Thoughts

I've learned some interesting interpersonal things lately.

I always used to think that with people I genuinely like, I should necessarily express what I think exactly the way I think it. I never thought for a second about whether it is blunt or if it is the right time to say it. I guess I instinctively felt that trying to "manage" a relationship by bringing in tact immediately brought in a certain distance and a slight degree of manipulation. My thought was that if I wasn't honest I was not giving the relationship the due respect and honesty. I have seen other people though, holding back their thoughts without saying them, or waiting for a "better time". In cases where the other person is reasonably to very close to me I did feel a bit manipulated even if the intention on the other end was good. In my book honesty somewhat equated to complete absence of restraint. But lately, I realize one does need to "manage" relationships, in fact more importantly, the ones that are indeed relatively important.

The other thing is, don't try to figure anyone out. What I mean is, when someone acts a certain way that seems odd to you, you may be thrown off by it, but if your level of intrigue gets to the point where you want to figure the action of the other person out, that's more energy and time than is worth it. We are all machines with varying levels of randomness and that is the way to treat each other.  This makes the whole relationship space a lot easier to deal with. In a way, it amounts to not taking anyone "too" seriously. Just because of that element of randomness or unpredictability in each of us.