How Reactions Change Instinctively When The Tables Are Turned

Posted: June 11, 2019

Sometimes the conversations that we have with our friends are not even worth a mention because they are so senseless and utter gibberish, but some conversations get us thinking. This piece is about one such conversation and my thoughts thereof.

Not a personal connection just an acquaintance.

Thanks to social media, we tend to express views on a lot of things and thereby get connected to strangers too. When I say connection, I don’t mean that we start off interactions as if we are good friends, but yes we do discuss things on social media in a friendly way and encourage ideas. While we may be connected to such a person, we cannot claim to know him personally. So here was this person, with whom my interactions have always been on social media, related to his work and some projects on which we have worked together, virtually.

Being a person who believes in bringing a smile on the faces of people around me, I keep sharing jokes with my acquaintances on and off through forwards. One may call me naïve that despite so much negativity around, I still tend to believe in the goodness of the people. During one such interaction, our conversation drifted off to a few personal questions. Although he didn’t seem offended, I didn’t find him too forthcoming and obviously since my motive was not to probe, I left it at it.

A realization of sorts

The conversation was done and dusted yet after some time I had a thought. What if the tables were turned? What if the same person in question had chosen to have such a personal conversation or even something else? It didn’t take me a moment to answer my own question; the answer obviously was that I would have reduced my interactions with him.

Strange, how when I as a woman ask a few personal questions to a man and go about my way without blinking an eyelid or giving too much thought about it. Yet even the thought of the same man asking me those seemingly irrelevant questions about my life and my family makes me conclude to shirk contact with him.

At the risk of being judged and being termed as pro men, I for a moment felt that this was so wrong. While I chose to take the liberty of fielding questions to a man about his personal life, I would be quick to take offence of the same.

I am unsure if this kind of reaction is due to the conditioned and conservative upbringing or to the presence of the nuisances in the society that make us go on a back foot against every man, no matter how educated or uninterested or casual he may be. We simply are unwilling to give him a chance and rightly so because we may end up regretting our own decisions.

Having said so, it also served as an eye-opener to me. While my conversation and the intent thereof may have been casual, it could have been assumed more than what it was. I was probably walking into a danger zone with my eyes open so to say. It was highly possible that there would be a point in time when my casual concern would be considered more than just that. Worse still, it could also be perceived as me being interested in forming a bond of sorts with the person concerned.

So maybe I need to be more cautious in my dealings with people. But I have always believed that bringing a smile on the faces of people is supposed to be easy and a fulfilling task. Or is it just not so simple anymore? Or maybe it is when one sticks to the friends and doesn’t stretch over to acquaintances. Or maybe it is my mind playing tricks at me.

In our busy lives, with a list of chores waiting to be attended to, there is not much scope for such questions to take too much of our time. Yet I am willing to conclude that maybe it is easy being children, where one can end up doing things without the fear of being judged or ridiculed; when there is not much thought being given to the actions and reactions thereof. But obviously I cannot go that route again, so for now, let’s get back to routine lives. An experience or two is also a lesson to learn. So let’s keep learning, growing and spreading the love (safer to restrict the love to friends and family only though).

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