I don't know why...but I just don't like you

Sometimes when we don’t like someone, we have a really good reason. Other times, we just can’t explain why? Well here’s one possibility:

Most people don’t realize that when we interact with people we’re not just interacting with that person in the current moment, we’re unconsciously interacting with all the people in our past that this person reminds us of.

That mailman you got into a fight with for no reason…he had the same smile as your cheating ex-boyfriend. The candidate that you didn’t vote for…their voice tone reminded you of your mother’s (when she used to scold you as a kid). And the guy across the street you despise, he raises his eyebrows when he talks just like your mean old boss.

The brain is a prediction machine. It’s contantly trying to guess what’s going to happen next, based on what’s happened before. Most of the time this serves us, but other times it’s just silly.

So when evaluating anybody, we owe it to ourselves to focus on the present. "The best thing about the past is that it's over."

Comments

[rs2shopping]

I am a newbie and your success is very much an inspiration for me.jhnkjn

[guitars]

Could it be that I'm crazy so I think that in this time of year, when a situation seems to bring the best of me I do not care when it stands beside me, close to Somet.

[jordan shoes]

own discipline by way of fines and/or suspensions if the situations warrant it under the current CBA.

[ClubPenguin]

When we’re conscious or unconscious the brain functions as a pattern making device searching for information about experience, real or imagined.

[ThinkTwice]

We're wired biologically for survival. When we’re conscious or unconscious the brain functions as a pattern making device searching for information about experience, real or imagined. Then, based on feedback, it searches for answers to questions like “Friend or foe, what’s next, what are the potential ramifications of this event to me - and by extension to those sharing my genes - and is this person like me or like those in my tribe? Finally we might ask the question, “Is this person trustworthy?" And the world turns and the patterns keep running and reporting below the level of awareness.

Your comments might have been better directed to the issue of what’s stored on the “hard drive” – garbage in garbage out. Research shows people to be prejudice toward one group or another when they claim not to be; the mind is a subtle, mysterious and mostly hidden world. So, I guess I’m trying to say, “What’s your point.”

The past is never over if the encoding of certain experience remains strongly rooted in memory. Why just say to people, “Get over yourself.” Moving beyond past experience, changing patterns, requires awareness first, focus second and a great deal of work.

[Rawthink]

Great blog guys, keep up the good work.

[bitterbetterideaguy]

This sounds a lot link Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell, although he never quite articulates our snap judgments of other people as related to our past experiences (could be wrong). Sometimes you just look at a person and, whether through past knowledge of similarities as you've described or maybe its just the microexpressions that our brain is subconsciously aware of. In "Made to Stick" by Dan and Chip Heath, they talk about the human brain's dependency on schemas. For any new thing we are trying to evaluate, we have to put it into a pre-existing schema that we already understand in order to simply cope with the new information. When we see that new person, it's really no different. If hair style, clothes and face all match a schema of people we dislike, it is going to be very challenging to alter that perception until we add more attributes to the schema such as voice, personality, likes and dislikes, etc. by which time the overall schema is more reflective of people we like. Then again, maybe it will just reinforce that we really, really don't like that person.