It’s been an interesting day. I learned the Greek root words for hippopotamus, why cats stretch and the way gorillas carry their young. We have commonalities with certain animals, yet we are distinct from them.
In some of my classical readings, perspectives have emerged on what makes humans unique. One thinker identifies intellect as our defining feature.
Through standard education, we aren’t taught the psychological patterns of humanity. We just pick them up as we go. Unless we don’t. Then we’re left in the dark wondering how the world works.
Take the herd mentality. Sometimes people go along with others – even when they know better. Get an influential person with an opinion, and others go along with them just to keep the peace or to keep their social standing.
Many years ago, I was doing an assignment which required me to observe a group. I asked the leader of a group I had recently stepped out of, whether I could observe a meeting. The leader said that if I spoke individually to everyone in the group and got each person’s permission, I could observe them for my assignment. These were the days before texts and social media. I called each one on the phone over the next few days, explained what I was doing, what I needed to observe, and all the other details. Yes, each one was happy for me to observe the group. It was wonderful news.
On the day of the meeting, I turned up and tucked myself in the corner, well out the way. I didn’t want to intrude. The meeting began. One person wondered out loud what I was noting down. Someone else added their piece and very quickly the room changed. I offered to read them what I’d written, to allay their fears, but they refused. Within minutes of the meeting beginning and after going to the effort of individually speaking to everyone present and getting their approval in advance, they asked me to leave. It was humiliating.
I still wrote my assignment on that group. It was a very different picture to what I expected, on a completely different angle to everyone else in my class, but I nailed that assignment. My marks were great. That group revealed things about group culture that no cooperative group could have done.
When we have a bad experience or feel humiliated, it’s easy to sit in the emotion. We think it’s about us. But, people act in strange ways. I was the outsider. Each individual, who were each lovely people on their own, made a decision to protect their place in the group. The genuine relationship we’d had before that point crumbled in the face of peer pressure.
To be honest, it took a long time before I felt welcome amongst them again. I held on to the emotion of that moment. But they didn’t change. Not really. They were just preserving themselves in their own context.
It didn’t make what they did okay. But it was explainable.
I’ve forgiven the people back in that room. I know it was only a small thing, but it held me back from feeling free around them for a long time. By forgiving them, I freed myself from the tie of that memory. The memory is still there, but it has healed.
People you know and love, will hurt you from time to time. When you understand the mechanism underneath their behaviour, you set yourself up to be able to deal with the situation.
A herd mentality leaves damage in its wake. Consequences of pushing someone to do something against their better judgement, can have lasting negative effects. You don’t have to look far to find stories of regret and remorse after succumbing to peer pressure, or the sense of injustice at being excluded.
A herd mentality amplifies bullying that chips away at someone’s worth. Unbearable isolation may stem from being turned upon, as the ostracised person fails to understand why they’re never included.
It’s easy to point the finger. Learning about the way that humans behave doesn’t just apply in one direction, us looking at them. To truly benefit from learning, we’ve got to look at it from the opposite direction. When have we caused pain by going along with the crowd? When have I, when have you, hurt someone because we didn’t want to lose face?
The beautiful thing about learning and reflecting is that we don’t have to stop with the theories and the explanations. We don’t need to keep a tally about who has wronged us and what they did. We can take it a step further and look for where that phenomenon resides in us. We know from experience that it is unpleasant to be on the receiving end. Can we now recognise when someone else is hurting? Can we be the ones to encourage them, or even become strong enough to stand against the current and prevent the damage from landing on its target?
Becoming Unoffendable is not about building walls of protection or training ourselves to understand what others did. It is about observing humanity and their flaws and realising that given the right set of circumstances, we too overlook or hurt others intentionally or unintentionally.
We don’t usually think through consequences when we act, consequences can morph beyond where we expected them to go. We can be so wrapped up in our own situation and hurt that we don’t realise the impact our self-preservation is having on those around us. What are we perpetuating from our reactions to others?
If intellect is one of our defining features, we, as humans, can train and hone it. There are stages to learning, first we learn the basics and look for examples in those around us. It’s important for us to lay a foundation of understanding and to be able to identify a pattern. The beautiful thing is that we don’t have to remain at that skill level. Once we have mastered that level, we can reflect on how we replicate that pattern. Then seeing the pattern in our own lives, we are positioned to do something about it.
We can’t change other people, but we can change the way that we respond. We can apply our own experience to someone else in need and make a difference in their situation. What a privilege. What a responsibility.
We are not the same as animals. Let’s prove it.
