In the field of psychology, cognitive dissonance is described as the mental disturbance people feel when they realize their cognitions and actions are inconsistent or contradictory. This may ultimately result in some change in their cognitions or actions to cause greater alignment between them so as to reduce this dissonance.
In the past few weeks, I've encountered several people in various situations who have behaved in ways that are contrary to their best interests, inconsistent with their values, and/or simply illogical, given the circumstances.
As I am not a psychic, I have no idea what they were thinking. I do not know if they faced the obvious and the true and could not or would not acknowledge it for some reason: pride, habit, or fear...? Or if they harbored such sizable illusions that their minds could not accept the reality that was right in front of them, presented as fact.
These encounters were in turns amusing, confusing, and frustrating to me. One reminded me of looking at a two year old child with chocolate all over their face and asking them if they had eaten chocolate. No, they would adamantly reply. Then of course one would lead them to a mirror and turn them to face themselves--and the messy reflection--and once again ask them the question: did you eat any chocolate? If not, what is that on your face?
Of course who knows what goes on in the mind of a two year old child. But in the confusing and frustrating category I had to ask my self what the hell goes on in the mind of a thirty-two year old adult, and a forty-two year old adult.
I try to discount the possibility that people are intentionally trying to deceive me. I'm nice, but early on in a relationship I try to convey subtly that just because I'm nice does not necessarily mean I'm naive. Au contraire.
To say it more succinctly: people sometimes try to fool me but are often only fooling themselves. I try to be diplomatic when revealing this truth, but sometimes I fail. I dislike debate and detest excuses even more. So I generally withdraw my confidence and limit my communication with the party in question following what I call a disconnect: a lack of alignment between a person's thoughts, words, and deeds.
I do make allowances for people being human. I do have a forgiving nature, but not necessarily a forgetting nature. I realize that people--myself included--rationalize things in their minds. We don't think of 'stealing' as taking a spoon from a restaurant or taking an ink pen from our office at work. Even though taking these things home with us is actually stealing.
We tell ourselves that the restaurant will be fine and our company will be fine. No harm was really done. We haven't really sinned or broken one of the Ten Commandments.
As with many things in life, this practice of rationalization is not destructive in small doses, occurring at infrequent intervals, regarding inconsequential things.
However, bigger, more uncomfortable issues may require us to become a little more athletic with our mental gymnastics. We may work for a company that does bad things to the environment and society as it makes a profit...and pays us a salary that enables us to put food on the table and pay rent. We may know that criminal activity is going on near us and choose not to report it to the authorities under the guise of 'minding our own business'. How do we justify our choices?
It is, of course, easy to look at dictators, terrorists, arms dealers, drug dealers, or prostitutes and scoff at their reasons for doing what they do for a living. But if you talk with with them, you will find a very rational rationale that, in their minds, justifies what they do.
But their explanations probably don't hold water with you, me, law enforcement, or the International Criminal Court. We see the obvious cognitive dissonance that must have, at some point, entered the mind of these people--people who most likely knew right from wrong as children--and then was somehow, instantly or over time, pushed aside or eroded, leaving them to do the things they do with a relatively clear conscious, or a very strong mental construct of reasons, excuses, or rationalizations that allow them to live with themselves.
Prisons are full of people with perfectly good reasons for doing the incredibly bad things they did: tragic examples of what happens when we rationalize our choices too often and too much.
There are a few things we can do to avoid falling into this trap. The first thing we must do is to know what we stand for. This baseline can come from cultural influences, religious practice, or individual creeds and codes we construct individually. As I've said before, our Code should be strict on us (our behavior) and generous and forgiving to others (their behavior).
We will feel good about honoring our Code and bad about compromising it. It's that simple. You may need to write down some basic tenets of your Code if you're young. If you're older, you probably know the Code you live by, and your life is a testament to its content and your adherence to its rules.
The second challenge we face in aligning our thoughts, speech, and conduct is to acknowledge the existence of right and wrong in absolute terms. Yes, there are shades of grey in our subtle and complex society. Contradictions abound. But to live with yourself you're going to have to draw a line in the sand and say, That's fair and just, or That ain't right.
Then you'll have to decide just how you're going to stand your ground in your daily life, with issues large and small, with family, friends, colleagues, acquaintances, and the world at large. (This may seem like a lot to think about, but it will increase the quality of your life if you're aware, then thoughtful, then decisive in small things. Then you can move on to the big issues.)
To be effective in life, we must distance ourselves from influence and seek information. We must be an independent as possible: financially, socially, and politically. We must retreat from propaganda and take comfort in practicalities. We must distrust slogans and consider policy. We must keep advice at arm's length and reach for wisdom. We must be suspicious that we do not have all the information we need, but that with investigation and deliberation, we can make an objective and informed choice on important matters. We must analyze but not necessarily embrace opposing positions and look for any validity in what our adversaries might propose.
In all things, we should ask ourselves, Cui bono? Who benefits? This will take us to the heart of an issue, regardless of who is presenting it or what they claim their motives are. If the motives revealed have not been presented upfront, credibility should be questioned. Profit is not necessarily a bad thing. Deception is rarely a good thing.
We must be reserved in sharing the mechanics of our decision-making process so that others cannot effectively construct their arguments to win us over and change our minds. We must be reluctant to explain our choices to those who are not our spouse, our children, or our supervisors at work, if our decisions affect them.
We must seek to be objective and accept that we never truly will be. If we are wise, we can try to compensate for our prejudices, our faults, and our reactions with patience, caution, and care.
After we have asked many questions of others and of ourselves, and after we have aligned our thoughts--hopefully noble, pure, lofty, and righteous--with our speech--hopefully honest, modest, kind, and clear--we must lock and load our actions directly in line behind the two.
We should be confident, but not arrogant. We should be resolved, but not dogmatic. We should be bold, but not impulsive.
As much as we plan and execute, we should be ready to be wrong. We should remain humble in case we are, and grateful if we are not. There is no point in beating ourselves up in the face of failure or beating others up when we are victorious. As many have said before: triumph and disaster are rarely permanent conditions.
To achieve great things, we must lubricate our lives with love. This is easier to do when we do not have the friction of contradiction between our thoughts, our words, and our deeds. Duplicity and cleverness can only accomplish so much.
Authenticity--which is the flower of this alignment--is attractive to honest people and intimidating to evil ones. It is sword, shield, and shelter in a turbulent world that often tries to compromise our nobler instincts, our sacred values, and our higher calling.
Align. Embrace this process fearlessly. For it is the hardest road to walk, but the most rewarding destination awaits.
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