Good intentions -- how much do they mean to you?

[vorlon13]

Time for another vorlon story;

Long ago, before I hit 12 Steppers, I was out helling around with a friend and we scored some acid and some coke. D noted we had enough dope for 3, and said he'd like to include a cousin of his who had been injured in a car accident and was now a paraplegic and who gets left out of everything.

I didn't have a problem with that, so we snagged the cousin and went back to my place and partied. The cousin got the coke, and D and I dropped the acid.

The party eventually concluded without incident and a good time was had by all. At some point D took his cousin back home and returned to my place. In my doped up condition (which was to persist for quite some time) I didn't really understand or appreciate aspects of that evening.

Yeah, providing coke to D's cousin was a bad idea, he was already on some meds from his accident, and I can't imagine cocaine doing his condition any good. However, something else happened, and that was D's care of his cousin. My place at the time was not wheel chair accessible, and D rose to the occasion and carried, carefully, his paralyzed cousin everywhere that night.

After getting into 12 Stepping, I've pondered that night, and despite his (and mine, LOL) drug problem, I've realized D was in his heart a decent guy.

Other aspects of my time with D included sex, and at the time, it was purely physical, pig rutting. Years later, I've wondered what a post 12 Steppers D would be like, and did I let someone pass thru my life I might better have kept, especially in lieu of some of the others that I did stick with that now seem less worthy?


So, we have a bunch of actions and intentions there, some good, some bad, some ambiguous, and all subject to 20/20 hindsight.

[GrandizerII]

The opposite of good intentions isn't necessarily bad intentions, IMO. Rather, I think if someone ''only'' has good intentions, but doesn't act on them...who cares? If someone has a ton of money for example and they had good intentions to help out the homeless, but they didn't...their intentions while good, didn't really matter in the end. It can also be a way for people to never act on it, and just say...''well, you know I had good intentions, riiiiight?'' lol

I understand the point of the OP, but good intentions by themselves aren't enough.

Good intentions sometimes just aren't wanted.

[Edwardo Piet]

The opposite of good intentions isn't necessarily bad intentions, IMO. Rather, I think if someone ''only'' has good intentions, but doesn't act on them...who cares? If someone has a ton of money for example and they had good intentions to help out the homeless, but they didn't...their intentions while good, didn't really matter in the end. It can also be a way for people to never act on it, and just say...''well, you know I had good intentions, riiiiight?'' lol

I understand the point of the OP, but good intentions by themselves aren't enough.

I agree. I would say though that malicious intentions are one of the most horrific things in this world if truly malicious enough because the malicious person has no interest in improving. Also someone with good intentions can be trusted to be honest at least.

It's like the difference between being honestly mistaken about important information and repeated manipulative lying about important information. An honest person is a trustworthy person. They might not be reliable, but they're trustworthy... they aren't going to go out of their way to manipulate you repeatedly with no chance of improvement.

I value my honesty and my intentions very much and I value the honesty and intentions of other honest people very much too.

[*Deidre*]

The opposite of good intentions isn't necessarily bad intentions, IMO. Rather, I think if someone ''only'' has good intentions, but doesn't act on them...who cares? If someone has a ton of money for example and they had good intentions to help out the homeless, but they didn't...their intentions while good, didn't really matter in the end. It can also be a way for people to never act on it, and just say...''well, you know I had good intentions, riiiiight?'' lol

I understand the point of the OP, but good intentions by themselves aren't enough.

I agree. I would say though that malicious intentions are one of the most horrific things in this world if truly malicious enough because the malicious person has no interest in improving. Also someone with good intentions can be trusted to be honest at least.

It's like the difference between being honestly mistaken about important information and repeated manipulative lying about important information. An honest person is a trustworthy person. They might not be reliable, but they're trustworthy... they aren't going to go out of their way to manipulate you repeatedly with no chance of improvement.

I value my honesty and my intentions very much and I value the honesty and intentions of other honest people very much too.

lol Of course bad intentions are well...bad. But, what I'm saying is ''intentions'' in and of themselves, are not enough in general. The end result of someone's actions, and how they treat you, is better to observe, than someone having ''good intentions.'' I've known people who say they have good intentions, but they did a lot of 'bad' things. Some people I think, use the phrase as an excuse. Not sure if this makes sense.

[Thumpalumpacus]

To me good intentions mean an awful lot. There are so many shitty people in this world and it means the world to me when people mean well. And some people go far beyond good intentions in that they are just such incredibly compassionate and empathetic people. It all means so much to me. When I know someone cares and they show it, it makes me smile. Sometimes it really is the thought that counts

They help, sure. But I've heard, and given, enough well-intentioned words abandoned right after their utterance, recently enough, to know that all the good intentions in the world won't bring a person to do as they've promised.

Empathy is beautiful inside the moment, but it's the showing, as you mention, that tells the truth about a person. All the high-minded words don't mean a damned thing when they're only honored in the breach.

/cynic

The message I'm getting from this is that good intentions are of course better than bad intentions. But if they are ever used to excuse negative behavior that probably devalues them. Would that be fair to say do you think?

... or worse yet, used as weapons -- "but didn't I say xxx?" Well, sure, you did, and that only makes your behavior thereafter even more questionable.

Don't give me Friday promises only to break them on Sunday. I'd rather you promise less and demonstrate more.

Anything else is quacking.

I hate to sound like a dick, but they mean very little to me. If someone has good intentions but bad results, the results are the same. Almost everybody has good intentions, almost everybody thinks they are good people. Whether or not they actually are is different.

Something I've dealt with in my recovery is this very thing -- "I'm me, therefore I'm good". And we all want to think that, we all want to feel that we're good people, but the fact of the matter is that each and every one of us is a mixed bag of good and bad.

The upshot, to me, is that we must each examine our actions based not on intent only, but results as well.

I'm sure Torquemada thought he was a good guy ... yet he still broke innocents upon the wheel.

[Ravenshire]

"Good" from who's point of view? Some asshole proselytizing me relentlessly save another poor sinner from the torments of hell? He can fuck off. Someone who's honestly trying to help and can't keep from fucking up? I'll laugh with him. Point of view is important here. From their points of view, they both have good intentions. From mine, only one does.

Edit to correct auto-correct. [eye-roller smiley here]

[Losty]

There's a limit. At some point no matter how good the intentions it's no longer fair to expect someone to continue bearing the negative outcomes.

[Losty]

I honestly believe my mother had only good intentions for me my entire life, but her good intentions put my life and the lives of my children at risk more than once. And so...her good intentions seem pretty worthless to me.

[Esquilax]

There's a limit. At some point no matter how good the intentions it's no longer fair to expect someone to continue bearing the negative outcomes.

I think it's worth noting that people don't really have bad intentions, in a moral sense. Nobody thinks of themselves as the villain in their own actions, we always have justifications for what we do that are internally consistent to us, even if they aren't factually or logically accurate. So it's more a matter of selfish intentions and unselfish ones, rather than good and bad.

The thing about good intentions, though, is that if you (generalized you, not you specifically ) really have them toward a given person then the fact that they are experiencing what they perceive to be negative outcomes from your actions, is a factor in determining your actions going forward. Essentially, if you can recognize that well-intentioned actions are resulting in a net negative for the person you're acting toward, then adjusting those actions to produce a more favorable outcome for them should be a trivial request.

Persisting in a course of action because of good intentions means that the actions are more about you, than the person receiving them. They can't exactly be called good intentions, at that point.

[Losty]

There's a limit. At some point no matter how good the intentions it's no longer fair to expect someone to continue bearing the negative outcomes.

I think it's worth noting that people don't really have bad intentions, in a moral sense. Nobody thinks of themselves as the villain in their own actions, we always have justifications for what we do that are internally consistent to us, even if they aren't factually or logically accurate. So it's more a matter of selfish intentions and unselfish ones, rather than good and bad.

The thing about good intentions, though, is that if you (generalized you, not you specifically ) really have them toward a given person then the fact that they are experiencing what they perceive to be negative outcomes from your actions, is a factor in determining your actions going forward. Essentially, if you can recognize that well-intentioned actions are resulting in a net negative for the person you're acting toward, then adjusting those actions to produce a more favorable outcome for them should be a trivial request.

Persisting in a course of action because of good intentions means that the actions are more about you, than the person receiving them. They can't exactly be called good intentions, at that point.

You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to start telling you how I feel and letting you explain it for me
This is a much better version of what I had going on in my head.