06/16/2022
Have you ever wondered why some people just rub you the wrong way?
In other words, have you ever felt that no matter how hard you tried, someone you work with or live with or someone you love just does not seem to get you or understand you the way you understand yourself?
And you try to understand them, so that the relationship goes smoother and everyone can be happy…but it’s rather exhausting, maybe even hopeless?
So you start to question what the problem is. It’s easy to blame them. It’s also easy to blame ourselves. And doing this…thinking in this way is futile. Because, we ARE all responsible.
And while there is an underlying positive intention at the heart of the philosophy “treat others as you want to be treated”, there is also naïveté, bias and the potential for ineffectiveness in relationships right from the beginnning. It’s this getting off on the wrong foot without even realizing we’re doing it that causes so much misunderstanding, frustration, and eventually conflict in relationships.
When we all mean to assume positive intent, we may as well begin by treating others as they themselves want to be treated. Do you know how you want others to treat you? At home? In public? In the workplace?
How are other people (in these different situations and settings, from day to day) supposed to know how you want to be treated? You might like to know this for yourself.
How are you supposed to know how someone else wants to be treated at any given time or in changing circumstances? You’re definitely not supposed to know unless they have told you.
Generally speaking, many people do not pause and orient themselves to the situations they find themselves in. They think they know themselves. We think we know ourselves. And we do instinctively as well as intuitively.
What I wonder is how we might benefit from becoming a more curious culture.
What if - instead of treating others as we ourselves wish to be treated - we asked others how they want to be treated, and did our best to act accordingly (as long as we are able and willing, of course)?
What if we began to communicate about how we treat each other, about what works well and what doesn’t work well?
What if we checked in regularly? What if we became competent at communicating intelligently and honestly this way?
What if we built more understanding of our different personalities, our different temperaments, our different senses of self?
How would you feel if you knew you could confidently express your personal boundaries and take full pride in the roles you play in your everyday relationships? At home? At work? I’m community?
What types of questions do you already use to ask others how they want to be treated?
