Sleep Thinking on Control and Empathy
This morning I woke up in the middle of a conversation with myself. The topic was people saying things such as "I know what you're thinking/going to do/feeling" I have always bristled when people say these things to me and I was untangling it to a greater degree than my dad said it when he was being an ass.
Now it's true that he did say those types of things when he was being an ass but he's not the only one. From my experiences people who feel the need to say the "know" your thoughts motivations future actions or feelings do so in order to subtly belittle the person they are talking to and establish dominance. If they are so knowing they can often use even the idea of their superior knowledge to manipulate others.
As children many people think that at least one of their parents must be clairvoyant due to a seeming uncanny ability to sniff out the kid's misdeeds. In actually mostly that ability comes from years of observing their child, learning their tells, having a sense of their personality and sometimes some thing just being fairly common kid things to do. Lying about eating the last cookie with a face covered in crumbs isn't Sherlock Holmes level detecting. Kids are generally terrible liars/thieves. I know I was, I tried to deny any knowledge of a box of missing treats when all the wrappers were in my bedroom trashcan around the age of 8. I got better at covering my tracks but it took years.
Anyway the idea that parents are so all knowing is an arsenal that many parents use to temper bad behavior. How often has a person told of not doing something because their mom would just know. Used judiciously it can be a good thing. However the problem comes in when the idea that knowing the behavior also grants anyone including parents the power to know for sure why the kid is doing something is troublesome.
For one thing it can keep a parent from actually listening to their child. I often did things as a kid that I saw later my kids do but our motives were different. I was an emotional child and have always been a stress eater so sneaking food particularly sweets was a sure sign of stepped up levels of stress. My parents never knew that, they assumed I was simply greedy and selfish. They had no idea of quite a bit going on in my world. I tried not to make the same mistake with my kids. My youngest used to get up at odd hours of the night and raid the fridge. After some questioning I found out he'd wake up hungry. There wasn't anything nefarious in it. He was hungry and not great at social niceties like throwing away empty cartons or making sure to leave enough for someone else when eating something more than he liked.
My idea is that many people, parents and others have a difficult time empathising with others. The idea of people having different internal experiences is foreign or possibly simply disdained. I know I'm guilty of sometimes thinking that someone was responding to something in a wrong way. I know I need to stop and take stock when I hear myself saying "well I did/went through such and such and didn't/did blah blah blah" Something I have seen in myself is when I have a strong negative response to other people's feeling or actions regarding specific shared experiences has way more to do with me and my issues be they anger, jealousy, or annoyance, than to do with the other person. Sure there are people who act in ways or express feelings that I just can't get with. I'm constantly working on releasing the idea that they are wrong, and reframe it as they are doing them and it's not what I would do but I'm not them. That doesn't mean I have to be around everyone or excuse stuff so much as it means I need to remind myself to check my own shit.
I think taking the stance of knowing other's minds/feelings when they haven't been revealed to us is an expression of a need for control. Hmm sleep-thinking is enlightening.
Now it's true that he did say those types of things when he was being an ass but he's not the only one. From my experiences people who feel the need to say the "know" your thoughts motivations future actions or feelings do so in order to subtly belittle the person they are talking to and establish dominance. If they are so knowing they can often use even the idea of their superior knowledge to manipulate others.
As children many people think that at least one of their parents must be clairvoyant due to a seeming uncanny ability to sniff out the kid's misdeeds. In actually mostly that ability comes from years of observing their child, learning their tells, having a sense of their personality and sometimes some thing just being fairly common kid things to do. Lying about eating the last cookie with a face covered in crumbs isn't Sherlock Holmes level detecting. Kids are generally terrible liars/thieves. I know I was, I tried to deny any knowledge of a box of missing treats when all the wrappers were in my bedroom trashcan around the age of 8. I got better at covering my tracks but it took years.
Anyway the idea that parents are so all knowing is an arsenal that many parents use to temper bad behavior. How often has a person told of not doing something because their mom would just know. Used judiciously it can be a good thing. However the problem comes in when the idea that knowing the behavior also grants anyone including parents the power to know for sure why the kid is doing something is troublesome.
For one thing it can keep a parent from actually listening to their child. I often did things as a kid that I saw later my kids do but our motives were different. I was an emotional child and have always been a stress eater so sneaking food particularly sweets was a sure sign of stepped up levels of stress. My parents never knew that, they assumed I was simply greedy and selfish. They had no idea of quite a bit going on in my world. I tried not to make the same mistake with my kids. My youngest used to get up at odd hours of the night and raid the fridge. After some questioning I found out he'd wake up hungry. There wasn't anything nefarious in it. He was hungry and not great at social niceties like throwing away empty cartons or making sure to leave enough for someone else when eating something more than he liked.
My idea is that many people, parents and others have a difficult time empathising with others. The idea of people having different internal experiences is foreign or possibly simply disdained. I know I'm guilty of sometimes thinking that someone was responding to something in a wrong way. I know I need to stop and take stock when I hear myself saying "well I did/went through such and such and didn't/did blah blah blah" Something I have seen in myself is when I have a strong negative response to other people's feeling or actions regarding specific shared experiences has way more to do with me and my issues be they anger, jealousy, or annoyance, than to do with the other person. Sure there are people who act in ways or express feelings that I just can't get with. I'm constantly working on releasing the idea that they are wrong, and reframe it as they are doing them and it's not what I would do but I'm not them. That doesn't mean I have to be around everyone or excuse stuff so much as it means I need to remind myself to check my own shit.
I think taking the stance of knowing other's minds/feelings when they haven't been revealed to us is an expression of a need for control. Hmm sleep-thinking is enlightening.
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