What you mean when you say you understand someone?
Is it their thinking process or a prediction of how they will act?
We are a mix of yesterdays and todays, things we read, things we believe from 2nd grade, ideas we are committed to, right, wrong and gray. We are what we believe we are. And all the skills and talents and constraints that we perceive to have.
On an every day basis we change and we don’t. We change on things we are forced to see our short comings on. We don’t on ideas that we never get challenged on.
That being said we pretty much give the same picture to someone who has known us for a while. We might change on a daily basis but not to the level where it’s drawing attention. Think of the shock you can cause if your love/hate response to the same thing changes on a daily basis. Still every one tries and changes in one way or another. As a society we evolve this way, albeit slowly, but I would still totally shock someone who suddenly came in from 10 years in the past and met me today.
So when you say you understand someone — what is that you mean?
A person is what she says she is and also what she does not say, and what she does not know about herself. We all have scope of more branches that we can spread towards than we are aware of. But our way of looking at ourselves can be limiting. By reducing ourselves to our actions and reactions we miss to explore all the capabilities that we can express.
We see people’s actions as a part of their character and motive. Everyone has a fixed character. Every one has to behave a certain way.
So is it our reaction to a situation that defines us as a person? How we react, how strongly we react? Or how we consume sensory information and react? If as a person I don’t say anything and don't react, will that give you any information to know who am?
Are we just an agglomeration of all things we like, things we are passionate about, things we have experienced, things we react positively and negatively to? Are we just a collection of weird habits? What are we? So if any of this changes in a person — what they like about or passionate about or their weirdness, will you stop connecting with that person?
Does connection mean common interests or something more than that? Is it that you like ice cream that I like you or is it your search for excitement that I find myself drawn towards you? And when I do like you, is it because you seem similar to me or a version of a human being that I aspire to be?
At any point of time some one’s beliefs, tendency to act in a certain way, responsiveness to certain triggers — can make her emit a predicable behavior. Is that all she is?
Sometime back I did a practical experiment on myself. Because of how things were going in my life I had a sudden distrust in the way I was thinking. So I decided to do the exact opposite of what my brain asked me to. I would scream when it hushes me up and be silent when its going bonkers. It did not change things much to the outside world but inside I was more peaceful. I had successfully erected a wall between my senses, my thought machine and my will to act. I could now act as I see fit based on what is the outcome I need and not based on my world view of what is right and wrong (though that view doesn't die, its just muted or has reduced volume in the scheme of things)
At any point of time we are a bunch of ideas about ourselves and the world. and we have incentives to act in a certain way. You will find yourself talking more about philosophy with a philosophy lover than a sports lover, for example. Others might not even know that you philosophize! The perception of who you are between person X and person Y, could be totally different. Then, are you, in effect two persons? Or even multiple personalities in one?
We love few people in our lives and hate few. We are a mix of our intellectual perceptions, biological responses, psychological tendencies and habits put together. Many of these are not in people’s control. We are not even aware of what impacts our actions.
When we ignore this fluid state of things,and have a “single” picture of someone’s personality— discounting all the thought processes, all the learnings, improvements, struggles, earnest attempts to change the person goes through— there are dangers of deriving simplistic conclusions. Conclusions that can make you do stupid things, conclusions that do not help you derive the best experience of a situation.
Accepting reality as reality
Do we have a peer pressure to act as the same person as yesterday so that we do not draw unnecessary attention? And the kind of person we are projecting ourselves to be - what percentage of that is us? Which personality of us are we projecting and why? And what happens to the rest of the thoughts and ideas of ourselves? When do they act out? When do they come out? And what if people do not like that person you just projected out? Is our behavior an incentivized system that depicts parts of us as required by the situation?
Is our own understanding of ourselves limiting? Are you more than who you think we are? If then, how can we use this to our advantage? Whenever someone says you can’t do it — you are right to say — “yeah, but you don’t know me! You can say this action will not work. Not that I can’t do something”
What if each interaction is seen as a part of the essence that is driving the action — love, collaboration etc. What if we see the past as not just a character expression but an interaction of character, trigger, environment, beliefs and ideas? And if you don’t like an outcome you can focus on any one of those variables than blame the person. And by helping people to react in different ways, you can open up new possibilities for social interaction.
It is possible that our idea of a person can change in certain situations. A strong person might act weak. A tough person can chicken out. Our assessments of ourselves and others can be limiting, harming and hindering us from nourishing the experiences completely. For example, X is this character, she reacts like this usually, I like her blah blah. In contrast, what if I say X says she believes in a, b, c etc., acts out a certain way in certain situations and responds to certain triggers. More like an unknown with few parts known. More like a black box that gives out few signals. Still there is a lot left to explore. This view of someone, especially someone close to you, can be so liberating. You have so much aspects to get into, aspects even she didn’t know. You have so many new ways to interact. You have so many new experiences to go through . So many new dimensions to explore. You can even help her understand the universe within her.
