We would all like to think that we could take other people 'at face value'; that what we see is what we get. To a certain extent this is true; but there's more to consider.
Our human survival has depended upon our ability to assess, and deal with, any potential threats to our well-being.
We 'attribute' characteristics and motives onto other people, based upon the partial information we have about them - the most obvious being their appearance and demeanor...how they look and act.
We can 'project' qualities onto others that we ourselves have, in an attempt to form a sort of kinship and alliance. Or would might instead project onto another the very qualities we wish we had ourselves, and then admire these in the other person.
Both are based upon our own inner psychological concepts and are not the 'truth' - we can never know the whole truth about anyone - or anything for that matter.
We can also 'pigeon-hole' others as a way of giving ourselves the illusion that we now know just what sort of person they are.
All of this can happen extremely quickly in a first meeting and be based upon our limited perception of them, or upon scant information about them.
We 'fill in the gaps' ourselves as an attempt to give ourselves a 'clearer picture' of the sort of person we are dealing with.
The other person may just happen to have a certain mannerism, or physical similarity, to someone else we know or used to know. We then treat them 'as-if' they were just like this other person from our history. We 'transfer' or overlay attributes onto them that don't really exist. This then clouds the way in which we attempt to relate to them; or we may not even bother trying to get to know them - as we have convinced ourselves that we 'know just what they're like'.
Our projection and transference of imaginary aspects onto another person is a two-way street.
People may well be doing just that to you too!
If you feel as though someone is relating negatively to you, or refusing to engage with you, then you could ask them if you remind them of someone else they know; and tell them that you are forming the impression that they may be mistaking you for another person and treating you 'as-if' you were that person without taking the time to experience who you really are.
However, who any of us 'really is' is not a fixed state. We all change our opinions, values and sometimes our beliefs and ways of behaving; particularly as a result of ongoing education and experiences. We can never truly know another person in the way that would help us to feel safer and more trusting of them. We have to settle for only knowing them clearly 'enough' to be able to decide what level of relationship, if any, we do want to have with them.
A further level in this process is called Counter-transference; wherein we react to others based upon what they are projecting onto us. This can be in the form of sub-consciously acting out the part in their life-drama that they have 'assigned' to us; or at least in being aware of their invitation that we become a member of the cast in the replay of their history. Counter-transference can also exist in our responding to them from our own history and experiences; when we then overlay the interaction with them with something from our own past, and then behave 'as-if' it were true and valid in the present.
Counter-transference can be used 'diagnostically' by a psychotherapist; when they become aware of what is being evoked in them by the client they are working with. Then they must examine if their invited reaction is from their own past history or that of the client. When sensitively brought into the therapy session, this can be useful in getting to the bottom of a client's underlying issue that needs to be worked with, and not necessarily the issues that are presented on the surface by the client.
When we were children we learned about how we felt in response to the individuals around us. Some people we felt light and comfortable with, others we may have feared as we felt our body tighten and recoil from them. We will have developed 'masks' to wear in order to present an acceptable 'false self' to those around us too.
All such deeper responses and ways of relating can show themselves in the psychotherapy sessions too; and a skilled therapist will pick up their own feelings from the interaction with the client. The therapist may then, for instance, feel like a cold, critical, demeaning mother; or perhaps a dominant bully; or maybe feel bored, tired, and disinterested in the client. These are all indicators of either the client's history, or the therapists history. The therapist should therefore have undergone their own long-term therapy to have dealt with their own history and projections/transferences, and to not act them out with their clients - who deserve this level of professionalism and clarity from their sessions.
Knowing that deeper levels of perception exist - often sub-consciously - can at least allow us not to take anyone 'at face value' after all.
By Maxine Harley (Msc Integrative Psychotherapy) Psychotherapist based in Sussex and creator of 'The Ripple Effect' Process and Quantum Psyche Process see http://www.qpp.uk.com/
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