This post continues a series of post which will document the beginning loss of naivete of yours truly.
Masterpiece theatre broadcasted Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’uberbille last couple weeks. And towards the end, the friends of the heroine wrote a cryptic letter to the good guy’s family, saying “Beware of an enemy disguised as a friend.”
This warning in fact should be applicable in real life. As I observe and think, not just believe, I suppose that there are indeed a couple possibilities of such people. We all have ambitions and when they conflict, people do whatever they can to advance themselves in the real world. Might as well. Fair enough. We are all selfish homo erectus constrained by the scarcity of resources.
Yet the stupid thing that I do all the time is to make the same mistakes of trusting people and saying things that should have been said to only people I trust.
Once I begin to doubt people’s words, I also begin to doubt their motives. Yet I have faith that I can still be a happy person despite becoming an untrusting person because I will only trust a selected few people. That should have been what I should be doing all along…now I hope it’s not too late.
7 Comments so far
Leave a comment
<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <pre> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>
“Yet the stupid thing that I do all the time is to make the same mistakes of trusting people and saying things that should have been said to only people I trust.
“Once I begin to doubt people’s words, I also begin to doubt their motives.”
This passage describes me. Sometimes, it can feel quite hopeless and frustrating. Sometimes, I wonder whether there really is someone whom I can truly trust.
Before, I might hope/long for mutual trust: someone whom i trust will trust me as well. However, now I realize that it may be too difficult. It is already hard to find someone whom you trust, what is the chance that he/she will trust you wholeheartedly as well?
Nowadays I am more selfish; I think I am more happy finding someone whom I trust than having someone who trusts me. But trusting/depending on someone can make you vulnerable.
I don’t put much hope on “eternal”/”forever” anymore… It is cliche, expectations lead to disappointment. So lack of expectation may avoid disappointment, but really, does lack of expectations lead to something better than disappointment?
Comment by me January 22, 2009 @ 12:39 amMy instant answer to your last phrase is no. But then, lack of expectations also makes you be easily satisfied. Now that you don’t expect anything, when someone does a minor thing, it will make so much happier. So lack of expectation puts a lower bound on disappointments and pushes up the upper bound of happiness!
Comment by Wendy January 22, 2009 @ 4:34 pmBut what if there is no expectation, but major/minor things do not happen either? Doesn’t void/emptiness lead to despair?
On a semi-related note, if someone is truly at the “highest” stage of 无欲无求, he or she shouldn’t be moved by anything, right? I have never been at that level, so I am just guessing here, but at that stage, we will be governed by the inner peace which shouldn’t be easily disturbed by any external factors, happy or unhappy.
But I guess 无欲无求 is different from having low expectations…
Comment by me January 22, 2009 @ 7:45 pmWhat if it’s the lack of expectations as such that makes you unhappy?
Comment by pinus January 22, 2009 @ 11:44 pmExactly. Agreed.
See, if we anticipate that things won’t turn out right, we may not want to have expectations just so we don’t feel disappointed. However, lack of expectations can also lead to unhappiness.
Comment by me January 23, 2009 @ 2:03 amI never say that I am lowering my expectations from people. I only say that I am reducing my volatility by taking people’s words less seriously.
Everybody’s “natural” trusting level differs. Yours may be naturally higher than me, therefore you are perfectly happy at your trust level. Mine is naturally low. Thus I need to raise it.
As to turning to be more distrustful of people, I guess it does make me feel crappy that I have to think suspiciously. You can call this “lowering expectation” of people — BUT I call it something else, and I in fact think of it as something else. I call it being more forgiving and accepting of people — as Jessica says, developing inner peace. People say things that they don’t mean — and the moment I convince myself that this is really human nature, I become more “understanding,” or as you call it, have lower expectations.
And I supposed developing this, which I call inner peace, could bring happiness. That’s why BUDDHA is happy!
Comment by Wendy January 23, 2009 @ 4:11 amActually, not happiness — but CONTENTMENT, which I crave more so than happiness.
Comment by Wendy January 23, 2009 @ 4:12 am