My Dear Hard Drive

Posts Tagged ‘psychology’

Most bloggers are hoping to receive comments to their posts. That is pretty much the reason they keep posting. If there isn’t any posts to their topics, they think nobody cares what they said and very likely stop. It’s still tolerable if you can tell nobody knows about your blog, but when you see in your stats that people read it but  nobody says anything, it can really drive you on the walls. I certainly don’t post as much as I would if there was comments on my posts, even though I have come to think the following:

The reasons I post a comment:

1) I read a blog post that is a fairly good one, but could be better. I have something to add or point out.

2) What the blogger said was so god damned idiotic, that I just have to tell them how things REALLY are.

Then there’s two reasons for not commenting:

1) The post was so pointless that it would be waste of my time to say anything.

2) The post was SO GOOD, that it would be pointless to say anything, because the only thing to add would be: “Hey, great post” and that reeks of someone after your Google Juice.

Now, the thing for you to do is to decide whether your posts are god damned pointless or simply amazing, and figure out which is the more likely reason for the lack of comments.

Popularity: 70%

This new year has started off great for me. I think it was the 2nd or 3rd of January, when I went and got my aura photo taken, as I’ve always been curious about it. Without going into a great detail, I’ll just post a photo…

Me with my logo created in 2007 and my aura photo 2010

But what has to do with this post today, is that green area. Green on your left side of the aura (my left) means healing that is coming to your being. The closer it is, the faster you’ll feel it’s effects. In my case, I think I already was feeling them when I got the photo taken, so I wasn’t surprised. I have been healing since the beginning of the year both physically and psychologically, but mainly the latter. I have understood a great variety of issues I’ve been struggling with all my life, some of them I’ve managed to put to rest.

The main issue: My mother.

As those who know me, know I have mother-issues. The issues stem from my deep respect for my mother, and a great need to make her proud. Instead of making her proud, I’ve always felt like a complete failure in her eyes in every regard, even though I’ve been proud of myself in my own eyes. I have been carrying a lot of anger about it (the red in the edges of my aura, btw) but it wasn’t until about a week or two ago that I understood the real problem. It wasn’t that she was disappointed or disapproving, it was because I, myself, have been carrying a lot of quilt for not being “the right kind” and disappointing her. That is not to say that she would be happy about me, but what I understood was that it doesn’t matter. It is not my duty to be the perfect daughter. I am what I am, and the only thing I can possibly do with what I am is to run with it. If my mom can’t let go of her quilt of not doing a better job at raising me, it’s not really my problem anymore – although I wish she will get over her quilt. As soon as I realised my own quilt, I was able to let it go – even though I’ve always thought my mom should somehow release me of it. I felt powerless to release myself.

Now that I have let go of my quilt, I can appreciate my mom in a completely new way. She doesn’t have to be perfect, she’s only a human as well, even though I always saw her as a goddess. Failing to be a goddess, I became angry at her for it. Not really fair, is it?
Second issue: Those without talent train

We have a humorous saying in Finland, “those without talent train”, meaning, that the talented ones are perfect as they are and should not be forced to practise their craft. Unfortunately, I have always taken that kind of seriously, even though I knew it wasn’t intended being serious. I don’t really edit my writing after it’s done. I hate fine tuning things, and I give up as soon as something turns into something resembling work. The reason why I do this is because it always gives me an excuse that if it’s not perfect, it’s just because I didn’t put the same amount of effort into it than others did. I have now understood this, and admitted it publicly. Maybe the next step could be that I can start training and practising. (In Finnish, we don’t have the dual meaning of “practising”, which in English can be used together with a professional in the field, even the professionals are still practising in English, which is just fantastic. In Finnish, professionals don’t practise anymore, they just work.)

Third issue: I have to be the first, the only one or the best

This has been a life long issue for me. I can’t STAND losing or being second best at anything. If I have a sneaking suspicion that I’m not the best, I rather pull out of it completely. I use rationale like: “Oh I can do it by myself.” or “I don’t know, it didn’t look like something I’d enjoy doing for any length of time.” Now, I have to come to terms with the fact that I am not the only writer, the first writer nor the best writer in the world, but that doesn’t mean I couldn’t be one of the respected (or paid!) ones. That will have to be good enough. It should be good enough for anyone.

So, I have joined a writers community online, and who knows, maybe soon I will read out stuff to people who also write and who write in a native language and who will know if I suck… Or if I’m good.

And maybe, just maybe, I will be able to publish an ebook and say that I want money for it, even though I’m not the best writer in the world, I still might deserve a pay.

Fourth issue: I need attention

Yesterday I was reading about attention seeking behaviours and was relieved to find out that even though some of the short descriptions of a mental disorder applied to me, at least I don’t resort to bullying and manipulations in my attention seeking. In fact, most of the methods do not make sense to me at all, like if I want attention TO ME, I see no sense trying to pretend to be someone else or something else, like some of these people do. Admitted, I did use some of these attention seeking tactics quite knowingly a couple of months ago when I pulled the “oh poor ol’ me toiling my tail off for you guys”-routine and felt quite uncomfortable doing it, but I wasn’t going to let my hard work go unappreciated and cast aside when it deserved an opened arms -welcome. It worked, to my horror. I’m never going to do that again. The point of this is that I must accept that I have human weaknesses. I am vain. What can I do other than start/continue doing things that are worth of attention and make sure people take notice. If they don’t, there’s nobody to blame but me.

So all and all, it’s been an exercise in taking responsibility of myself, long time overdue at that. I have been living on about 1/10 steam, so maybe now I’ll be able to kick myself into gear. Wish me luck (and courage).

Popularity: 67%

It is of general knowledge that Twitter is hard to understand. Why is it so hyped, when there’s so little to do? On Twitter, there is two things you can do to make it valuable for you: Be interested or be interesting. If you can’t be neither, there’s nothing left for you on Twitter. You can’t go on polishing your profile endlessly, nobody looks at it more than once anyway. You can’t spend your time taking tests of what type of a flower you are or which movie you should see next. You can’t spend your time posting links to your friends who will comment and “like” them out of responsibility toward you. On Twitter, you have to get to the point and get it there fast or you’ll sink into the oblivion in no time. Frankly, even if you do get to the point fast, you still sink into oblivion quite fast, and that is bad for your ego. That’s why you have to be interested in what others are saying too, in order to “get” twitter. And you have to know what interests you, and what type of people interest you, or you will randomly follow people who really are not interesting to you. Would I be so bold as to suggest that Twitter is a tool for smart people with a healthy ego..? (Not counting celebs and companies into that though.)

What people with a fragile ego will do to attempt to fool themselves into believing that they are interesting, is to follow a lot of people hoping to get a follow-back, especially those that use auto-follow tools if they spot one, and seek ways to “get thousands of followers automatically.” I doubt very much that those functions have much to do with practicality, but a lot to do with ego stroking. (I’m sure they explain it to themselves that they are doing it for business.) They are for people who don’t think their tweets will get them far enough fast enough for their own liking.

It is also quite an ego-bashing idea to believe that people would actually be interested in what you are doing right now. It won’t take you long to realize that NOBODY gives a damn about what you had for breakfast (unless you are a celebrity) and you will decide that you “don’t get” Twitter. Some people might have decided before trying it out that they don’t get Twitter, because who in their right mind would be interested in the daily activities of millions of nobodies around the world?

Twitter needs to be redefined so that people actually know what to expect of it. To me it’s a tool to broadcast 5 types of messages: Headlines, questions, one-liners, aphorisms and celebrity updates. Everything else is pretty pointless to put on Twitter. I admit I may have missed a type or two, if you can think of something else that is useful on Twitter, please do mention them in the comments!

Popularity: 30%

You know the people I’m talking about. People who always find the negative side to anything. Who tell you how your new company will fail, how you’ll end up heat broken in your new relationship and how everything you watch on Telly is just crap. Ever wondered why they do this? This is the only way they feel important. They try to control you with fear, and to bring you down to their level. But… Would anyone had ever invented the aeroplane if they’d listen to these people? Safe to say, nope.

For some reason, we are prone to believe negativity over the positive. Let’s think about movie critics for example. Which one do you think sounds more professional and believable, regardless of which movie it’s written about… Think about your favourite movie and imagine it’s written about it:

“The movie as a whole was really well done. The characters were believable and deeply engaging, the plot was imaginative and timed perfectly. The set and wardrobe was truly loyal to the time and there is simply nothing to complain!”

vs.

“The movie as a whole wasn’t that great. The characters were shallow and quite unrealistic, while the plot left something to hope for. The set and wardrobe could have used some advice from a historian.”

Which one do you think would gather more listeners? The negative, of course. The positive sounds like he knows nothing about making movies and accepts everything as it is, while the negative shows some “deep thinking”. When you read them though, neither one says anything about the movie, but the negative sounds like it did. And that’s why everyone hates a critic.

Negative people are useful though. If you need to test out a new idea and find flaws, there’s noone better to do it for you than a negative person. If he can’t pin-point anything specific or logical then you have a winner in your hands. That doesn’t mean that you have to get something positive out of the person, because you won’t, but you can get a lot out of him. For example, when I write and someone seems eager to tell me how much I suck and he can’t find anything but grammar mistakes, I’m celebrating. That means I’ve really done well. Positive thinking people won’t tell you about these little mistakes you do, so if you have a thick skin, you can really learn from the negative people, because they will point out every mistake you made or are likely to make, and while their attempt is to sound better than you and make you feel bad, just try to shake that off and look at the positive in the negatively thinking: They’ll give you the worst case scenario that your well-meaning friends won’t. And won’t that piss of the negative people if you’re able to see the positive in them!

Popularity: 33%

Do you know people, who rant and rave along the lines of ‘why can’t they just take my advice’ in their frustration of yet another failed attempt to help? I’m sure you know a relative like this (like your mother), but maybe you know one that is a chronic helper, someone who helps anyone who submits to it. These people don’t care if you want their help or need their help, because they are not helping you, they have their own issues forcing them to help you.

A conversation I had earlier today awoke my thoughts about this. An enlightened, wise man. I’ve admired his writing for years, and then, recently, had a few IM conversations with him when it hit me. He was on an ego-trip.

Let’s back up a bit. I learned something about myself a long time ago. I love giving people advice, helping them and giving them virtual playgrounds like discussion boards and the like. To the surface it seems like I’m doing this out of the goodness of my heart, but that’s only a part of the motivation. I get my reward. The reward is the feeling of superiority, authority, capability and control. I of course take delight of actually helping the people and seeing them enjoying what I created for them, but that is not my only motivation, unless I’m helping a friend. On the flip side of the coin, I don’t ask for help, and I don’t like receiving it either. And I believe, most people don’t really care for it either.

So the question arises; how do you help people without making them submit to your superiority and feeling like shit, while still getting the same satisfaction you do it for? The answer is simple: Never help anyone individually, unless they ask for your help. Also, never offer help assuming someone needs it. Always check with them if they need help, and try not to sound desperate to help, so that they won’t feel OBLIGATED to be helped, and let them give you green light to do it. When you have the permission to help, don’t abuse that permission and help the person on areas they didn’t request for help, even if they needed it.

Now you might say that you have to help a person if they need it. It’s your duty. You cannot pass them without helping them if they need your help and wisdom. I tell you to get over yourself and reassure yourself that it is none of your concern. If you really want to help that specific person, open the doors and offer your help to anyone who is willing to help themselves to it, but don’t ram it down someone’s throat when they’re not asking for it. The reason is, that there is a big difference between these sentences: “I’m out of my depth here, I need help.” and “You don’t know what you’re doing, I can help you.” I’m sure most of you can pick the difference, but I’m not sure everyone can. Once the green light is on, you can go in like a whirl wind and fix everything up, but before that happens, you have to keep your distance and let people figure things out for themselves.

The reason why general help works better than individual help is that it is less intrusive and less personal. You’re not making people feel like a charity case, inferior to you, like a child. They can see that this problem they’re having is big enough to be addressed to masses, so they’re not the only damned idiot who still hasn’t gotten it. If you go in and target an individual, they think that boy, they really must be stupid for not getting this as you go through all the trouble just for them – or at least you must think they’re stupid, or they realise it is a power sift thing intended to establish a child-parent (submissive-dominant) relationship. Neither one is really a fertile ground for any kind of growth. The bigger the help you’re offering, the more careful you have to be with the approach. If you swing into someone’s life with an intent to change their lives forever and solve all their problems, “if they just listen to you” that’s not going to work. You are telling them to accept you as their saviour and blindly follow you like you were Jesus himself.

Yesterday, I got some help from my brother-in-law. He solved a problem I’ve had for months. (To save my face I’ll have to say that I have been doing other things other than just trying to solve that one issue…) I went to him and asked him a simple question, and in 5 minutes my problem was solved. I didn’t feel stupid or anything, because at least I was clever enough to ask the right guy. Now, if he had come to me and told me: “Oh, let me do that for you!” it would have made me feel like a complete loser. He would have declared his superiority over me, but in the situation that happened, I had already decided that okay, this is one thing I can’t do without asking someone. (Some of us take longer to admit that than others. )

Another reason for chronic helping is the escape of one’s own problems by helping out other people. They don’t need to face their own failures and inadequacies if they just focus on yours. Again, it gives a feeling of capability, like they were in control of their lives – or at least somebody’s. Helpers motives are rarely questioned if it is apparent they don’t want your money, and pointing out the selfish motives for selfless acts might not go unpunished. Let’s see.

Popularity: 49%