The Cost of Goodness

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Kindness, honesty, and trust are the foundations of civilization.

They are also the traits that make us most vulnerable.

The same openness that lets light in can also let darkness walk through the door.

Good people often assume others share their conscience.

That assumption is where the cost begins.

When someone has no restraint, your restraint becomes a weakness they can exploit.

When someone feels no shame, your decency becomes leverage.

And when someone uses cruelty as a tool, your empathy can be turned against you.

This is why so many good people become exhausted.

They keep paying a price that the cruel never pay.

Yet goodness is not a mistake.

It is the only thing that makes a society worth living in.

The question is not whether to abandon goodness.

The question is how to protect it without surrendering it.

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Next in the series:
The Seduction of Strength

Series index:
The Vulnerability of Goodness -- Table of Contents

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