Ever notice how you deal with dozens of other human beings on a daily basis? Well, if you go to UNL, you likely do. Whether it’s your professors, classmates, gas station attendants, or people you see walking across campus, you have tons of social interactions everyday. And something I’ve noticed throughout many of these interactions, is that a lot of people are just sour. They seem to let the numerous social interactions wear them down until all they are capable of is being that impatient dick waiting in line at the gas station.

But think about it, you know what it’s like to be on the receiving end of a negative interaction. It doesn’t take much to make a mundane conversation unpleasant, which is why I’ve realized that it’s the least you can do to try and be a pleasant person to deal with as much as possible. It’s easy to make someone feel bad about themselves, but that should be added incentive to see if you can deliver positive energy in your fleeting interactions with strangers.

It doesn’t matter if you won’t see this person again, not having to deal with their emotional state after your interaction isn’t an excuse to treat other humans as disposable. This doesn’t just apply to dealing with strangers, when dealing with friends and family you should make a point of being a decent person. Every text message you send, every tweet that you tweet, every tinder reply you send should be considerate of how the other human on the receiving end will feel about it. If you get a weird pleasure out of saying off putting things to people you don’t know very well, maybe you should reconsider your current way of life.

You may think it’s funny to troll friends and acquaintances, and you may be right, but people need to be more cognizant about the way they are making other humans feel about themselves. Every social interaction you make with someone, no matter how small, will leave the recipient of that interaction with some sort of feeling. Don’t let the feeling you give people be weird, upsetting, or stupid. You have the choice of being a pleasant passerbyer, or another asshole on their way. You decide the way that you treat other people, remember that.