Wisdom for these times

I get emails from Ryan Holiday periodically. The one from 2019-08-26 contained some observations I found very valuable. He said:

A dangerous assumption we seem to have made as a culture these days is that being right is a license to be a condescending jerk, that it exempts you from the need to persuade or even to have human decency. Being right is not enough. We need people who can be kind, who are willing to put in the time to understand those who think differently and convince them. To respect them. We need a lot less humiliation and a lot more humility.

And that starts with you. Catch the sharp or clever works before they come out of your mouth and replace them with respect, with patience, and with kindness.