#15: Finding the MRI
The Most Respectful Interpretation, that is
Aristotle once spoke of good temper: to be angry within reason and favourable of making allowances. An excess of anger manifests in different ways: being angry for too long or about multiple things, and finding it hard to forgive. By contrast, mildness is moderation: we're angry, but to a limit; we react, but more rationally; we seek the truth, but we make allowances.
Let me just put it out there that reading Aristotle from end to end is an achievement I can't claim yet. But this excerpt is something that tugs at me when I'm yet again blindsided by something I've concluded rather than cross-verified. My mind tends to jump to the worst possible conclusion, catastrophising non-issues until the ball of anxiety in my chest is fiery and unrelenting.
So much of what we hear is opinion, not fact; perspective, not truth. I often find myself making assumptions, getting angry or frustrated, then coming face to face with my own error of judgement when I'm asked, "do you have proof or is that an assumption?"
It doesn't help that everything around me is geared to make me the Absolute Realest, Most Vivid, Most Central Person in the world right now. 'I' and 'me' features so frequently that things aren't just there, they're to the left of 'me', or in front of 'me', or behind 'me'.
My understanding. My circumstance. My truth.
It's a default setting, hard-wired instinctively yet talked about rarely because self-centeredness is taboo and selflessness is not. But in reality, we can't perceive anything without some sense of self, some thread we use to connect any situation to ourselves when it falls onto our radar.
Unfortunately, this setting often leads to us holding fast to our assumptions in complete belief that it is the truth. We assume the worst in a situation to protect ourselves, keep ourselves in the right, other people be damned. We assume a friend won't pick up our calls because they don't care; assume the fellow speeding along the highway is simply insane; assume the mum who yells at her child in a grocery store line is abusive. We make fundamental attribution errors everyday, and we seem to think they're right.
An experiment I would like to perform mindfully this year is choosing the Most Respectful Interpretation instead, and seeing where that takes me.
The Most Respectful Interpretation is a way of inverting the equation and, instead of assuming the worst, assuming the best. It's a challenge to be more generous with our opinions, and making allowances instead of catastrophising. It's to judge fairly, instead of letting our anger, frustration and confusion plant negative seeds in our mind and taint the other person entirely.
It's to ask ourselves this question when faced with tough situations and springing to react: "Do I really know what reality is? If no, then what's the most respectful interpretation I can make of it?"
What this could look like is assuming the friend we called is busy or doesn't have the mental space right now; that the person speeding has a very valid reason to; that the mother yelling at the child just spent days dealing with a traumatic circumstance and, for once in her life, snapped.
Passing judgement is one of the most exhausting things my mind does on the daily. Nitpicking is an energy-drainer, and assuming the worst puts me in a foul mood that could've been avoided had I assumed the best. Aristotle calls this "irascibility', where being angry at the most random things, without rhyme or reason, can turn us into bitter, quick-tempered people. Instead, Aristotle advocates being mild, and being:
angry at the right things and toward the right people, and also in the right way.
Even thinking about a situation in retrospect, and seeing how many alternative opinions I could've found, was enough to make me realise just how unfair I was being both to myself—for carrying that negative assumption as a burden—and to the other person, for having assumed the worst of them.
In learning to be more good-tempered, we learn to be situationally aware, generous, and empathetic of other people. After all, we'd want people to assume the best of us as well.