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What is going on, guys? Welcome to
this episode of Aussie English.

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It is 10:22 p.m. and I thought I
would come on today to sort of do
like a Walking with Pete episode,
although, I am currently sipping on
coffee and chilling out talking to
you guys from my office.

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So, I wanted to talk about this issue
that's kind of come up recently.
Yesterday, I received an email from a
person who had been billed twice by
the automated system that I have set
up for Aussie English. And to put it
politely, they were angry. So, you
know, and fair enough. It was a
surprising thing they weren't
expecting. But they sent me all of
these, you know, very emotional
emails, very angry emails, with a lot
of anger in those emails and, you
know, quite a lot of threats as well.
And it really sort of shook me for
the night, I guess, you know, it kind
of really made me feel a bit, you
know, am I a horrible person? You
know, I feel really bad for this
person. I feel... Have I done
something really bad. You know.

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I ended up refunding them, obviously,
and, you know, cancelling their
account and talking to them. But they
were really threatening me and
saying, you know, you've set this up
to do this on purpose. It's illegal.
You're stealing from people. You're a
horrible person. And then I found out
afterwards that they had actually
submitted a complaint to the
Financial Institute in Australia,
some sort of group in Australia, the
Taxation Department or something. And
they were sending me emails telling
me how they had submitted a formal
complaint because I was a, you know,
a horrible con man online. Anyway.

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So, I sort of got to the bottom with
this with this person after a few
emails saying, you know, this isn't a
trick. I'm not trying to con you. I'm
sorry that that's happened. And I
have refunded you immediately because
of this, you know, accident. And it
turned out the problem was... Was my
problem, was my fault. The website
had glitched. Something had gone
wrong that I'm trying to get my team
to fix where the person couldn't
cancel their account and they had
been charged again. You know. We're
on it. We're trying to fix it. But it
was a mistake. It wasn't done
intentionally.

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And, I guess, the reason I wanted to
talk about this is because I have
these sorts of conversations quite a
lot with people, because it's easy I
think in human nature to always
assume the worst, right, to always
assume that people are out to get
you, that people are always trying
to, you know, do you wrong when
things don't go your way, when things
bad happen. And there's a certain
saying that is, you know, "don't
attribute to malice what stupidity
can explain". Okay.

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So, in other words, don't assume that
someone is doing something evil or
nasty or, you know, trying to con
you, trying to get one over on you
when a more simpler explanation could
be that it's an accident or that it's
stupidity. Right. Stupidity on my
behalf in this example.

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And so, I have to remind myself this
all the time. When I have issues, you
know, say, I go and get a coffee and
the person who makes the coffee burns
the coffee, and it's a bit too bitter
when I get it. You know, it would be
easy for me to think, ah, this person
is, you know, an arsehole. They
wanted to ruin my day. They're
horrible. They have it in for me.

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But there's no real... When you think
about it there's no real reason to
think that's the case, right? The
person doesn't know me. The person
may have had a bad day themselves,
and maybe it was an accident. Maybe
they left the beans on the machine a
little long or whatever. It's
probably not that the world's out to
get me.

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And so, I was thinking about this. I
was... I went to bed last night after
this sort of altercation via email,
after resolving it, but I still kind
of shaken and I was still thinking
about it. It was whirling around in
my head. And I was thinking, you
know, how much we could improve the
world if we just gave people the
benefit of the doubt in these sorts
of situations, because I'm sure this
person didn't know. And, you know,
for all they know, maybe they've been
conned before online. And they
thought that I was doing what's
happened to them in the past or
something and they assumed the worst.
And, you know, it's an easy thing to
to fall foul of and to think is
happening.

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But they didn't understand that I'm a
real person on the other end of these
hatred filled emails, right, of all
this abuse that I'm actually having
to read this. I'm having to deal with
it and that it was a genuine mistake,
right.

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And so I was thinking last night, I'm
like, how often does this occur where
people don't spend a second to think,
to contemplate, to try and work out
these sorts of situations when
something goes wrong, when something
doesn't go your way, you know, is it
done on purpose because the person's
doing something malicious, something
horrible, or was it an accident? Was
it stupidity? Was it, you know,
absent mindedness to the person, not
mean to do that thing that has upset
you?

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And I was thinking, imagine how many
people get upset and assume the
worst, and then spew that kind of
nastiness, that kind of anger out
into the world, and it goes around,
right, like a ripple effect, like a
butterfly effect where you... you
know, this person emails me. They
make me incredibly depressed or angry
or annoyed. I then, you know, feel
like crap for the rest of the day.
And my wife and my son, you know, see
that and react on that. And, you
know, maybe they start feeling bad as
well and they go out into the world
and interact with other people and
have bad experiences with them on the
same day, and that... it spreads,
right. It's like a ripple effect. A
butterfly effect.

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And I was thinking, you know, how
often must this happen where someone
misunderstands a situation, reacts
poorly for no need, right? And that
it leads to so much suffering. You
know, I guess it's a bit of an
existential thought, but I was
sitting there thinking about this and
how I am going to try, you know, in
the future to always assume the best
of people and to not assume the
worst, Right. To always try and give
people the benefit of the doubt until
they have... Until I have a reason to
think otherwise.

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And I guess that's just our judicial
system in the West, in places like,
you know, Australia, America,
Britain, Europe, South America,
pretty much everywhere in the world
these days, I guess, has the
presumption of innocence until proven
guilty. And I think it's easy to
forget, it's easy to not live by
those standards in day to day
interactions or life. But it's
incredibly important to do so.

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So, yeah, I wanted to come on here
and just see what you guys thought,
give you that sort of... you know, my
two cents on this exchange. What
happened? And just let you know that
if those kinds of things happen with
you in the future, whether it's with
me, whether it's with Aussie English,
or whether it's with other people,
don't always necessarily assume the
worst, right. Don't always assume the
person's doing something malicious,
they're out to get you, because quite
often it's either a mistake or it is
stupidity.

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Okay? So, with that, guys, I hope you
enjoy this episode. Hope it's giving
you something to think about and I'll
chat to you soon. Peace.