{"id":229,"date":"2020-10-14T19:53:00","date_gmt":"2020-10-14T23:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=229"},"modified":"2020-12-06T20:22:45","modified_gmt":"2020-12-07T01:22:45","slug":"the-ben-franklin-effect","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2020\/10\/14\/the-ben-franklin-effect\/","title":{"rendered":"The Ben Franklin Effect"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Benjamin Franklin was savagely denounced by a fellow member of the Pennsylvania legislature in the mid-1700\u2019s. 
 
His antagonist, who apparently enjoyed talking about<\/em> him, had never even bothered to talk to<\/em> him. 
 
Franklin promptly initiated a response. 
 
He had all kinds of weapons at his disposal.  A master of linguistic cleverness, he could have nailed his adversary with a few Twitter-length putdowns.  An accomplished printer, he could have crushed him in a satirical editorial.  A central figure in Philadelphia\u2019s social scene, he could have rallied dozens of allies to his side.
 
Franklin, however, did something unexpected. 
 
He describes it in his autobiography: \u201cHaving heard that he had in his library a certain very scarce and curious book, I wrote a note to him, expressing my desire of perusing that book, and requesting he would do me the favour of lending it to me for a few days.  He sent it immediately, and I return\u2019d it in about a week with another note, expressing strongly my sense of the favour.\u201d
 
So, he asks his nemesis to loan him a book?  What happened next was fascinating. 
 
\u201cWhen we next met in the House, he spoke to me (which he had never done before), and with great civility; and he ever after manifested a readiness to serve me on all occasions, so that we became great friends, and our friendship continued to his death.\u201d 
 
Franklin intuitively understood what most of us overlook: We tend to like the people for whom we do nice things, and to despise the people whom we harm.<\/em> 
 
Nowadays psychologists call it the Benjamin Franklin Effect. 
 
What exactly happened to the man who had gone out of his way to disrespect Franklin?  Franklin gave him an opportunity to do something nice, and to feel good about doing it.  Consequently, his attitude toward Franklin softened.   
 
This phenomenon is well known.  When we act kindly toward someone, our attitudes gradually catch up with our actions.  We begin to feel<\/em> kindness toward that person. 
 
But when we act rudely or callously toward someone, our hearts fossilize.  World War II concentration camp guards rarely felt surges of compassion toward the victims they were torturing.  Instead, their actions caused their hatred to intensify.   
 
Feelings follow actions<\/em>. 
 
This core principle of human behavior shines light on one of the Bible\u2019s most challenging paragraphs.  It\u2019s found in the middle of Jesus\u2019 Sermon on the Mount:
 
\u201cYou\u2019re familiar with the old written law, \u2018Love your friend,\u2019 and its unwritten companion, \u2018Hate your enemy.\u2019 I\u2019m challenging that. I\u2019m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best\u2014the sun to warm and the rain to nourish\u2014to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that.\u201d <\/em>(Matthew 5:43-47, \u201cThe Message\u201d)
 
Jesus is commanding actions, not feelings.  That makes all the difference in the world. 
 
If \u201clove your enemies\u201d means cultivating feelings of affection for the monster who betrayed you, the co-worker who stabbed you in the back, or the creep who broke your heart, any rational person would feel paralyzed.  But Jesus is saying, \u201cTake action.  <\/em>Do something that expresses care.  Pray for that person.  Choose to be kind.\u201d  By adding, \u201cThis is what God does,\u201d he\u2019s assuring us that heaven\u2019s resources are available to help us do what seems impossible.
 
Choosing to bless another person \u2013 even if our feelings are flat-lined \u2013 is God\u2019s counter-intuitive formula for jump-starting a wounded heart.    
 
Spouses know this well.  Couples may have promised to be there for each other \u201cin plenty and in want, in joy and sorrow, in sickness and in health.\u201d  But anyone who has been married for longer than seven days knows that partners don\u2019t always feel<\/em> like doing this \u201cfor as long as we both shall live.\u201d 
 
Love is a choice \u2013 a decision that we make again and again to offer kindness to another human being, often in the face of contrary emotions.   
 
If we wait until our feelings come around, we may be waiting for a very long time.  But God has created us in such a way that doing loving things helps kindle loving feelings. 
 
We may not always win a lifelong friend, as Benjamin Franklin did.  And our picture probably won\u2019t end up on the $100 bill. 
 
But choosing to love a difficult person, just because Jesus said so, is one of the ultimate doorways to spiritual growth.     
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Benjamin Franklin was savagely denounced by a fellow member of the Pennsylvania legislature in the mid-1700\u2019s.  His antagonist, who apparently enjoyed talking about him, had never even bothered to talk to him.  Franklin promptly initiated a response.  He had all kinds of weapons at his disposal.  A master of linguistic cleverness, he could have nailed his adversary with a few Twitter-length putdowns.  An… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":230,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[71,70],"class_list":["post-229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-love-is-a-choice","tag-loving-enemies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":256,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229\/revisions\/256"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}