We are social animals; people perceive us that way, and that is how we portray ourselves to the outside world, to some extent.
The drinker wants to stop binge drinking, but one day, late night though, even when he comes home in a sober state, his wife throws out such words, “I know! You must have drunk a lot! Simply useless! Wimp!” So out of resentment towards the mistrust from his dear one, he really goes out to drink.
I watched a movie (Wong Kar Wai’s 2046). The girl in the movie fell into a sex relationship with the guy and she did really love him. Everyday after they had sex, he would leave her a cash note without giving good reasoning for doing so. The girl kept the notes in a box, cherished them and counted them to know how many nights they had spent together. Until a day the guy had enough of such superficial relationship, he ceased all sorts of interaction with the girl. He gave her money, he indicated that their relationship is merely a transaction and she only needed money from that. The girl laughed decadently, her heart bled but she just accepted the money, more money.
How a child ends up to be is also determined by the parents’ expectation towards him/her … I suppose.
To protect one's dignity, why do people still act in the way people think they are? Why the drinker continues to drink? Why not the girl throws all the cash notes back to the guy? Are they are losing the “self”, conforming to others’ expectation?
In the other extreme case, one ended up committing suicide partly as a result of being triggered by someone’s intriguing words. The close one expected that he wouldn’t dare enough to take the final road to ruin his life, but who knows, he tragically acted against other’s expectation and proved others wrong.
Do you have faith on the other who wants to make a change on himself/herself? We don’t know the outcome of this person’s effort.....I always believe that there’s no force to determine the future but it is the present doing to fix the future. If you anticipate a negative outcome and give awful feedback on someone’s next action, chances are he will get frustrated by your mistrust and remains a wrongdoing, or he may be triggered to act against you and do a good one to prove himself. Hmm .. but if you always have a goodwill towards that person, assume his capability to make a substantial change, I don’t see much possibility of his purposeful action doing the undesirable due to you.
We really don’t understand enough the person in front of us, his personality may set him into going through a rather predetermined route, but still, his future is yet to be determined, as long as he develops a wilful intention to change, don’t assume subjectively on how thing is gonna be for someone especially by assuming negatively.
