Loosing my shit when I am with people I admire.

[deleted] · 2015-03-16T20:58:16+00:00

I can always go to him and ask for help

Ask him, dude. Get his help. He knows you so much better than we're going to be able to based on a simple post. He'll probably be a lot nicer to you than the assholes on this subreddit LOL

foomfoomfoom · 2015-03-16T21:50:17+00:00

Develop a sense of what I call "human impermanence." It contrasts with object permanence. When babies are born, they have to develop a sense of object permanence: that things keep existing even when they can't see them. At first, babies literally think things cease to exist when they can't see them.

After that, people develop what I call "human permanence," where we see people in certain modes and think they must be like that all the time. We also strive to be stable things that act in stable, consistent ways all the time in accordance with roles that we're trying to occupy. We do this because we assume others have a sense of human permanence, and how they see us in this moment is how they think we are in every other moment.

Eventually, just like the baby, you graduate to a sense of human impermanence. You realize that for the greater portion of a person's life, they are nothing like they are when you are presently seeing them. I think people naturally mature into this mode, the way babies naturally mature into a sense of object permanence.

The way this relates to your point: when we think that a person is impressive, it's because we're only seeing how they are in this moment, and assuming that they a) have always been like that and b) are always like that. We don't see the events that helped them to come off in a cool, charismatic way now. We don't see them fumbling and goofing up and making really awkward statements. And if we're at the level of human permanece, we think their skills are simply innate.

Once you have a sense of human impermanence, it's pretty hard to be impressed with anyone, or to be wowed by someone, or to be awe-struck. Here's how to catalyze that sense of awareness: visualize that person when he was younger, when he'll be older and out of his mind, when he's asleep and drooling, when he's wondering if there's enough toilet paper left and realizing that there isn't, when he's inappropriately thinking he understands someone else's motives but misses the bigger picture, when he's nervous about something important, what he might be afraid of, etc etc etc. Just think about things that fill out the person with the common experiences that we all go through. And don't just think about the present life of the person, think about the past and future.

I came to these conclusions from watching my roommate's relationship with his girlfriend. He always tries to act like he has his shit more together than he does, and always tries to make himself look very presentable before they meet up. He is at the level of human permanence. She is at the level of human impermanence, and knows his act is mostly bs. It's funny to see because she is actually uncomfortable around him because his phoniness is very off putting to her, but he is not at the stage of understanding to even know that she sees through everything. Recently, after she tried to dump him twice (and once on Valentine's Day), he started acting more real with her, and you can see how much more relaxed and comfortable she is around him.

Im_Hitler · 2015-03-16T22:52:06+00:00

Im 24 and work in corporate sales around a lot of older and very succesful men which is a great environment to learn in. I agree that in situations where youre getting alot you should also be giving and adding value. While you might not have any advice for him youre job in this situation is to pad his ego. Make him feel good about himself when giving you advice. Make sure he knows that you appreciate his time and that he is making a material difference which is true, right? You'll find you become more likeable and he will be more inclined to help you.

Title	Loosing my shit when I am with people I admire.
Author	[deleted]
Upvotes	2
Comments	3
Date	March 16, 2015 8:55 PM UTC (11 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/askTRP
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/asktrp/comments/2z9w9f/loosing_my_shit_when_i_am_with_people_i_admire/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/askTRP/loosing-my-shit-when-i-am-with-people-i-admire.191613 https://theredarchive.com/post/191613

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