to everyone. Life is much easier when you don't have anyone to dislike.