Paying attention to each other
One of the things parenting taught me, is how important it is to think about what you reward. Children crave attention. If a child only gets attention when they have massive tantrums, then they have every reason to keep having massive tantrums. If you reward the behaviour you want to see, then you get a child who spends a fair amount of time doing the things you would prefer they do.
It’s much the same with adults. People who grew up being rewarded for acting out are likely to keep doing that. People who could only get attention by being destructive or harmful are likely to maintain those patterns.
We all impact on each other, we all have the power to encourage each other in any and all imaginable directions.
It is fairly easy to try and become important and influential by being critical and putting people down. It’s easy to discourage people and rubbish their dreams and desires – you don’t need to know what you’re talking about even, to have a go at that. Obviously this is harmful for whoever is treated this way. The trouble for the person doing this, is that taking people down gives them very little. Hurting people won’t make them love or admire you, or respect your opinion. Usually what happens is people flee from that as soon as they can.
It’s very different when we choose to give our attention in more constructive ways. Positive feedback often calls for more thought, attention and understanding. You have to really engage to be able to tell someone why their art, or song, or story was good. To give meaningful positive feedback you have to invest in yourself, in your own knowledge and ability to appreciate things. That’s good all round, everyone wins.
Making a deliberate choice to engage with the things you want to see, impacts on the people you deal with. Sometimes, the choice to be very bland and dull can do a great deal to reduce drama. By not rewarding a drama llama with attention, you give them less incentive to do that. For maximum effect, taking the time to reward them with attention for things that are good and helpful can give them a reason to change tack.
This may all sound a bit manipulative. However, it’s worth thinking about the ways in which we learn, how we are conditioned by experience. Some kinds of manipulation – as with gaslighting – are undertaken to crush people and take away their power. It is just as possible to apply similar tactics to making things better. I’ve known a few grand masters of this art, and it’s amazing what you can get done this way. People grow and flourish when they get attention for the good things they do. People heal, and become sure of themselves, they stretch and take risks.
We’re intensely social beings. We’re all to some degree affected by our social standing and our sense of how others see us. Most of us want attention and positive feedback. Really interesting things can happen when you step up to provide this deliberately. I can heartily recommend seeing the best in people and telling them about it in a way that encourages them to do more. Simply not responding much to unhealthy bids for attention can also get a lot done. Put the two together, and you can sometimes change the direction a person is going in. Most of us need incentives and reasons to try. Most of us do not grow and learn in face of knock downs, so I think it’s also important not to reward the people who deal in knock downs as a way of seeking attention.
