15 May 2025 · 6 min
Thomas Anglero argues that constantly interpreting everything through your own lens makes you miserable. He uses a store encounter and neighbor story to show how shifting perspective to see life from other people's viewpoints actually improves relationships, work, and how you feel.
Welcome to the Soul of Innovation podcast. I am Thomas Anglero and I have a question for you. Do you live every moment of your life only thinking from your perspective? Thinking about, "Woe is me. Oh, my life is in such a way, my marriage, my job, my income or my lack of income." No one finds me attractive, no one sees me, no one talks to me, blah blah blah. Everything is from your perspective. Is that you? My project, my school, my lack of social life, all I do is study, maybe I don't study enough, all I do is social media. Is this you? Why are you always thinking about your life from your perspective? It's a trap. Let me tell you a story and help you out along the way. I just came back from the store, and in the store there were several people there, and this store is on a part of town, let's say, that's affluent. So the people that go to this store want to be seen, but these two women in particular, they made sure everybody saw them. Talking loud, loud clothes, laughing loud, the whole typical thing. But one of the women went all the way to the other end of the store and then she said, "Oh, I forgot something," and she ran through the store to make sure everybody saw her running through the store. There's no reason to run through the store. They weren't in a rush. Are you a person— now that's an exaggerated version of what I'm asking you— but are you a person that everything is about you and every moment's got to be about you, every place you go to is about you? Are you always thinking only about you and from your perspective? Do you realize that there's so many people, that everyone around you has a life, and that the trap that the universe is throwing at you is that is allowing you to spend every moment of your day thinking only from your perspective and only about you, and you're embraced in this me, me, me, me, me, me, me, when there's— that's the trap. And what it's saying is, you want to optimize life, you want to have a fantastic life, you want to have a full life, you want to have incredible opportunities at work, you want to have incredible opportunities in love, you want to have incredible opportunities in finance, you want to have incredible opportunities in vacations, then think of every moment from everybody else's perspective. Literally walk down the street, and as you look at people, go, "Hmm, I wonder what kind of life that person has. I wonder how that person's doing. That person looks like they're a lawyer. That person looks like they're a doctor. That person looks like they're a student. Wow, students have it tough. Doctors, God, my life is in their hand. Lawyers, I have nothing good to say about lawyers, I'll skip them." Plumbers, they work hard and they have to mess with the feces in the ground. Think of life from everyone else's perspective. Then you've conquered life. Walk down the street and as you meet people, think about their life, their challenges, and you've conquered life and the most amazing things will happen to you. As I came back from the store, I saw my neighbor, and she was talking to some guy who's doing some work on our house, some carpenter or something, and she didn't seem to be so happy to talk to him. And I waved hi to her, she waved hi back, but I noticed something. When you wave hi to someone, if you turn your wrist the other way, it's the same thing as gesturing "go away." And she actually waved hi, and then she flipped her wrist and like, "Go away." And I realized that she's self-consumed in her moment about her. That here's this carpenter who's hitting on her. Here's this neighbor who's saying hi, hitting on her. I realized that, man, she's in a moment. And I didn't get upset, but I understood life from her perspective, from her moment. I didn't think of that from me saying, "Oh, somebody just blew me off." She didn't blow me off. She was in a moment. How easy can your life be if you looked at everything from someone else's perspective? Then you understand how almost nothing's personal, and how everything is because that person's experiencing something difficult, something hard. Here in 2025, the year 2025, everything is hard, everything is difficult, and everything is new, and people are super uncomfortable. They're not happy with themselves, they're not happy with the way things are going, and they can't figure out why things that worked yesterday are not working today. People liked them yesterday, they don't like them today. What are the new rules? What are the new conditions? They understand you can optimize everything by looking at life through their eyes. Go forth and spread beauty and light from their perspective, from everyone else's perspective but your own. You want to have love in your life? Then love others by seeing their life before you think about you. You want to have money? Think about everybody else and money will come. You want to be respected? Respect others, and then respect is granted back. Think of life from everyone else's perspective but your own. I'm Thomas Anglero, reflecting on a moment in a store that reminds me that We're in our heads too much, and we have to take care of everybody else but ourselves sometimes so that our life is the most fulfilling. I love you. Until next time.
