MECHANISM OF UNDERSTANDING RELOADED
Introduction
Mechanism of Understanding
is the mental, physical and psychological process of knowledgeability of the
other person.
In other words, it is an
aspect of interpersonal relationship that makes for the understanding of the
other person’s point of view. It literally means how to understand/have
knowledge of the other person, mentality, physically and psychologically. This
aids how well we relate with people and I can assure you that if we all do this
well, the world would have been better than it is at the moment.
Mechanism of Understanding
helps to see in another person’s end, even when it seems most unreasonable to
do so.
For instance, if after you
have a light disagreement with your partner, you try calling, but he/she isn't
picking up. The WhatsApp and BBM messages you sent shows he/she read them, what
will be going on in your mind at that moment is that he/she intentionally
ignores your calls and messages. You think you will not assume such?
Regardless of how well you think
you all can handle such situation, it is obvious most of us will get annoyed
and say some things out of anger. What causes such anger? That anger was self
influenced. It was actually as a result of lack of understanding of what is
going on with the other person and the assumption of wrongs on behalf of that
person.
Most of us, if not all of
us, would have thought: “oh, because of this little quarrel, he/she
ignores my calls; he/she even sees my messages, read and didn't reply. I guess he/she
has been seeing another person, I guess he/she planned this to happen in order
to do what’s on his/her mind.” But only few of us would have reasoned
in the other person's favor in that situation.
Law of Coincidence
For Mechanism of
Understanding to be appropriately put to use, we need to understand something
called: "Law of Coincidence" and how it works.
Law of Coincidence states
that: “when something of uncertain cause happen, there will always be another
occurrence to ascertain its presumed cause.”
The fact is that Law of
Coincidence will always occur, but it doesn't always mean occurrences that come
to ascertain the cause of initial occurrence are accurate. They are not at all
time right.
Remember the word "Presumed"
it means, law of coincidence acts on your presumptions
& assumptions. This law also relates with Law of Attraction, but the
real cause is divine, not Law of Attraction. It means, if something happen and
you are already thinking of what the cause is, something will happen to
convince you of what you think is as the actual cause, whereas, you might be
wrong, no matter how convincing. This does not happen because you think of it,
which is why it cannot be said to be Law of Attraction. The cause seems divine,
no one determines it.
Antidotes to Law of Coincidence
Have you ever wondered why
when someone is shot dead and it is clear to everyone the victim died of the
gunshot, the police will still want to conduct autopsy on the corpse. Have you
tried to know why? Having known that the person was shot dead, is there any
need for autopsy?
The police conducts autopsy,
because assumption could prove them wrong, they have to be sure. Reason:
certain things happen, but the obvious and assumed causes are not really the
causes (Law of Coincidence). The person might have died just immediately the
gun was shot, but another thing might have caused his death, not the gun shot,
but life will always present to you, what you want to see.
Patience
Regardless of how sure you
think you are, how obvious and undisputable you think causes of things are,
never assume the cause at the detriment of anyone, even the supposed prime
suspect. Always try to know the real cause of things. Ask questions.
This requires a virtue
called: Patience. Instead of assuming, ask questions. However, permit
me to tell you that patience has limitation in Mechanism of Understanding. It
usually runs out.
However, the place of
patience in the Mechanism of Understanding can never be overemphasized. Try as
much to understand why people do things they do. Dig deep into their intentions
and sympathize with them. Even though there are cases in which you do not have
to sympathize with people, but I tell you, if you do it when you ought to, the
world will be a better place and patient helps in achieving this.
I once sent a quote out
saying: “The greatest Art of Communication is the Art of seeing in the other
people’s perspectives and sympathizing with them.” I also sent another
one out saying: “one of the worst forms of blindness that has so much plagued the world
is inability to see with the other person's eyes.” The two quotes are
only saying the same thing in different ways.
They are referring to one
single thing: “empathy” without this, the world will become a war zone.
What is empathy?
Empathy
Empathy is paranormal
ability to physically read another person's emotions.
Empathy is a very great
trait essential for living; some people don't know it, while most people
consciously ignore it. “The only profession in which people are
trained not to use empathy is military and this is because they are trained for
war. So if the world has become a war zone, it is because of lack of empathy or
conscious ignorance of it.”
The greatest Art of Communication
is the Art of seeing in another people’s perspectives and sympathizing with
them. Take the word "sympathizing" it is derived from empathy, and it
simply means, without empathy, communications will always be faulty and if
communication is faulty, we have misinterpretations and misinterpretations
leads to anger, anger leads to quarrel and this may degenerate to war.
It will be easier to
sympathize if you understand why people do things they do, but most times we
don't really understand or care to do so. Most of us are not skilled in reading
people, we are so stereotyped, we could only see from our own end; all we want
to believe are the things we already presumed. This is a major cause of anger.
For instance, you already thought somebody disrespect you by acting in a certain
way towards you; you’d obviously get annoyed, but that might not be the
person's intention.
Many sincere acts have been
misinterpreted and they lead to serious damage of persons and relationships. I
once read about an army lady, who beat and ordered to be beaten to pulp, a
young man for saying she is beautiful. That was bad. Sincere appreciation
landed him in the hospital, half dead.
The woman was probably blind
to see with the man's eyes. She probably thought man was mocking her. She could
only be tagged wicked, if she knew it was a sincere appreciation and still
acted thus. The same reason why she beat the man up is the same reason why
telling a religious girl on the street how beautiful she is makes you a
potential destiny killer.
This is caused by
misinterpretation of people’s actions out of blindness to see with their eyes
and peer in to their intentions.
Without understanding why
people do what they do, there always will be problems. Always try as much to
look beyond your presumed cause of certain occurrences and see the real causes.
I tell you, anger, bitterness and quest for revenge will be far from you. It is
also very important to put yourself in the other person’s shoes and sympathize
with them.
For instance, If you go to a
brothel to sleep with a prostitute, and she treats you badly because you didn’t
pay well, you probably might get angry and want to treat her badly too, but
that will be because of your blindness to see with her eyes. You probably think
it is useless to sympathize with a “common prostitute”? You feel nothing good
can come out of her? You think she’s acting that way because she’s a slut, or
you don’t even care? All you care about is to get the service, which you paid
for? That is self-centeredness, nurtured by your lack of empathy or conscious
ignorance of it.
If you pay a very little to
sleep with a prostitute, she has much more to lose, she lost her pride in the
society already, and the money that could be a replacement is what you do not
have, yet you want to enjoy her, she won’t feel happy and that will affect the
way she treats you. Perhaps, no girl in her right mind decides to take to
prostitution. They are not there because they enjoy sex and want to sleep with
everyone. If you have been able to understand where she’s coming from, you
won’t get annoyed. That seem the worst example, but it is the best I can use
now.
Jesus made the most correct
and efficient psychological statement on interpersonal relationship. He said; “do
unto others what you want to be done to you”. He didn't say what you
will do to yourself, you could hurt yourself. He didn't say what people do to
you, which will be revenge or payback. But knowing that we don't want people to
hurt us and we always expect the best from them, he said, that which you expect
people to do to you, do it to them first. I tell you, if we can do this, the
world will become a better place and we will automatically practice the
greatest Art of communication without stress.
Selflessness
The first virtue that makes
Mechanism of Understanding work well is “selflessness”
though it works well with love, but it is a virtue on its own. If you are
selfless; you are able to look beyond yourself, what you feel, what you think
about certain situation or people, it will be easy to understand their
perspective on things and not run roughshod on their feelings.
The Act in Mechanism of Understanding – Assumption of Rightness
Since you can assume wrong
reasons why people do things they do, it is also possible to assume right
reasons why they act the way they do. Instead of getting angry when she is not
answering your calls, assume she is busy. Instead of thinking she's a slut
sleeping around; assume she is helpless and needs help.
Instead of thinking he's
useless and an ordinary area boy, assume he did not have good up keep and home
training and don’t just stop at that, ask questions and make attempt to help.
Take the fault away from
people and with that, you will have no reason to get angry, nurse bitterness
and revenge, all of which are attributes of hate. That’s an act that helps in
utilization of Mechanism of Understanding, it does more good than harm, but it
has limitation.
Limitations to Mechanism of Understanding
Crime
A major limitation to
Mechanism of Understanding is crime. Under the law, once investigation proves
you guilty, people won’t adopt Mechanism of Understanding in your favor. This
kind of law might be jungle justice or legal laws, but whatsoever, whenever you
go against the law, the law must act and this is a major limitation to
Mechanism of Understanding, as no one will be willing to listen to you once you
are caught in the act.
Lack of Forgiveness & Quest for Revenge
Once someone has refused to
forgive and set out to revenge, it will only take a stronger force to make the
person see in your own end. Earlier adoption of Mechanism of Understanding
might prevent lack of forgiveness and quest for revenge, but if it was not
adopted earlier, it will be hard to adopt it again when the mind is already
set, though not impossible.
Static Assessment of the Other Person
This precedes every other limitation
to Mechanism of Understanding.
Everyone in the world is
guilty of this in one way or the other. Most people are quick to assume who people
are, based on their past behaviours or what people had said about them. While
it could be good at times, for security reasons, it has done more harm than
good. It is very good not to judge people by their past behaviours, good or bad
until you find out they are still the same.
Sometimes ago, in a WhatsApp
group I belonged, there was a guy that I know for criticizing harshly. One day
I wrote a poem and I pasted, and then came his comment, where he seemed to be
riddling my poem by calling it mere rap scroll. I took offense, responded with
caustic words and he was there wondering what had happened. I was so sure he was referring to me until he
had to explain that he was actually commenting on a piece of rap lyrics posted
just before my poem came in, which I didn’t see.
I found out and he was
right. My words could not be taken back after I realized they were all
unnecessary. I had to apologize and keep quiet, but doing a psychological
dissection of my disgraceful actions, I realized it was because I had build a
static frame of his personality in my mind; I had always seen him as someone
who will do anything to make my work look ordinary, a critic who doesn’t
measure his words. Of course I was wrong against him. It was a shame. But
that’s what many of us do on daily basis. I tell you the truth, only a few
things cripple interpersonal relationship more than that.
Lack of Knowledge of the Other Person
This is another limitation
to Mechanism of Understanding. A lot of us, despite we do not know people, we
depend on hearsays and gossips about them, we listen to popular opinions and
once they behave in such a way that people described them to be, we will assume
that’s who they are. That’s wrong.
They say “first impression
matters”, so once the person’s first impression conforms to those hearsays, we
believe there is no need to find out any other thing or see from their own end,
talk less of sympathizing with them. That’s not god enough.
It is very important to understand
why people behave the way they do and sympathize with them. The worst way to
try to change people is by condemning them first, especially publicly. Instead
of assuming their persons with the first impressions which agrees with
hearsays, ask them why they do things they do, with maximum regard that won’t
appear like queries. In order to change people, you must care to know the
reasons for their actions, without first condemning them. Even the most stupid
people have very good reasons why they do things they do if you ask them.
Written, edited and delivered by Soul’e Rhymez
Delivered as lecture on Citadel of Life – COL & Soul’e Rhymez And Friend– SRAF on 26th October, 2016.
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Thanks for reading.
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