Are You A Good Person?

Read before you answer.

Apr 01, 2024

“In this world, there are good people, and there are bad people,“ said Martin Luther King Jr, but that is subject to what side of the room you’re standing, isn’t it? If it is subjective, how can we be absolutely sure?
- Abiola Okunsanya

I met someone a few weeks ago, and in the middle of a conversation, the person asked, "Are you a good person?"

You would agree with me that this isn't a typical 'talking stage' question. It's not a question that anybody asks generally. Usually, people would decide for themselves based on what you do to and around them.

There are even people who take the optimistic position of life and simply assume that everyone they meet is a ‘good person’ until the person shocks them and proves to be worse than Adolf Hitler.

Some people even decide to assume the worst of people they don't know until the person works his way to prove to them that they are good people, and so, generally, nobody asks the question point blank, or at least, I hadn't come across the question point black before.

Maybe that was why it was hell'a thought-provoking.

Am I a good person? First, it sounded like a trick question because if I said I was a good person, even though there wasn't a follow-up question, I'd have asked those questions in my head over and over again. If I was a good person, what scale did I use to measure my goodness? How did I arrive at the conclusion that I am a good person? Would everyone around me think the same of me? Do I even truly think that of myself?

I began to reevaluate who I thought a good person was, and from my definition, I certainly am not a good person, heck, going by that definition, I don't think anybody is good.

A good person is someone who does good things all the time, someone who makes good decisions, says good things, and behaves in a goodly manner at all times. If that's the definition of a good person, I sure as hell am not a good person.

I don't do good things all the time, as much as I want to. There are times I make shitty decisions, there are times I duck away from responsibilities that should be mine. There are also probably times I've cheated and lied and not shown up for myself and other people even after promising that I would.

There are times I've probably deceived someone just for my gain, and the truth is, as much as I want it to be, I can't say with absolute confidence that all of those days are completely over. I'd most likely still make bad decisions, behave horrendously out of character, hurt someone, you name it!

In the face of all of these could I confidently say, that I am a good person? Absolutely not! I simply wake up every day and try to make decent and good decisions, better decisions than I made the previous day. That's just it. I'm not a good person, I'm a person on the journey to good.

I'm not a good person, I'm simply a person on the journey to good.

"Well, I don't know. I try," was my honest response to the question. In fact, it'd have been a better answer if I had said, "No, I'm not. I just try daily."

Luckily enough, it was a good enough reply for the person who asked. However, thoughts about it still haven't left my mind.

All these thoughts made me realize that I have been organizing the dealings of my life from this angle; that nobody is good or bad. There are no "good people" or "bad people." There are merely people. The same person who's 'good' to you is 'bad' to someone else. The same person you think is the worst person alive is the same person some people are living comfortable, peaceful lives because of.

These labels; good, and bad, they disintegrate at the slightest shift of narratives. Not only that, they are also very crucial to our survival as individuals.

When you label someone as a good person, you set yourself up for wicked and terrible things in unrighteousness, because when the person does something bad like they most likely will - after all, they are humans, your heart breaks apart. The pedestal you've placed them on comes crashing upon your head, and if you're left alive, you'd regret why you never set boundaries, thinking the 'good person' only has goodness about them.

On the flip side, when you label somebody as bad, you are automatically disadvantaged. You block yourself from the potential goodness that could emanate from their life to yours. It ends up being your loss. That you have labeled someone bad doesn't mean they are incapable of good. It doesn't even mean they are bad.

So maybe nobody is bad or good. Maybe we are just simply people who are trying to be better versions of ourselves daily, whatever that is.