You do owe the world things, actually. It’s just those things tend to be perfectly balanced.
You owe people respect and dignity; they owe the same to you.
You owe children kindness; as a child, you are owed a kind world.
You are owed nourishment by any world that brings you into existence, you are owed a chance to thrive. In return, you owe the same to any people or creatures you agree to take guardianship over.
The issue is not that we, and others, and the world in general, owe each other. We are all born being owed certain things, and by living we acquire debts; life requires this interdependence to thrive. The issue is that we are often misled as to what this actually means, by those who would take advantage of us. We are lied to by authority figures who do not want to respect us, or acknowledge their responsibility to us. Worse: we mistakenly come to believe that taking advantage of others is the key to restoring balance. We were cheated, so others must be cheated in turn.
We trap ourselves in these deadly cycles. Society betrays us so we are taught to disengage, to break it further. We are taught to forget the value of repair. We are taught to forget what is owed. Fundamentally, we are taught to forget that people are owed basic decency. When we say we owe the world nothing, we forget we are affirming the opposite: the world owes us nothing in return.
But this is so incredibly untrue. We owe the world things, and are owed in return, and that’s good, that is so so good. I would hate to live in a world where I didn’t believe people were fundamentally owed dignity and decency and kindness. The real issue is that these things often go unpaid, and unreciprocated. We think: “The world gave me nothing, though it should have. Why should I owe anything?”
And that is such a dangerous way to think. That type of thought just turns you into another gear in a destructive machine. That type of thought just allows despair to self-replicate. That type of thought validates the abusers and ensures there is never a shortage of victims. Feed those kinds of thoughts, and a plug gets pulled somewhere inside you, and lets the humanity drain away. You lose everything, trying to steal from others what was stolen from you. You cheat yourself and the world, with that kind of thinking.
I promise you this: When we try to balance the scales by refusing to pay forward what wasn’t paid to us, we just double the debt and burden the world in the process. A better world requires that we first do better.
