Seeing the best in people vs. seeing the worst in people

Ted Lasso's optimism vs. Dr. House's cynicism. Plus, why you love Tony Soprano even though he kills people.

Let me tell you a story about 2 TV characters.

The first is Ted Lasso (of Ted Lasso). He’s a soccer coach who doesn’t know anything about soccer. He’s still a damn good soccer coach, because he loves his players and bringing out the best in them.

The second is Dr. House (of House M.D.). Dr. House is a doctor with terrible bedside manner. He’s rude to everybody. He doesn’t get along with his patients and his coworkers. He’s still a damn good doctor, because his cynicism helps him figure out what’s wrong with his patients even when they lie to him.

Ted Lasso and Dr. House have completely opposite ways of viewing their fellow human beings. Ted Lasso sees the best in everybody and Dr. House sees the worst in everybody.

If this article were a fairy tale, I would tell you all the virtues of thinking like Ted Lasso and I would try to paint Dr. House as this evil curmudgeonly villain.

But this article isn’t a fairy tale. I’m not trying to warm your heart. I’m trying to tell the truth.

And the truth is that Ted Lasso’s approach to dealing with people has strengths and weaknesses. And Dr. House’s approach to dealing with people has strengths and weaknesses. This article is about those strengths and weaknesses, and how to get the best of both worlds.

Seeing the best in people

Lasso: “Dr. House, you’re a damn good doctor. If I was sick, I’d get on a plane and head right for your hospital. But you don’t seem to do so well in the people department, my friend. Don’t you ever get lonely?”

Dr. House: “Of course I’m lonely. But what am I gonna do? It’s not like I can just, you know, TRUST people.”

Lasso: “Why not?”

There are 2 big strengths of seeing the best in people, like Ted Lasso. The first is that you have way better connections with them.

When you love everybody, they love you back. That’s because people can tell whether or not you like them. Your attitude towards everybody radiates off of you. When people see that you like them and you enjoy their company, they’ll want to hang out with you more. They’ll treat you better, creating an upward spiral where everybody is happy and everybody is better off.

The second is that by seeing the best in people, you bring out the best in people. There’s some research that says that when you tell teachers which students are “gifted”, those students do better, even if you say who is “gifted” completely randomly. This is probably true everywhere, not just in schools. When you expect the best out of people, you motivate them to be better.

The problem with seeing the best in people is that it’s naïve. Human beings are deeply flawed. Oftentimes we treat each other like crap. If you only see the best in people, people will screw you over, break your heart, steal from you, cheat you, cheat on you, and leave you lying in the gutter. And the more you think that people are fundamentally good, the more blindsided you’ll be when it happens.

Seeing the worst in people

Dr. House: “So, Mr. Bright-And-Cheery-All-The-Time. Tell me this. What are you gonna do when someone DOES screw you over, huh? What are you gonna do when your wife cheats on you, when your assistant coach steals from you, when your players quit on you, when your kids join gangs, and when that clueless woman you work for finally gets tired of your antics and fires your ass?”

Ted Lasso: “Well, I’m not worried about that. Maybe I’ve been lucky, but none of that has ever happened to me before.”

Dr. House: “Not yet.”

The strength of seeing the worst in people is that you know what to expect from them. You can tell who’s lazy, who’s stupid, who’s mean, who’s dishonest, and who’s worthless. You can anticipate all the problems that are gonna come up when you deal with them. And you can cut bad people out of your life before they have a chance to hurt you.

Dr. House can tell his patients when their wives are cheating on them. He can tell which ones are gonna sue him for malpractice. He can tell who just wants to see a doctor to get the most out of their health insurance before they get fired. Ted Lasso could never do any of that stuff, because he believes in people too much.

But the problem with seeing the worst in people is that it makes it really hard to be friends with them.

Dr. House is a lonely man. People at work tolerate him because he’s brilliant, but everybody hates him. He can’t keep a girlfriend. He drinks all the time. He’s not happy.

Same goes for most other super-cynical people. Sure, they’re right, but they’re miserable.

Humans evolved to be seriously unhappy without social connection. Being lonely can take years off your life. If you just see the worst in people all the time, then it’s gonna catch up to you.

So how do you balance these things?

Tony Soprano and Don Corleone both love their families. They take care of the people around them. They have love in their hearts.

They also kill people. They steal and cheat and do some really awful shit. And you’ll probably root for them when they do.

The magic of mafia movies is that they show both sides of people. You can see somebody like Tony Soprano, understand that he’s an awful human being in some ways, learn not to trust people like him, and also understand why the people who love him love him.

Another example: the other day I bought food from some guy on the street. I had a friendly interaction with him. I felt grateful that he was feeding me. I was really looking forward to the food because I’ve had it before and I know it’s very tasty. So I smiled at him and said “thank you” and told him how much I enjoyed his food as I paid him.

Then, for a brief moment, I counted my change to make sure he hadn’t short-changed me. In that moment I was suspicious of him. Once I confirmed that I had the correct amount of change, I let go of all my suspicion and went back to being friendly with him.

That’s how you have to think about everybody. You have to think like Ted Lasso and like Dr. House, at the same time.

Loving Everybody

If your dog is always fishing around in the trash, pooping all over your floor, or stealing food from your neighbor’s yard, you might get angry with him, but you don’t stop loving him. He is what he is, and you accept that.

That’s how we think about dogs. It’s not how we think about people. When people do bad things, we want to blame them, get angry at them, hurt them, steal from them, shame them, et cetera.

A few people throughout history — Jesus, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela — understood the Great Truth that you should love everybody. Anger and hatred are silly and counterproductive. You should think of people who do bad things the same way you think of dogs who do bad things.

When someone hates you, when someone treats you like garbage, try your best to love them. That doesn’t mean you don’t punish them, it doesn’t mean you have to keep hanging out with them, and it doesn’t mean you don’t try to make them better. But it does mean that you shouldn’t waste time getting mad at them.

I know this probably sounds like a bunch of hippie BS to you. It would have sounded like that to me, too, but these days I see great wisdom in it. This is how you see somebody for who they really are without making them hate you.

Hey! Thanks for reading.

My name’s Theo and every Monday I write an article about something that was on my mind the week before. Usually it’s about psychology or social sciences or long-term trends in the world.

You made it to the end, so I’m gonna guess you liked this article. And if you liked this article, you might also like my article about why people are terrible at understanding each other.

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Happy trails!