What is something you do voluntarily to make other people‘s lives easier?

MrBakedBeansOnToast@lemmy.world to Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world – 125 points –
88

This one might seem to be a bit silly, but for the last few years I've made my girlfriend's breakfast every day and she's packed my lunch.

She has a hard time getting up, so it helps her to have a fresh coffee and whatnot ready for her. She in turn makes my sandwich for lunch because even though I like eating it, I don't like touching the lunch meat.

So while we're doing the same amount of work, we're doing a job for each other that the other doesn't really enjoy. It also irrationality suggests tastes better, because it was made with the other person in mind, not as a chore we have to do for ourselves.

You’re still touching the lunchmeat. It’s touching you inside. All over. It’s rubbing against your tongue, teeth… the roof of your mouth. It massages its way to the back of your throat rubbing itself against every inch of your esophagus, until it finally reaches the inside of your stomach.

But it’s not done there. Your lunchmeat - the same thing you revile touching with your fingers - begins to lay against the walls of your stomach lining as it is slowly digested. Some of it may even make its way into your small intestine completely intact. It touches you all the way through.

Is that really what you want for yourself?

Lol... Meanie! 😜

It's only my outside nerves that get bothered by it. The insides know it is tasty.

Very descriptive writing though, so good effort!

Much obliged. You and your wife have a very considerate, charming relationship and I’m happy you found each other!

Are your lips inside or outside

Take my cart from where people randomly left it or from the return and leave it in the store.

Tidy up my table and stack dishes when I eat out.

Park between the lines.

Put my cart on the side when shopping instead of leaving it in the middle of the aisle.

Pick up the dog poop other people don't.

Pull forward product if it is shoved into the back of the shelf.

Hold open doors.

Pick up stuff that people accidentally drop, especially if they have kids or are elderly.

Leave intersections clear.

Let people merge.

Not park on the street when it snows.

Be polite to anyone working public facing, no matter how bad my mood is.

Take my meds.

Teach my kids to respect rules, even the ones that seem dumb.

Keep my dog leashed when not in a designated area.

Leave accurate and fair reviews.

Return ebooks early if someone is waiting.

Take my meds- man I never thought I was that different on or off meds until the recent ADHD medication shortage combined with some personal issues last Fall made me fall apart. My poor SO was worried sick because I was losing my damn mind, turns out I do not mask well. I didn’t realize that being properly medicated is as much of a public service as a personal one. May your meds always be available and well balanced.

I'm the SO of someone with ADD who was similarly affected. It messed her up for months. Things are just getting back to normal now. On the bright side, she has less insomnia on the new meds.

Good on you for sticking by her while she was working it out. Changing medication is so hard and takes a while especially if you’re taking more than one kind. I am really happy you both got through it and that she found something better!

Yeah ...after about day 3 or 4 without meds, my short fuse is back and I'm just a ball of nervous, irritable energy. And can't focus. Or motivate myself. I'm sure I am a pain in the ass normally let alone when off meds. Definitely a service to others to take it. Then there's the anti depressants.

Pick up the dog poop

Would you, by any chance, intend to move in my neighborhood???

Put my cart on the side when shopping instead of leaving it in the middle of the aisle.

I would kill for you.

Brother/sister from another mother! Boo ya!

Love helping people even when they dont know it.

I do most of that except the dog poop.

I let people merge.

When I see someone doing something selfish, I assume they are having a bad day and give them grace rather than assume they are an asshole and try to teach them a lesson.

Live and let live.

I will make room for someone to merge if the person is using their signal, as long as it's safe to do so. I'm not going out of my way to help folks who can't be assed to do the bare minimum.

Why not? So many people put in extra energy specifically to block people who try to merge late, without a blinker, or for any other asinine reason. Just let them in and go on with your day. We all make mistakes when driving or forget to use our blinker occasionally.

Give them the benefit of the doubt and just be kind.

For me it's usually the one you can see bobbing and weaving in and out of traffic just to get 1 more spot ahead in heavy traffic. That person will cause a wreck at some point driving like that. I'll actively prevent them from getting ahead of me until there is adequate room for them to gain some separation once they go by. If they're doing crazy shit right in front of me and wreck, I might not have any way to avoid that. If they're doing that a mile down the road, it's on me of I can't avoid that wreck.

I'm not going to fight them and if they are weaving in and out and could be dangerous I'm just getting out of the way and staying away from them so they don't hit me.

When I go to the grocery store, I grab my shopping cart from the outside corrals instead of from inside. That way it's one less the employee has to take back in.

Bonus: I'll also always put the cart in the stack of the same kind when I put it back - a lot of places have various-sized carts and most people just shove them in there haphazardly.

I've found most people who have worked retail tend to do little helpful things like that without even thinking about it.

I do the same thing!!!

It's also nice when you get inside and people are complaining there are no carts left - I just breeze by with the one I brought in. lol

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I have a very small car so I make sure to park toward the end of the parking spot so people don't pull half way in before realizing it is occupied. Your welcome.

I'm really only good at one thing, that is designing and developing software. So I try to make all my personal stuff open source, so others can benefit from it too.

I take out my neighbors’ garbage cans. It’s a collective home with a unique living situation and nobody really seems in charge of the house itself, including taking the trash to the curb. Since I gotta take mine anyway and they’re all in a shared alley, might as well do something nice for people who might need a hand.

That, and I’m trying to keep bugs and rodents at bay. So it’s not entirely selfless…

We have a pool of vehicles at work and I always reverse them into a bay when I put them back so the next guy can just drive out forwards.

I volunteer my time to tutor high school and college students in chemistry, biology, math and physics. Thousands of students tutored for free.

I am currently working on creating more tutoring videos and a tutoring blog as well as other science resources. i.e discussing current events in science

Good continuing practice for you, and good learning for them. Wholesome.

Leave facilities as I found them and clean up after myself. It’s a slightly OCD thing in that it bothers me not to, but more from a sense of social obligation rather than preserving order.

100% all of this. I don't want to leave a trace behind. If a place is a certain way, I assume it's the way it should be. Leaving it in another state is not acceptable. In fact, if I can repair part of it that needs service, I will.

Despite being disabled from a broken neck and still riding a bicycle in the evenings for physical therapy (because disability is complicated), if you are on the side of the road or bike trail having problems with a bike, I'll still at least ask you if you need help, and I will fix almost anything you are having trouble with if asked. What I won't tell you is how much holding posture hurts and how helping you will cost me a few days of extra pain. I've been there and know how frustrating it is to get stranded over something silly and shit happens. I always have layers of backup redundancy on the bike to cover almost any situation.

Pick up plastic trash on the street. I walk/take transit and if I: 1) see plastic trash, and 2) see a trash can nearby; I pick it up and dispose of it.

Whenever it snows enough to need it, I will run my snowblower up & down the whole sidewalk along my side of the street, and will clear the snow off my elderly neighbors' driveway aprons for them. They always offer to pay me for my time, effort or gas but I won't have any of it. It doesn't snow that much here that often anymore, so it's a treat for me to break out the heavy machinery when it does. Might as well make it worth my time to bust it out, right?

Last time, someone left a bottle of nice bourbon in a gift bag on my front porch the next day.

After snowblowing from a heavy snow I did my neighbors driveway (they were at work at the time). When they brought it up later I acted like I pulled the most dastardly heist and cackled maniacally.

Jokes on them though, i really like those kinds of outside chores.

I compliment people when they are good at their job. Or that they make a solid effort.

At restaurants and shops, sometimes I'll try to be the anti-Karen - I ask for someone's manager to give them glowing praise. I'm autistic so sometimes I drop that in there for extra points (tho tbf, if I've been given a service that's good enough to make me want to do this, it probably does relate to my autism, even if indirectly)

I give a list of generic opt-out excuses when I invite people to an event. That way, if it doesnt sound fun to them, they just pick an excuse off the list instead of trying to make one up and potentionally seem rude.

Its simple, but surprisingly effective for staying on people's good side.

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Mentor children.

It only takes about an hour a week and once you establish a relationship with them you just bring them along when you are doing something fun anyway. You feel a sense of purpose and they fare better in nearly every measurable statistic of emotional well being and academic success. Men in particular are needed to mentor young men and can have the greatest impact. Many organization will match you with a kid who has your same interests too so you're just doing stuff you both like. I really can't recommend it enough.

At the gym I often sort the plates on the racks I take minr from (not only mine).

I do it mostly out of selfishness, since it bothers me a lot when they're not sorted, but hey.

public restrooms. I always leave them better than I found them. I clean everything. So the next person that goes in there after me is greeted by a a nice clean bathroom and doesn't see what I saw when I walked in there.

Whenever I come across a person in one of those driving school vehicles, I take my time to be extra nice to them and helping them a bit in a way.

When someone parks like a complete asshole with a spot open on their driver’s side, I park like an asshole right up next to them so they have to get in another way. This teaches them not to park like an asshole so they don’t bother others.

I guess I do the opposite, I rarely see cars that are parked badly, So I'm not worried about that, but when I see a spot open next to a driver's side of a car, I purposely don't park there because I want to leave that space open for their comfort.

Is the opposite specifically giving asshole the space or specifically giving good drivers the space? Or is it giving absolutely everyone space and not caring how badly they park?

What I mean is this, when I see an available parking spot but it's right next to a driver's side door of another car, I leave that spot alone and find another spot.

I already told you I don't encounter "asshole" parkers very much. And if I do, I park extremely far away from them and don't let it bother me.

You assume they are an asshole when they could just be having a bad day, a lot on their mind, and were focused on something else more important in their life than parking straight.

And quite frankly, even if they are an asshole who the fuck are you that you have any right to "teach them a lesson."

An eye for an eye leaves the world blind.

Who the fuck are you that you have any right to teach me a lesson?

If someone looks like wanting some help, and I'm able+willing to help, I ask the person "do you want help?" before touching whatever they're doing. Because a good part of making the others' lives easier is not making it harder; and if I were to screw shit up with my "GoOd InTeNsHuNs" + assumptions/idiocy, I'd certainly make it harder.

In the USA, at most intersections you are allowed to make a right-hand turn at a red light.

If I am in the right lane and approaching a red light, I will move over to the left lane (even if this means I’m now behind other cars) to allow anyone behind me who might want to turn right to make that turn.

Show them kindness. World's messed up enough adding social stress on top just makes people's lives harder. That's not to say that I'll not call a dickhead a dickhead or point out inaccuracies or the like but, really, being an asshole doesn't help to make the world a better place.

I try to make sure at least mine and a few other shopping carts are nested at those return spots, so there's room for the next person.

Share my talents, knowledge, and time freely. You got an IT problem? I gotchu. Need furniture moved? I gotchu. Want advice on buying a coffee grinder? I'll talk your ear off.

Sometimes I hotlink photos or links on Lemmy.

I always appreciate it when other people do that on here to help explain or visualize things, or just give easier access to the source, so I try to do it to when I can.

I added a wheelchair ramp to the entrance of my home, even though I'm not in a wheelchair.

Just me?

I know, right? Over the years, I've built wheelchair ramps for people several times and not once in the those cumulative weeks of hammering and sawing and pouring concrete did one of the wheelchair users deign to get off their ass and help us. So lazy.

I didn't even know the home addition companies hire wheelchair users for help. Which company did you do work for?

When I was growing up I lived with my grandmother and it was just me and her. I would always put the toilet seat down because I thought it was super thoughtful. I can bathroom standing up more than half the time, women sit every time. I mathed it out

Leave two car lengths in front of me on the highway. But doesn't that mean people are always merging right in front of you? Yeah, and that makes me about 2 seconds later to my destination every day. I'll gladly sacrifice that time to reduce the likelihood (and potential severity) of a crash

I recycle and compost. Guess this is a long term/big picture thing though

Acknowledge compliments and thank people for their work. Admittedly I'm not perfect in this, but it really makes me feel good and the other person too. If someone says I'm good at x I say thanks. Likewise, if someone helps me on a project I make sure to make my appreciation clear.

When I go through the self checkout line, I always fluff open the bags in the rack for the next person as I'm waiting for the payment to go through.

If I’m going to be hostile and act against them, I do it openly and I make sure I’m unpleasant while I’m doing it so they’re not guessing whether it’s actually happening.

I only oppose people to their faces.