When we barely know someone and are first exposed to them, they seem like a big deal. This is the case whether it’s a friendly introduction or our first sighting of a new celebrity on the red carpet. But as we gain more and more information about them, they shrink.
This might sound a bit counter-intuitive; your friends and family, whom you know most about, are likely a pretty big deal in your life, so why is it that as we learn more about those on our social peripheries, their capabilities seem to diminish? Simple: there’s a threshold of acceptable mystery that we pass through. If I know nothing about you, I can neither accurately praise nor criticise you; all I can do is pay attention, gather information, and decide on a firmer course of action once I’ve done my recon. Once I have this information, I can do one of three things: dismiss you, cultivate you, or destroy you.
Dismissal is really simple, more so in the age of social media; If the process by which I’ve discovered you is your twitter account or your blog, the unfollow button is simple to find. It used to be harder to dismiss people, but when friendships can be lost in meatspace entirely because someone accidentally hit the unfriend button on Facebook – well, it shows how superficial we are with our outer-valence contacts, right?
Cultivation is the long process, it’ how we gain friends worth keeping for an appreciable amount of time. If you’re aiming to do this, you can’t just grab every piece of information about someone in hopes you find something useful. You also can’t be cultivating people and hope to use them for anything; if you’re hoping for a business transaction, whether you’re on the end that’s buying or selling, you’ve got to keep people in the zone of casual disinterest where the acceptable mystery lives, otherwise there are expectations. Sort of like being stuck as friend guy when you’re really rather date a girl – once you’ve passed the mysterious proximity barrier, it’s difficult getting back out to the distance needed to do good business, unless you build that expectation into your friendships by strongly separating your professional and personal lives.
Destruction is, deceptively, even harder to achieve than cultivation. Most of the time you’re stuck burning your bridges, having little real effect on those you’re trying to hurt. Why are you doing that, by the way? If you just don’t like them, dismiss them. If they did something do hurt you, dismiss them. Why go to all the extra effort? Because maybe they’re a threat. The trouble with this is that you first have to define threat. Socially? Commercially? Technologically? Internet aside, it’s a pretty big planet, and unless someone has you cornered, it’s not hard to divide up the world into your own little chunk. The trouble with this is that mutual connections rarely give a crap about petty squabbles, which is where destruction gets so messy; unless you can convince your peripheral friends there’s a real benefit to them in helping you out, someone will always try to fuel both you and the other party.
Why is any of this a big deal? Because recognizing the process can demystify a lot of things. Exposing yourself to people, especially those you initially conceive of as bigger than yourself, can either be enlightening or distressing. Being aware of what makes the lustre on celebrity eventually disappear can help get past the depression of realizing your heroes are just louder versions of yourself.
About This Post's Author - Ian
Hi! I'm Ian. I'm an online marketing specialist with Modern Earth Web Design. When I'm not working, spending time with my family, or puttering about in various spaces online, I write here, as well as at Thoughtwrestling and Unspeakable Media.This is my blog.
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I knew you'd eventually grow bored with me.
On the other hand, what your interpersonal relationships are capable of changes as you learn more about each other. Over time, enemies become allies, lovers become friends and friends sometimes become enemies, all based on how their information intake about (and perception of) each other changes.
I agree, and I would submit that this principle goes further then just interpersonal relationships.
Like when a musician hears a song that they really like, so they take the time to sit down and learn it. What happens? After making the song assessable, it USUALLY loses most of its appeal. There is some aspect of things being quantifiable, when you initially evaluate something, you put some sort of value on it, you quantify the object/person/place. When you dig in and determine the actual value, your interest/respect is going to depend on how that new more accurate value compares against the initial guess you made.
I think that most of the time (especially with celebrities), the actual value is lower, so we become less enchanted. But, there are those few times that digging deeper reveals even greater value then you initially thought, and that's when really meaningful relationships take place.
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Bored? Please. We barely know each other.
Which is part of the point. There's a dip that happens before those
purpose-of-relationship changes occur, and the press and media are
very good at manipulating it. You never really know enough aboiut
celebrities to make a purpose judgement on them, but they're so easy
to dismiss. Example of a blog really good at this is Seth Godin. He's
so snackable, the ” what the hell” factor remains for a long time.
You've hit on a very important point here: Consistency.
I can have a few dozen conversations with people that are never the
same, this can either add or subtract value to or from them. That
makes it a very perspective oriented process.
But when I'm reviewing music, the songs are always the same. I can
focus on different aspects of the song; composition, polyphony versus
repetition and so on, and find new beauty as often as my own
imagination allows.
A big part of this acceptable mystery dip comes from people not being
as consistent as we'd like. Even with so much living record being
created, behaviour is not predictable. Often, it's this inconsistency,
in ourselves and others, that encourages the first and third options;
ignore you, or burn the bridges.
I knew you'd eventually grow bored with me.
On the other hand, what your interpersonal relationships are capable of changes as you learn more about each other. Over time, enemies become allies, lovers become friends and friends sometimes become enemies, all based on how their information intake about (and perception of) each other changes.
I agree, and I would submit that this principle goes further then just interpersonal relationships.
Like when a musician hears a song that they really like, so they take the time to sit down and learn it. What happens? After making the song assessable, it USUALLY loses most of its appeal. There is some aspect of things being quantifiable, when you initially evaluate something, you put some sort of value on it, you quantify the object/person/place. When you dig in and determine the actual value, your interest/respect is going to depend on how that new more accurate value compares against the initial guess you made.
I think that most of the time (especially with celebrities), the actual value is lower, so we become less enchanted. But, there are those few times that digging deeper reveals even greater value then you initially thought, and that's when really meaningful relationships take place.
Bored? Please. We barely know each other.
Which is part of the point. There's a dip that happens before those
purpose-of-relationship changes occur, and the press and media are
very good at manipulating it. You never really know enough aboiut
celebrities to make a purpose judgement on them, but they're so easy
to dismiss. Example of a blog really good at this is Seth Godin. He's
so snackable, the ” what the hell” factor remains for a long time.
A lot of what you say makes sense, but you don't seem to allow for the possibility of underestimating people.
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Too right, it's a generalisation. Part of the trouble with the whole process is that the info we gather about people is still filtered through our own perspectives, which are often less forgiving than they should be. That's why the “destroy you” process amounts mostly to bridge burning, and why we often feel regret when we realize we've judged people too early.
Speaking of judgement – that's up later this week, I believe.
You've hit on a very important point here: Consistency.
I can have a few dozen conversations with people that are never the
same, this can either add or subtract value to or from them. That
makes it a very perspective oriented process.
But when I'm reviewing music, the songs are always the same. I can
focus on different aspects of the song; composition, polyphony versus
repetition and so on, and find new beauty as often as my own
imagination allows.
A big part of this acceptable mystery dip comes from people not being
as consistent as we'd like. Even with so much living record being
created, behaviour is not predictable. Often, it's this inconsistency,
in ourselves and others, that encourages the first and third options;
ignore you, or burn the bridges.
You've hit on a very important point here: Consistency.
I can have a few dozen conversations with people that are never the
same, this can either add or subtract value to or from them. That
makes it a very perspective oriented process.
But when I'm reviewing music, the songs are always the same. I can
focus on different aspects of the song; composition, polyphony versus
repetition and so on, and find new beauty as often as my own
imagination allows.
A big part of this acceptable mystery dip comes from people not being
as consistent as we'd like. Even with so much living record being
created, behaviour is not predictable. Often, it's this inconsistency,
in ourselves and others, that encourages the first and third options;
ignore you, or burn the bridges.
A lot of what you say makes sense, but you don't seem to allow for the possibility of underestimating people.
A lot of what you say makes sense, but you don't seem to allow for the possibility of underestimating people.
Too right, it's a generalisation. Part of the trouble with the whole process is that the info we gather about people is still filtered through our own perspectives, which are often less forgiving than they should be. That's why the “destroy you” process amounts mostly to bridge burning, and why we often feel regret when we realize we've judged people too early.
Speaking of judgement – that's up later this week, I believe.
Too right, it's a generalisation. Part of the trouble with the whole process is that the info we gather about people is still filtered through our own perspectives, which are often less forgiving than they should be. That's why the “destroy you” process amounts mostly to bridge burning, and why we often feel regret when we realize we've judged people too early.
Speaking of judgement – that's up later this week, I believe.
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