First of all, Merry Christmas 2022 everyone! I hope you were able to spend time with your loved ones, or at least had the chance to take some reprieve from the busyness and frantic schedule that 2022 has imposed. In spirit of christmas I wanted to make this post, and excuse me ahead of time for a post that may seem to be a bit Christian centric. But I assure you this post is short and quick (no time return though, unlike gift shopping :sweat_smile:)

Googling grace, one of the definitions you get will be:

(in Christian belief) the free and unmerited favor of God, as manifested in the salvation of sinners and the bestowal of blessings.

Now this post won’t be talking about this specific definition of grace, but it’s definitely influenced. I want to talk about the grace of humans, in particular the grace that a human may display to one another (or in extension towards non-human entities). In Christian teachings, God shows grace through for the redemption of humanity from their sin in past, present, and future through Jesus Christ(-mas). Instead of this God-centric definition here’s the definition of grace that I will use:

a deliberate decision to not use one’s power over another party that will cause harm or pain or with no regard for the best of the other party

A bit lengthy, and you may think that this definition falls under “do no harm”/”do no evil”. Part of it is, but it goes beyond. Some examples may help:

  1. not delivering judgement (behind/in front of them), despite moral high ground
  2. not increasing prices when you have market dominance (similarly, not using a tight labour market to demand higher pay)
  3. dropping our rights to make a claim in court towards anotheer who you feel have wronged you
  4. embracing those deemed, implicitly or explicitly, not desirable in your group
  5. not seeking tit-for-tat
  6. delivering the best for others
  7. make our resources for the benefits of others

Grace in my mind is not simply to not do something, but it is the active disposition to do the best, and give the best for other parties. It demands having others at the centre of our universe instead of ourselves. And to make it even more difficult, grace should be available for everyone and not just a select few.

Can a world where everyone show grace towards everyone exist? What would such a world like? I naturally think that such a world will be open to unscrupulous exploitation by some people who sees grace as a weakness ripe for picking. And economic and game theory teaches us that agents (humans) would prefer to favour their self-interest, opposite of what grace requires of us. Anecdotally, I know that I’m not that graceful either, and reading the comments and reactions to this Reddit thread seems to speak for the case of favouring self-interest. Even if it is achievable, would it be sustainable? And what conflicts or issues would arise from such a way of life?

But perhaps such a world would not the need ardent pursuit of self-interest. And such a world would naturally remove the desire to exploit. It may just be a chicken and egg situation in the end, and that it just takes the seemingly unlikely first step to be taken by us all.

Though it is difficult to envision such a world (or even it’s possibility), personally I believe it is a way of life worth striving for. Grace may not encompass all facet of our life, but we can see pockets of it sprinkled in our life. Yes, I’d like to believe that humans seek for grace, even though we may not know of it…