Thoughts During My Sabbatical
I took some time off and reflected on the most recent arguments I got into on this blog. On why I became angry about the issue. I came to the realization (not without the help of my friends) that this ties directly to another issue that has been known to arouse such anger in me in the past. An issue that on the surface appears to be completely different.
I have to force myself to reign in my temper at work sometimes when I am trying to go above and beyond to help somebody out, and they are fighting me and thus preventing the assistance I am trying to provide. Or when people call in screaming and yelling because they expect to get a hassle from you, and when they don't, they feel the need to keep going until their arsenal is exhausted any way. In both of these cases, people form opinions about what is going on in the conversation, and where it will go, and they act according to these opinions rather than to the results of the conversation.
This does tie in with what happened here, and has happened here in the past. I originally assumed insult with the scenario, because I did not consider the fact that this was a decision being made by a group of individuals, not a single entity. The fault in this lies with me, and I have already admitted that.
The response, however, is where the anger seeded and matured. Those who responded all took a common approach. They assumed they knew me, and my motives for reacting as I did. They then crafted their responses based on this assumption.
Those familiar with the scientific method know that you can't form a conclusion first and then make the test results fit this conclusion. Detectives know you can't make the facts fit the case, but must, rather, do it the other way around.
At the core of this is the reason for why I became so angry. Angrier than seemed warranted, even to me. It is a primal issue, and the inherent cause for virtually all of the ills of the world. The formation of reasoning based on belief, rather than belief based on reason.
The fact that people chose to form beliefs about me, and then deduce my motivations based on this connected to this more primal issue at the core of numerous other problems that are more serious in the world today. Rather than take the time to try to determine why I was offended, people decided that they knew, and that I was wrong. The former was false, even if the latter was not.
This issue, anonymous, is why you got such a hostile response from me in that earlier conversation. I requested to specifically avoid this scenario in that conversation and was ignored.
So while some of you hover over the keyboard with the response I expect at least one of you to respond with anyway, I will try to clarify once more. I am aware of the fact that I made some assumptions about the motives of others in the synchroblog thing. I have already apologized for this, having realized my error. (An error that I only realized because I continued to try to understand the motives of others, rather than rest on the initial assumption.) So I know at least one of you will point out this error of mine and I will simply copy this paragraph and point out additionally that I asked all along for the error in my way of thinking to be pointed out to me, and wasn't taken up on it. Well, since that is now part of this paragraph, I can just copy it.
Just some explanations of some of the emotional issues re: life, or something close to it.
I have to force myself to reign in my temper at work sometimes when I am trying to go above and beyond to help somebody out, and they are fighting me and thus preventing the assistance I am trying to provide. Or when people call in screaming and yelling because they expect to get a hassle from you, and when they don't, they feel the need to keep going until their arsenal is exhausted any way. In both of these cases, people form opinions about what is going on in the conversation, and where it will go, and they act according to these opinions rather than to the results of the conversation.
This does tie in with what happened here, and has happened here in the past. I originally assumed insult with the scenario, because I did not consider the fact that this was a decision being made by a group of individuals, not a single entity. The fault in this lies with me, and I have already admitted that.
The response, however, is where the anger seeded and matured. Those who responded all took a common approach. They assumed they knew me, and my motives for reacting as I did. They then crafted their responses based on this assumption.
Those familiar with the scientific method know that you can't form a conclusion first and then make the test results fit this conclusion. Detectives know you can't make the facts fit the case, but must, rather, do it the other way around.
At the core of this is the reason for why I became so angry. Angrier than seemed warranted, even to me. It is a primal issue, and the inherent cause for virtually all of the ills of the world. The formation of reasoning based on belief, rather than belief based on reason.
The fact that people chose to form beliefs about me, and then deduce my motivations based on this connected to this more primal issue at the core of numerous other problems that are more serious in the world today. Rather than take the time to try to determine why I was offended, people decided that they knew, and that I was wrong. The former was false, even if the latter was not.
This issue, anonymous, is why you got such a hostile response from me in that earlier conversation. I requested to specifically avoid this scenario in that conversation and was ignored.
So while some of you hover over the keyboard with the response I expect at least one of you to respond with anyway, I will try to clarify once more. I am aware of the fact that I made some assumptions about the motives of others in the synchroblog thing. I have already apologized for this, having realized my error. (An error that I only realized because I continued to try to understand the motives of others, rather than rest on the initial assumption.) So I know at least one of you will point out this error of mine and I will simply copy this paragraph and point out additionally that I asked all along for the error in my way of thinking to be pointed out to me, and wasn't taken up on it. Well, since that is now part of this paragraph, I can just copy it.
Just some explanations of some of the emotional issues re: life, or something close to it.
Labels: reasoning, self examination
posted by Wanderer at 8:23 PM
3 Comments:
I have to say that this entire issue went a direction I didn't anticipate, and I'm sorry for any role I played that might have seemed antagonistic or judgmental. Unfortunately I tend to be a "let's all just play nice" kind of person, to a fault, i.e. I often want to see conflict resolved rather than true understanding of others' perspectives.
The fault doesn't lie entirely with you. I will aim to make no further assumptions about your feelings, motives or beliefs. We all deserve that.
Just to clarify, in your text you said I might be annoyed. I'm not; I said do what you wanted to with the thought, and I'm thrilled you seem to have actually contemplated it. Relating it to others isn't something that would annoy me. I just thought it wouldn't do any good, because it's one of those things you can't teach people who don't see it for themselves.
I don't really understand the conclusion you came to, but maybe I don't really need to either. I'm glad you thought it through and came to an understanding that satisfied you.
I hope you'll believe me when I say that I never post here with the intent to push your buttons.
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