Not asking questions to be nosy vs sticking up for yourself?

Lately I’ve not been asking questions because I don’t like to question people unless it’s absolutely necessary. But sometimes I wonder if at times I’m not sticking up for myself. Yesterday at the grocery store I bought two warm bottles of tea. The cashier put a paid sticker on them but did not put them in a bag. I was surprised she didn’t put them in a bag or ask me if I wanted one. But I didn’t think it was a big deal and I just took them and left. I know some rude people would have been like “uh, a bag?” But I know grocery store employees get a lot of crap as it is and maybe she thought I was going to drink them. I was also trying to set an example for my mom who is alway so rude to store employees. So I just took them and left.

But lately I’ve been doing a lot of that of never asking questions and always just going along with everything and I’m wondering where the line is. Am I just not sticking up for myself?

Dear Mountaindewed, [Don?]

Wish I had some wisdom to share with you about what you ask, but sadly I don't.

In my opinion [and my opinion is often wrong] I think that "sticking up for oneself" can be either virtuous or vicious and anything in between depending on the circumstances.

It takes a great deal of prudence to know which is which.

In the course of life there may be times when there are situations that are matters of life or death importance. I think that in these situations, "sticking up for oneself" can be a great virtue.

But I suspect that many of us give a sense of life or death importance to matters that are not really matters of life or death. In such cases, I wonder whether "sticking up for oneself" is a virtue?

Perhaps I am mistaken, but sometimes it seems that persons with low self-esteem or those with a grudge against life can be overly sensitive to minor matters. I fall into this group myself.

And sometimes it seems a person who was wronged at at earlier stage of life might "get revenge" later in life in situations that are not really of great import.

Of course these are just my personal and fallible reflections. Hopefully many people here on the Forums, people with many different life experiences, insights and knowledge will see your post and respond with words more helpful than my poor words.

Something you might want to consider as a possibility: People can sometimes see the world through the eyes of their expectations. These expectations color what they see and can distort it. Things can look awful sometimes because perhaps our expectations about ourselves and others is unrealistic.

For example, it is unrealistic to expect a human being to be perfect. No human being is an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-seeing Infinite Being. But much distress, in my humble opinion is often caused when people have unrealistic expectations.

People are going to sometimes be rude and inconsiderate, neglectful and unfeeling, crude and unfair. Perhaps we can tolerate much of this if we realize that we are people too and have our rude and inconsiderate moments as well. Perhaps it isn't other people who "make" us mad so much as it is our unrealistic expectations about people that cause us anger and distress?

Perhaps it is helpful to distinguish the falls and failures of others into cases that are matters of life or death importance and those that are not. Perhaps then we can live a little more peacefully and tolerantly.

I have seen people treat getting the shortest line at a supermarket checkout as a matter of life or death importance. I have seen people treat getting the closest parking spot to a store as a matter of life or death importance. I can be one of these people myself!

We each have a kind of ideal "self" in the back of our minds, how we think we "should" be in various situations. As we go along in life we continually compare our "real self" with this abstract "ideal self." Sometimes we even use this abstract "ideal self" to mentally beat ourselves up. We beat up the real in the name of the ideal.

Unfortunately, it can happen that our abstract ideal self is not realistic. We may be in the habit of questioning our "real self" but forget to question this "ideal self." Is our "ideal self" realistic or perfectionistic? Sometimes it can prove helpful to take a look at our "ideal self" and enquire into whether it is based on realistic or unrealistic expectations. This can sometimes lower our stress level and threshold of anger. It can also perhaps prevent useless and impractical self-hate and self-loathing.

These are of course only my opinions. I am not a doctor or medical professional and so cannot really offer an "advice" that others could or should rely upon. My field is philosophy and I am not really qualified to speak outside this field.

I do hope you find answers to your question about "sticking up for yourself." Please do not be too hard on yourself and remember that we are all "works in progress" so to speak.

You show a great deal of insight and self-awareness. Both of those are often rare virtues. Sometimes it takes great heroism just to be patient with ourselves. The love we owe others we also owe ourselves if we are to be loving people.

I wish you only the very best, Mountaindewed!

Sincerely yours, Yao Wen

It sounds like you wanted a bag but some thoughts got in the way: you were worried about sounding rude, you wanted to set an example for your mom. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Is it possible that store is giving out less bags due to environmental concerns?

I also think its ok to ask for a bag when I don't express my needs and wants, like when I just hold them in, I sometimes get that itchy "what's going on here?" Feeling that you got.

Thank you. My mom is like that. She will sometimes put the the entire store in an uproar just to get to the shortest line. It’s especially bad when they just open a new checkout after theres a long wait. It’s almost like waiting in line is so anxiety provoking for her and she’s about to have a panic attack if she doesn’t get checked out right away.

Yes you are right.

I was wondering about the environmental issues. Also at the grocery store job I had several years ago we would sometimes run very low on bags. So I thought maybe that was the issue and they needed to save the bags for larger purchases instead of a couple things that could be carried out.

Thats where road rage comes from, sticking up for yourself. Which is ridic! Some people are new to an area and looking for a street, for instance. They are not doing something "on purpose" to the other drivers! I should say, i am not...!