Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Not the sort of person who ... | Wise Bread:

There are readers out there who say, "I'm not the sort of person" who:

* rides the bus
* wears used clothes
* takes in boarders
* rents a room in someone's house
* has a roommate
* borrows things
* lends things
* does manual labor
* follows a budget
* tracks every penny
* buys food on its sell-by date

The reason I say not to do that, is that none of these things really have anything to do with the sort of person you are.  For stuff like this, when someone says, "I'm not the sort of person who," what they really mean is, "I'm so rich I don't need to" do whatever it is.  And, if they live in a rich country, they're almost certainly right--even if they're pretty poor, just living in a rich country means they're so rich they can imagine that they're some particular sort of person who doesn't need to economize in some particular way.

The thing is, there's a problem with this kind of thinking--with imagining that "you're not the sort of person" who does certain kinds of things:  You can start to believe it.