Deception: Good Intentions ---> Ugly Consequences!

It’s a tricky headline, right! Counter-intuitive maybe as common sense says bad intentions mostly lead to ugly consequences but even good intentions cause a lot of havoc in our daily lives, everyday and everywhere around us. Let’s go a little deeper.

Don’t you observe ‘good’ people trying to do the best for others – shielding them from sadness, pain, disappointment etc. etc. by hiding things from them which ends up messing things up even more? Every day I see a lot of actions born out of positive deep-seated feelings causing immense pain to those around. The pain is simply delayed and in majority of the cases, multiplied by a factor of 10. Why does this happen so frequently? Despite the best of intentions, why do people end up fucking things up?

• Is it because we are too optimistic about the consequences of our actions?
  Everything Will Get Fine syndrome we are caught in
• Is it the over-confidence on our own abilities to make things right?                                        Too many variables which are beyond our control in the real world
  
• Is it love and the ingrained desire to not cause pain to others?
        Love – the under-estimated villain!

•       Or is it plain & simple deception?People with good intentions deceive themselves first and others later. (At-least the people with bad intentions are true to themselves J)

Won’t things be simpler if we just stop assuming that we will cause pain to others if we are completely transparent about our actions? Or have we assumed masks so fake that complete honesty isn’t palatable these days? It’s the age of filters and glorifying fakeness, isn’t it? But our animal instincts usually override the sophistication of civilization during moments of weakness (maybe these are the moments when we are truly alive but that’s a separate topic altogether!) The questions are many, the answers are few – what have we really become is a mystery nobody wants to think about. Who would really want to accept that they have shades of grey? Don’t you have secrets you have shelved down your conscience? Everybody has!

Coming back to the original thought, I feel for people who make judgmental errors trying to protect those closest to them and then are later blamed by the very same people when things turn ugly. How do you cope with reality then – usually the first thought is that they shouldn’t have thought about the best interests of others. Bitterness kicks in accompanied by other negative emotions which is further fueled by the taunts from the closest friends/relatives who one would have turned to for advice or support in any other such difficulty. Things aren’t looking good, the support system has vanished and the self confidence is quickly evaporating – perfect conditions for depression to kick in. Alcohol or other drugs become your new friends and while they may lessen the short term pain, they are secretly digging an even bigger grave for you. And all this because you tried to do what you thought was the best for everyone around you – a big punishment for a seemingly healthy gesture.

Now, let’s shift focus to the people who feel they have been cheated by the ones closest to them, who suffer because of no fault of theirs. Usual thoughts -- It’s not fair – why couldn’t he/she have been more transparent in the first place – you could have tried figuring things out together. Now it seems too late! You start losing respect, the love or intimacy is suddenly gone and you just don’t know who the person next to you is anymore. You try your best to support the ‘guilty’ person in some cases but things are slipping every second. Others instantly give up on the wrongdoer. All you feel like is escaping your current life where everything is blurry.

A catch-22 situation to be in for all the parties involved, right? And it happens so frequently. People repeat the same actions hoping for a different result – shouldn’t we just try being more real for once. I am sure even that would backfire in a lot of situations given the expectations and idealistic philosophies of everybody around us - can’t help thinking about the ever-growing peer pressure which is defining people’s needs, desires, actions & ambitions and the implicit need to be seen as perfect.

Though I don’t really know what the right thing to do is but I choose to be honest and face outright backlash rather than delay and risk even worse consequences. (even honesty is due to selfish reasons – maybe!). Life is surely full of contradictions and though we are social animals, we are still taking baby steps in figuring out the sweet spot of living in a society. We might claim otherwise but all you need to do is ask yourself – how much do you deceive yourself on a daily basis! Please do let me know if you think the answer is not at all. 😊