Of Perceptions and Expectations
In the previous past I have been forced to learn through experience that no matter how I want people to perceive me in a certain way ultimately they will make their own assumptions of me.
Their perception of me will depend on who that person is as an individual, their values and virtues and how they see the world. I will do things which I will consider okay and someone else will see it as absolute nonsense, trash even ( forgive my language). It won’t matter what I do to try to maintain that perception of me that has been made, eventually people believe what they want to believe and see what they want to see.
Expecting that people see you in the same way that you see yourself is a naive thing to do. The best thing you can do is just be yourself and stay true to who you are, be open to criticism and accept that you are not a perfect human being.
You will hurt other unknowingly and if they don’t confront you about it you will not know what you did wrong and therefore will not improve because how can we learn to be better if we don’t recognize our mistakes?
One has to search their own actions towards others sometimes. Think outside of yourself, take a close look at your actions and use the feedback from people you interact with. Find where you can do better and apologize where you did wrong.
However you have to know too that ultimately you have no actual control on how someone perceives you. Even a smile can be seen as threat by someone who encountered a psychotic person that smiled right before doing some psychotic things.
You just need to be aware of your environment and not get too comfortable in your head, take a breather once in while and honestly interact with others. Don’t expect to be seen as a good person always even if that’s who you have convinced yourself to be.
If it so happens that someone’s see’s you in different way from how you perceive yourself don’t take offense immediately, instead calm down and table it out with that person.
Remember no matter how good a person you are, you are still not perfect. Mistakes will be made, feelings will be hurt. Own them and apologize.
