when was the last time you disappointed someone? i think i recently disappointed someone i care for very deeply, and i am not sure how to make it better. the thing is, i don’t know if there is any way to make it better. when you are a person known as someone not disposed to act without considering, and reconsidering, the implications of every decision, it is not easy to get off the hook if your decisions end up causing someone disappointment.
i am not talking about disappointment to someone you barely know. i have disappointed people at work recently, normally because i made a decision they didn’t like. i have put what i thought was the company’s best interest above what the person was hoping for. there is no, well not much, guilt in this. it’s clear the company needs to be protected and to come before an individual. decisions have to be fair and precedents need to be set. i believe people understand this, if not i hope they respect it.
i am also not talking about doing something which is wrong, hurtful or harmful to someone. there was no direct pain caused. there were no promises broken, no lies told. nothing was done to hurt the person, intentionally anyway.
i am talking about making a decision, or acting in a way that i thought was best, not for someone one else, but for me. i made a decision, more than one decision, and now i am willing to live with the consequences. no, i am not willing; i simply know that i have to live with them. we are all responsible for our decisions. the biggest sin i can imagine is someone acting and then either not taking credit or responsibility for his actions. i didn’t care what bill clinton did with monica or anyone else for that matter. i cared that bill didn’t have the will to come forward and say, yes i did have a relationship with her and you know what its none of your business, its private so bugger off. (he went to school in england, he knows the phrase).
if you are wondering, no, i didn’t have an affair with an intern, and i haven’t lied about anything. but i saw something in the eyes of someone i care about, something i don’t know how to place. the only thing i can assign it to is disappointment. it was just after discussing things that i would not discuss with anyone else, things that are private to me, but i am not going to hide these things when i am asked truth in this relationship; it is too important to me.
john and mona taught me, “any question is allowed, if you are sure you can handle the truthful answer” with the corollary “only ask a question you are sure you want a truthful answer to”. i am not sure if i am slipping off topic. it wasn’t that kind of conversation, nothing intense or heated; it was a simple, easy, conversation, one that makes me value our friendship as much as i do. but at the end, there was the disappointment. truth is not overrated, but sometimes…
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Saw you on Lily's blog. Touched with this entry. You disappointed someone? Dont know how to make it better? Tell that person you are so sorry you disappointed him/her. Make your intentions known that you want to make it better. Sometimes life can be as simple as that. But we are the ones who make it diff with our rationalisations. If you are sincere with your intentions, the other party will get the message through your pheromones. Even before you utter it the person is at ease already. Try it. No loss, only gain.
ReplyDeleteI wished it was that simple but unfortunately it's not
ReplyDeleteAs you can read the disappointment came from a conscious action. And apparantly he is not willing to change.
As far as I see this can go two ways:
1) He still thinks he is right and than he will have to learn and live with the disappointment and most probably loose the valuable friendship. He will move on and hurt the next person that really cares in the same way. Just because he keeps on thinking he is right.
2) He realises that even decissions he makes consciously can disappoint and hurt people he cares for and he will try to make up and save the friendship
I would know what to choose. Will he?
sometimes you do things for yourself, and you are honest about them, but it effects other people.
ReplyDeletei am sorry if if i hurt someone, but on the same note, people can not expect people to always do what they think is best. we all do things that our parents, grandparents or friends might not think of as acceptable.
we are all experianced in hurting the feelings of people we love. i think most of us just keep things private so it doesn't come out.
is it better to lie about it to save someones feelings? once the thing has been done, you can't go back and change it.
yes, the issue here is that i am not willing to change this. i could say sorry, i won't do it, but i will. i think it's best to be open about this.
its not a wrong thing, just not what someone else wanted me to do.
@ stainedhead
ReplyDeleteSorry if I sounded like judging you. That's not what I wanted to do.
I am just wondering if the thing you do and want to keep on doing is worth taking the risk of loosing the person you care for so deeply?
What you do is definitely better than lieing. No one deserves to be lied at.
Isn't there some kind of middleground that can keep both of you happy so you can treasure the priceless, close relationship between the two of you? So there is no risk in throwing that down the drain?
Have you never thought about giving up your thing just because you value the person too much to disappoint him/her? I have the feeling this is something that really stands in between the two of you. Have you ever thought about how much better and deeper your relationship could be when you did give up?
I am pretty sure that because the person is disappointed with what you did, you have that disappointed feeling as well. I bet you sometimes just think: Why can't you just accept?
Is what you do really not a bad thing? Or is it something that you think of as not bad because you were honest about it? Have you managed the expectations from the beginning? Or did you only start doing it recently? I am pretty sure this is debatable.
I hope you guys stay the magnificent friends you are and I really hope this will never really come between the two of you. That would really be a shame.
Or does all of this come too late? I am not sure if you still are as close as I think you are.
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