Exercise 3.3

What I Believe Others See As My +'ve and -'ve Traits

Purpose

This is the third exercise in the series of four designed to help you examine your self-perceptions. In this one, our purpose is to examine what we think others would see as our positive and negative traits. This is somewhat of a merging of the intent of the first two exercises. Note this is different from our view of positive and negative traits in that we are focusing on how we think others might view them. Doing this exercise and the others in this series, aids development of key fundamental awareness skills whether your goal is personal or spiritual development.

Duration

30 to 40 minutes (create list 10 min. and 20 to 30 minutes to consider the list)

Prerequisites

Exercises:

Ex. 3.2: How I See My Positive and Negative Traits

Background

In this exercise, we continue our journey of self-examination and self-awareness. We will combine aspects of the first two exercises to examine ourselves from different though related perspective. As in the previous exercise, we want to build our awareness of ourselves to add points we have not previously considered.

Remember the following:

This is not a test
Be as relaxed as you can to start and throughout the exercise
Be as open and objective as you can
Try to write the first things that come to mind
Try to notice when you hesitate to write the first thing that comes to mind for any reason (it is wrong, silly, not me at all etc.)
Wordiness is not a shortcoming
Try not to get sidetracked
Try to limit your answers to one page, though if it takes more so be it.

Method

1. Find a place to do the work, one where you will feel comfortable and relaxed

2. Divide a blank page into two columns. The headings of the columns are “What I Believe Others See As My Positive Traits” and “What I Believe Others See s My Negative Traits”

3. Layout your page as in the following example:

4. Relax as best as you can before you start. This way you will be more objective and will reduce the tendency to note points that correspond to moods or to have our moods affect our points. While this can be useful to analyze a particular feeling, at this stage we want to get as broad a view of ourselves as possible. Later exercises will cover topics that will help you get to an objective and neutral space, something very useful when working on particular issues. In the mean time, simply try to be as spontaneous and honest as you can when you are writing down your points under each column.

5. Pick a column to start in, read the title and then write down the first thoughts that come to mind. Try not to scribble out points you do not like, these are some the answers to which you want to pay the closest attention. If you can, note what you felt about that particular point such as it was not the right word, it is was not accurate, you do not think it is right, it made you uncomfortable and so on. You do not need to stick to one column; it is okay to switch between them.

6. The “What I Believe Others See As My Positive Traits” column:

The objective is to get at our view of what others would call our positive traits. If, for example, we believe others see us as friendly, diligent or perhaps helpful that is what we enter them in this column. If we believe others would view a trait such as friendly is a weakness, hence a negative, it should go into this column. Do not try to imagine how they must think of you based on their actions, we are trying to get at how we think they see us, which is a different matter altogether.

7. The “What I Believe Others See As My Negative Traits” column:

The objective is to get at our view of what others would call our negative traits. Again, we are not concerned here with what they actually see as negative about us for we do not know. All we know is what we think they think about us. We want to learn this view to shed light on how we believe others see us to gain insights into how this affects our thinking and actions. We do this to find ideas or beliefs that are incorrect or a hindrance so we know what to work on.

Layout your page as in the following example:

As you complete this, remember that everyone will view you differently, so it is best to go with a general view. For example, you may believe one person sees you as overbearing which you believe they would see as a negative trait, while you may also believe some would see this as assertive and hence be a positive trait in their mind. Again, others may or may not be judging these attributes in the manner we believe to be, as we do not know they are thinking. We are merely noting how we believe they have been judging them.

As I have stressed, we judge in terms of good/bad, right/wrong or better/worse. However, in reality there is only experience, choices and consequences. We have been trained to judge, blame ourselves for not succeeding, not doing something well, we have not been trained to observe and adjust without guilt, blame, hurt etc. We have examined judgment, or criticism, and the unbalanced energies it can manifest. What we want now is to become more aware of them, if only that we have them, as it is an important step in getting to know ourselves.

What you write down is for your knowledge and understanding alone. While being as objective as possible helps, this is by nature a subjective exercise. Since part of the purpose is to help us notice how we see ourselves, discovering the subjective nature of our thoughts and our way of viewing the world is all part of the process. Being subjective will not affect the value of this exercise. Doing this set of exercises over time will take you down the path towards better objectivity and improve your powers of observation.

Remember, the goal is to start to notice our perceptions and not to be too concerned with why we do so or in judging whether this is beneficial or good for us. As you do this exercise over a period, in conjunction with your developing awareness, the focus will naturally shift from merely noting aspects of thinking to delving into and actually working on them.

Your page should have points such as below:

The results you get from any exercise are dependent on what you put into them. The true value of this set of exercises is in developing one’s skills at objectivity, sensitivity and observation. We need to start to notice our lack of objectivity, notably in regards to ourselves. We already observe the world, we do so continually and the skill we seek to develop here is to start to notice how we observe.

Observation is not simply perception; a process divorced from personal valuation or interpretation. Our rational minds process what we observe before we become consciously aware of it. The question is what have we programmed our rational mind it to do for us, how does it affect our perception and why have we done so? We want to become observers that are more neutral, we want to start noticing what we previously did not and to cease processing our experiences based on notions that in many cases are false or outdated.

Follow-up

After the exercise read what you wrote down one column and one line at a time, it does not matter which column you choose. As you read, do the following:

Do not change what you wrote after the fact.
Consider what you wrote.
Monitor your feelings and thoughts as you read it.
Note your reaction to it separately so they are not mistaken for your original responses.
Ask yourself if the point is accurate and pay attention to how you feel as you ask.
After reading through all the items in both columns, the next step is to consider our responses as a whole.

Look to see if you avoided, focused on or glossed over any areas

If you have already tried the Honesty Table, apply what you learned there to what you noted here.
In cases where you were not accurate, remember that it is just as important to acknowledge that your answer was not accurate as it is to know what the “correct” answer should have been.
Look at your answers and ask yourself, “How have my views of how others perceived me affected my actions and choices?”

The efforts you are putting into this exercise will, in conjunction with the other steps you are taking, help you to growth and develop yourself. These exercises and others that follow are part of our process of self-examination. The goal is to expose those aspects of ourselves that we may have overlooked, ones that cause us issues so we can then focus on and resolve them. We cannot fix what we do not see and it is difficult to benefit from the better aspects of ourselves that we do not acknowledge.

You will get as much out of this exercise as you put into it. If you do it haphazardly then your results will reflect this. We do not have hundreds of issues; we have a number of core issues that manifest in hundreds of ways. We fix our issues with honesty, for example, by learning to understand, work through and resolve the reasons why we lie. We get at our reasons by examining and exploring our dishonesty without judging ourselves for what appear to be errors of the past. Be positive even though you may want to judge yourself, for self-judgments will not benefit you. We do not beat up on ourselves for our ignorance as this tends to increases our reluctance and resistance to growth.

When you do your review, give extra consider to any points you edited, or questioned. Try to understand why you did so, or at least how you justified the point. We are not looking for right or wrong, only our perception. As before, we should have a dialogue with ourselves by questioning ourselves on our responses.

For this exercise, we want to explore what we believe others see as our positive and negative traits. Again, this is not to be confused with what they actually believe for we do not likely know this, and they may not even know themselves. This knowledge, along with the previous exercise, builds our awareness of both our conscious and our non-conscious thinking processes. By learning about what we view as our positive and negative traits, and how we believe others see us in this light tells us a great deal about how we think and how this affects us.

When we dig deeper into how we believe others see we also start to see how these notions affect our relationship with ourselves and with others. Do we find we like and hence trust people who we believe view us a particular way and feel less so regarding others? If we do, why do we do it and how do we justify these as valid reasons to determine whom we like? Further, how has this affected the choices we have made and hence the outcomes we have experienced in life? To change this behavior we must be aware we have it first.

This is just an example of the kind of exploration one can do as they “troubleshoot their rational mind”. Knowledge is power, and there is nothing more empowering then knowing ourselves. Peeling away the layers of erroneous, fallacious and superficial observation and faulty integration of experiences that result from it can be a slow process. Try to stay focused on your intent and desire and do not be concerned about how long it will take. This is not a race to the finish line.

==> Continue to Ex. 3.4: Skills and Growth Points

==> Return to Ex 3.2: How I See My Positive and Negative Traits