Good, Better, and Best Possible Self

Good, Better, and Best Possible Self

This article is about why I want to be a good person and what being a good person means to me.

Originally published to: https://deliverystack.net/2025/11/05/good-better-and-best-possible-self/

I recently ran across the following quote from my main digital gonad Stephen Watson on a LinkedIn thread:

In order to answer the question "am I a good person?", you need to consider yourself from an outside perspective by reflecting on what a bad version of you and a good version of you would look like.

This really got me thinking, especially after I started writing about my thoughts. The only way for me to unpack this is to add my own personal context.

I don't know why, which is probably one of the first and most important questions to ask on this topic, but I've always wanted to be a good person. Like most things, this personal objective may result from some internal potential shaped by my unique life experiences. For example, maybe I learned that I prefer to be around happy people, and people are happier if I live my definition of good. And maybe my semi-religious upbringing taught me that being a good person is important. And maybe there's a genetic component as well.

Another important question to ask is what shapes one's definition of a good person? Do I care only whether I consider myself to be a good person, or whether others consider me to be a good person? To merge and simplify questions, whose definition of a good person matters to me? My friend Marta had these thoughts on the topic, which may not be comprehensive, but agree with my perspective that there are mulitple possible sets of criteria by which to evaluate a person's goodness, and multiple perspectives from which to evaluate the person. In other words, if being a good person is important to you, consider what it means to be a good person, as well as who evaluates your thoughts and actions against these criteria:

At its core whether a person is considered "good" or "bad" depends on the lens through which they are being seen.

There is no authority that defines "good" or "bad" in a person, instead, it's a mix of empathy, morality and self-awareness.

The definition of a good person is a variable and subjective thing. In any case, it seems that a good person would have good habits, which might be easier to define individually.

For example, if I have a habit of shitposting on LinkedIn, I could say that's a bad habit, increasing negativity and making others less happy. Without enough countering good habits, too many bad habits could make me or others consider me to be a bad person. Therefore, I should try to change that habit. This can mean stopping the habit, but optimally, sometimes means reversing the habit -- doing the opposite. I could try to stop my bad habit of shitposting, or I could try to do the opposite and post positive things, which is what I'm trying to do here.

Habits don’t change easily. Expecting an immediate and complete change of habits can result in failure and abandonment of the effort. According to the book Atomic Habits and/or possibly The Power of Habit, rather than setting a New Years resolution or otherwise expecting oneself to completely eliminate or change their bad habits, which often results in failure, a better approach might be to try to make incremental changes to a one's habits. It is impossible to achieve a goal without working towards that goal, but not every action against the goal makes the goal impossible.

Therefore, rather than determining to stop shitposting and especially to start posting only positive things (which seems impossible for me), a more realistic approach might be to try to reduce shitposting over time, for example trying to reduce negative posts by 1% daily. For any habit, I could try to be 1% better than yesterday every day.

Regarding the question of who evaluates whether I'm a good person, only I do. Others see only my behaviors, not my thoughts, and they do not always even know the intentions behind a actions that may appear bad by their criteria or mine. Most people don't see things I've done that make me question whether I am a good person, though I myself often focus on such behaviors and any of my negative thoughts, such as dislike for the behavior of others. It seems that I am the only person that can evaluate whether I am a good person and that's really the only person whose evaluation should matter to me.

Therefore, I interpret Guru Stephen's phrase "consider yourself from an outside perspective" not as a suggestion that I apply some else's criteria or judgment to myself, but that instead of focusing and dwelling on self-criticism of my negative thoughts and behaviors, I should try to evaluate my goodness as I might evaluate the goodness of someone else against my own criteria.

Then there's the phrase "reflecting on what a bad version of you and a good version of you would look like." This is a really scary thought for me. As a white heterosexual American male born with significant advantages, I could leverage my position by abusing others for personal gain, specifically by taking advantage of other people that have less opportunity. This is the absolute opposite of my desire and would certainly lead to me feeling terrible about myself.

I don't think that I can ever be the best possible version of myself. I can, on a daily basis, work to be a better version of myself. I can also accept that I am already a good version of myself. While outside perspectives may shape my influence my idea of what it means to be a good person, I must reject anyone else's judgment of whether or not I am a good person.

Relative to a bad version of myself, and especially the worst possible version of myself, I must be a good version of myself. But I can always get better.

Update 6.Nov.2025: Stephen commented on my LinkedIn post about this article:

Be careful you don't create a good and bad version of yourself within as a way to steer towards that objective, John West, and inadvertently forget that they're both you.

I see this as a reminder that I need to stay aware of its existence and incorporate my Jeungian shadow into my true self. This requires that I stay focused and aware of it and the overall goal of inner growth, understanding, and developing self-awareness, which are all certainly huge challenges for me.