Convergence 0 – Week 3: The Golden Rule

Not yet trial-taught Not yet expert-reviewed

This week: read two short passages and one teaching slowly. Each day, do one "swap places" action: ask yourself "if I were the other person, how would I want to be treated?", then act on the answer.

Measurable goal: do and note one "swap places" action a day, on at least 5 of 7 days.

1. Traditional teaching

Week 1 practised pausing; Week 2 practised noticing what we have received. This week uses the pause to look towards other people. Many traditions have a teaching along the lines of "treat others as you would want to be treated", often called the Golden Rule. But its wording, its scope and its place within each tradition are not the same.

Christianity: do to others

[Traditional teaching] The verse below comes from the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew, chapters 5–7). This tradition teaches it as a summary of what the Hebrew Scriptures require.

A note on context: "the law and the prophets" was a way of naming the Hebrew Scriptures at the time. The verse comes straight after a passage on asking in prayer (7:7–11): God gives good things to those who ask, so believers also do good to others.

Judaism: what is hateful to you, do not do to another

[Traditional teaching] The Talmud tells many stories about the teachers Hillel and Shammai, who lived around the turn of the Common Era. The story below tells of a gentile who wanted to be taught the whole Torah while standing on one foot.

A note on context: "This was a common measuring stick…" is an explanation added in the Steinsaltz edition, not the words of the Talmud. [Inference] The closing words "Go study" suggest Hillel's saying is a door into Torah study, not a claim that the one sentence is enough. Because this page quotes a CC BY-NC source, the whole page is licensed CC BY-NC 4.0.

Islam: wanting for your brother what you want for yourself

[Traditional teaching] This tradition teaches that faith is not only in the heart but shows in how one treats others. Hadith 13 in an-Nawawi's collection of Forty Hadith, narrated by Anas ibn Malik and found in both Bukhari and Muslim, says that a person's faith is not complete until he:

The English translation on sunnah.com is in copyright, so this page quotes only a short phrase. Read the full hadith at sunnah.com, Nawawi 40, hadith 13.

A note on context: [Inference] The hadith is about faith before God, not only about good manners. Scholars understand the scope of "brother" differently: some read it as a fellow believer, others as all people. The Muslim reviewer will say how it is commonly understood in their tradition.

Where the traditions differ

[Expert judgement] All three teachings start from oneself: what I want, what I hate. But they differ on these points:

This week borrows only one shared action: before acting, put yourself in the other person's place. You do not need to accept the beliefs of any tradition to do it, and the week should not be read as saying the three traditions are "really the same".

2. What science finds

We have not found any review that measures "practising the Golden Rule" as such. The nearest evidence is research on doing kind acts for others.

• [Verified] A 2018 meta-analysis of 27 experiments with 4,045 people found that doing kind acts for others raised the well-being of the person doing them by a small-to-moderate amount (δ = 0.28). The studies were often small: average statistical power was only about 0.42, meaning many studies would struggle to detect an effect even if one existed. (Curry et al. 2018)
• [Inference] This week's exercise adds a step, putting yourself in the other person's place before acting. The studies above did not measure that step separately, so we cannot say whether it adds to or reduces the effect.

Limits: this figure is an average across many different studies and does not predict what will happen for any one person. Acts of kindness do not replace treatment if you have a mental health problem.

3. Practice for adults

10–15 minutes a day in total.

1. Read slowly (3 minutes). Choose one of the three teachings above. Read it slowly twice, the second time quietly aloud.
2. Pause (1 minute). As in Week 1: sit still and let the breath be natural.
3. Choose one person (2 minutes). Think of someone you will meet today: family, a colleague, a delivery driver, a shopkeeper.
4. Swap places (3 minutes). Ask yourself two questions and write one line for each: "If I were this person today, how would I want to be treated?" and "What do I hate having done to me that I might be doing to them?"
5. One action (during the day). Pick one small thing you can do from your answers: speak clearly instead of curtly, let the person finish their sentence, reply to a message when you said you would, say thank you using their name.
6. Note it (2 minutes, evening). One line: "Today I swapped places with ___ and did ___." Tick the day. The weekly goal is at least 5 of 7 days.

Note: [Expert judgement] swapping places does not mean giving in to every demand, or silently putting up with being treated badly. Putting yourself in someone's place includes looking at yourself too: you are also a person who deserves to be treated kindly. If thinking about a particular person makes you afraid or hurt, choose someone else.

4. Kids' corner 6+

Game: "Swap shoes" (5–10 minutes, with an adult playing too)

1. Adult and child each draw a shoe on a sheet of paper, then swap sheets. "Now I'm walking in your shoes."
2. The adult describes a small, real situation from the day: "Your little brother was building a tower and it fell down", "Mum came home tired from work".
3. Ask the child: "If you were in your brother's (Mum's) shoes, how would you feel? What would you want someone to do for you?"
4. Together, choose one small thing the child can do right away: help rebuild the tower, bring a glass of water, say "I'll help you".

Do not judge the child's answers as right or wrong. Do not use the game to blame the child ("see, you made your brother sad"). Choose gentle situations; do not talk about bullying or frightening events. If the child gets bored, stop the game.

daynentang also has a lesson, Secret good deeds (in Vietnamese), for families with children aged 2–8.

5. Stop practising if

• You feel panic, have flashbacks of trauma, have a lasting sense that you or the world are "not real", lose sleep for several nights, or have thoughts of harming yourself.
• "Swapping places" makes you blame yourself constantly, or makes you feel you must put up with someone who is harming you. This exercise never asks you to set aside your own safety.
• If so, stop and see Get help now.
• If you have a history of psychosis, bipolar disorder or severe PTSD, ask a doctor before increasing sitting time beyond 20 minutes.

6. Foundation skills on daynentang

If swapping places brings up an unresolved conflict with someone, daynentang has a lesson on problem solving (Giải quyết vấn đề). If emotions rise, see Neo lại khi cảm xúc dâng cao (anchoring when emotions rise). Both are currently in Vietnamese only; your browser's translate option can help.

7. Practice for today

Before dinner, think of one person at home. Ask yourself: "What does this person need today?" Do one small thing for them without announcing it.

Scientific sources

• Curry OS, et al. (2018). Happy to help? A systematic review and meta-analysis of the effects of performing acts of kindness on the well-being of the actor. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 76, 320–329. Article page