Four kinds of people

Praise,

It was nice to talk to you yesterday. You see, I was tired. Like I described to a friend who gave me a call yesterday, I didn't lack strength, I had weakness in quantity. It was like matter—occupied space and had weight. I was tired.

I couldn't do things clearly. How I got through calls was purely instinct. I was so tired that when it came to writing that letter, nothing seemed so truer than those three words.

"I am tired."

I've recently come across a new approach to judgment—the curiosity of why. It is an approach that takes you out of your own self, and gives you the privilege of inhabiting someone else's experience.

When you ask the question, it's almost like astral travel. While you may think you do this often, I find that we don't do it well; and even if we did, we don't do it enough.

Self-awareness is something we've come to want, yet Daniel Kahneman in his fascinating book, "Thinking Fast and Slow" shows you how similar we all think. You find this realisation in the first 50 pages of his book—surprisingly. It leaves you guessing if you're any special at all.

Well, enough about me projecting how I felt about that book. Back to why. Criminal Minds, a Netflix US series I began to watch, is about a team of FBI profilers who solved crimes by empathising with the unsub—full meaning, "Unknown Subject", generally used to describe the unknown suspect.

The one question they kept asking in every episode on a consistent basis was "why did he do it?"

And it didn't help that the new book I started yesterday, "What the Dog Saw" by Malcolm Gladwell had in its preface a profound discovery about storytelling.

It says, "the trick to finding ideas is to convince yourself that everyone and everything has a story to tell".

Well, I want to tell you about yesterday, and come to a hasty conclusion I made about why I received the replies I got.

It was interesting that few seconds after I sent in that email, I got a reply. This is our first kind of person.

They care, a lot, more than you'd imagine; but usually would use familiarity and humour to cheer you up than empathise. It's usually a zero or one thing. You're either happy or sad, weak or energised. Use one to counter the other.

They're not tone deaf, their response is just personal. Half the time, they project themselves on you. They're the kings of "if I were you".

Let's call him, "The Disney Guide".

Then the next reply hit. Interesting, it brought a smile from my tired mouth. She said, "I know what it feels like to be tired".

These guys don't care because they should. They care because there's nothing else they'll rather do. They usually don't rush up to give solutions, or find the root of the problem. They really just want to live your experience with you.

Even when they do not mean it when they say they know what it feels like, there's a genuine want to know.

I'd call them "The Therapist"

I got this from Criminal Minds.

These guys want to understand you. They ask why, how, what, who, when. For them, your emotions have to be tied to some logic, something that can make them understand you.

Yes, they want to know for sure what is wrong. Usually, it comes with the delusion that when they know what's wrong, there'll be a sure fire way to fix it.

It comes with the assumption that there's something to be fixed. When they don't try to figure it out, they provide solutions off the bat.

Remember when you had a heartbreak or lost someone? Ever heard someone say move on, stop crying? Yep, that's them

"The Profiler" sounds just right.

Right off the bat, there's "The Parent".

These guys called.

The act is not the trait. It's the reason behind it. The extra-ness. The feeling of responsibility. Usually, they'd assume one or all of the previously outlined set, but there's always that bit of extra in how they do it.

I got over a dozen calls and emails yesterday, and I have come to a conclusion. Every person needs all of them. I'm not at a 100, but I am far better than I was last night.

Thank you, all of you, who reached out. Thank you for telling me how you'd have handle it. Hey Chuks, thanks for telling me to geddifok; I tried but it just wasn't good advice. Lol.

Thanks for trying to figure out why; work, stress, pressure, sapa, loneliness—I don't know but thank you.

Thank you for telling me you are tired too. It felt good to not be the only one. I hear that it's an airborne condition—that everyone is getting tired.

Thank you for asking me to take a break. I did. I will again—soon.

And you, Praise, thanks for being family.

Ciao.

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