On an on-topic note, I really liked this post. I can confirm that being able to like people is instrumentally useful. Due to high Agreeableness and Openness, I like everyone by default. It’s difficulty for me to explain how I do this, because it’s probably done through my personality hardware. I have to try to not like people. But I’ll see if I can think of any ways to articulate my cognition on this subject.
Sometimes I’ve deliberately amplified my dislike of people just so I can assert values of my own. I do that by noticing small irritations and internally vocalizing them—“Man, I hate how Billy Bob takes so long to get moving. He’s always double-checking every little thing. I prefer to be a little less anal-retentive.” You start by noticing that you’re irritably tapping your foot, and then you work it up into a whole worldview.
I do this intentionally because I’ve often found myself unhappy in some people’s company, even when I think I like them, and the unhappiness becomes much more tolerable if I think of it as a reasonable response to irritating behavior, as opposed to a nameless flaw in myself. (Example: my parents often got under my skin. Complaining about them to friends, and believing myself justifiably irritated, made it a lot more bearable.) Irritation is actually a “high” emotion—irritation, as well as elation, is a symptom of mania—and in fact I’ve found that irritation is almost an opposite of unhappiness. It’s also a cognitive emotion of a sort. Irritation is expressing your own opinions in contrast to other people’s, which is something we high-Agreableness folks need to encourage in ourselves, to avoid being wimps and pushovers.
So, I’d expect, if you wanted to go the opposite direction, you’d do what I do by default—don’t vocalize the irritation. Don’t regard yourself as being entitled to irritation; it’s a mosquito bite, which will stop itching if you don’t think about it. Billy Bob must be so slow and careful because he has a good reason for it.
Make yourself “small.” That’s the best metaphor I can find for it. (Actually a Pirkei Avot metaphor, as I recall.) If you’re “big” then you perceive other people constantly bumping into you and intruding on your personal space, but if you’re “small” then nothing anybody can do is a personal insult or irritation, any more than a bird can bump into a fly. (I’m actually trying to make myself “big,” because smallness, aka humility, has its disadvantages.)
On an on-topic note, I really liked this post. I can confirm that being able to like people is instrumentally useful. Due to high Agreeableness and Openness, I like everyone by default. It’s difficulty for me to explain how I do this, because it’s probably done through my personality hardware. I have to try to not like people. But I’ll see if I can think of any ways to articulate my cognition on this subject.
I’m the same way, in fact.
Sometimes I’ve deliberately amplified my dislike of people just so I can assert values of my own. I do that by noticing small irritations and internally vocalizing them—“Man, I hate how Billy Bob takes so long to get moving. He’s always double-checking every little thing. I prefer to be a little less anal-retentive.” You start by noticing that you’re irritably tapping your foot, and then you work it up into a whole worldview.
I do this intentionally because I’ve often found myself unhappy in some people’s company, even when I think I like them, and the unhappiness becomes much more tolerable if I think of it as a reasonable response to irritating behavior, as opposed to a nameless flaw in myself. (Example: my parents often got under my skin. Complaining about them to friends, and believing myself justifiably irritated, made it a lot more bearable.) Irritation is actually a “high” emotion—irritation, as well as elation, is a symptom of mania—and in fact I’ve found that irritation is almost an opposite of unhappiness. It’s also a cognitive emotion of a sort. Irritation is expressing your own opinions in contrast to other people’s, which is something we high-Agreableness folks need to encourage in ourselves, to avoid being wimps and pushovers.
So, I’d expect, if you wanted to go the opposite direction, you’d do what I do by default—don’t vocalize the irritation. Don’t regard yourself as being entitled to irritation; it’s a mosquito bite, which will stop itching if you don’t think about it. Billy Bob must be so slow and careful because he has a good reason for it.
Make yourself “small.” That’s the best metaphor I can find for it. (Actually a Pirkei Avot metaphor, as I recall.) If you’re “big” then you perceive other people constantly bumping into you and intruding on your personal space, but if you’re “small” then nothing anybody can do is a personal insult or irritation, any more than a bird can bump into a fly. (I’m actually trying to make myself “big,” because smallness, aka humility, has its disadvantages.)
Sorry, that’s not allowed on this thread ;)