I suspect that most interpersonal conflicts are really based in disappointment. We’re disappointed that the other person didn’t do what we wanted them to do. Think about it. The last time you were mad at someone, why were you mad at them? Nine times out of ten it’s because they disappointed you. They didn’t show up on time, didn’t say the right thing, did something you disapproved of, or weren’t there for you in the way you needed them to be. They didn’t do, say, or feel what you wanted them to.
A friend is catering another friend’s benefit event, and was feeling frustrated because people he had recruited to help him didn’t come through. The day before the event, he had nobody to help him cook, prepare, pack, or deliver the food, and had to scramble to be able to get things ready. It occurred to me that one of the problems in the situation is that my friend hadn’t counted on these other people’s proven tendency to flake out. This type of thing had happened before with this group, and he had been left scrambling. At the very least, he could have followed up sooner and known earlier that the people in question weren’t going to be able to help. In a sense, he had set himself up to be disappointed, because he had expected these people to act differently than they had in the past. This line of thinking made me realize that the best way to avoid being disappointed is to accept people for exactly who they are.
If your partner habitually forgets your anniversary, you view the upcoming anniversary with some anxiety, right? You believe he’ll forget again, and you can taste the disappointment and anger, even before it happens. Then he forgets again and you get upset. “This happens every year,” you say, “Why can’t you just remember!?” Sure, if it’s important to you, he should make an effort to remember. But if he doesn’t, and hasn’t for most years, isn’t the disappointment you feel somewhat on your own shoulders, for expecting him to be someone that he isn’t? In this case, you might consider taking his remembering on as your responsibility (writing it on the calendar in the kitchen for instance, or reminding him a few days before). But how many of us (and I’m guilty of this as well) will actually avoid mentioning it or writing it down, as if to catch him forgetting, so we can be justified in getting mad? Isn’t that entrapment?
The funny thing is that the people who disappoint us the most bitterly are often the people we know the best. This seems counterintuitive, because if we know these people so well, why would we expect them to behave in ways that they never have? I have a friend who is almost always late when we make a date to go out. For years and years, I would boil, fume, and make snarky comments to her every time she was late. But eventually, I stopped expecting anything else, and now, not only doesn’t it bother me when she is late, she’s not late as often anymore. I used to feel uncomfortable around my mother because I felt that she rarely asked questions about my life or my work. It felt like she didn’t care. But when I was able to drop the expectation that she be someone she wasn’t, it didn’t bother me anymore. I know what we talk about (movies, food, travel, family), and I know what we tend not to talk about, and I’m pleasantly surprised when we end up talking about something that goes deeper than our normal conversations.
How do we accept the people around us for who they are, and not for who we want them to be?
1) Understand who they are in the first place. I have a bad habit of trying to find psychological reasons that explain why people don’t act the way I would in a situation. I can always come up with some seemingly sound psychological reason why Steve doesn’t respond to the emotional content of my emails or Jodie never answers her phone and takes days to call back. But the reason why isn’t important. How do they act? What are their patterns? That’s who they are. End of story.
