“We judge ourselves by our intentions, but other people by their actions,” said by someone once and then people forgot who and I can’t for the life of me find the source online… But this is a thing.
This week’s post is an exploration of intentions and actions. What side are you on? Do you think about this? I do.
Growing up, intentions mattered. A lot. Actually often more than actions. The scale was dramatically weighted to one side. You could do something horrible, and within the explanation, all could be forgiven. Just understanding the “why” was enough to solicit compassion/empathy.
It was not until I married someone who had been raised with a flipped scale – valuing actions over intentions – did I understand the statement, “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” I actually think I had not heard this phrase until I was 30. Their family valued the idea that actions were the only outward presentation you had and that other people’s ideas on how you acted were more valuable to the community than your internal voice.
Broadly speaking, the contrasting values (intentions vs actions) would look something like seeing compassion & belonging vs function & efficiency. Just reflections on how people in society want to be. Neither is good or bad. It just is. I find value in both, as I age. I do, however, really like the idea that people wouldn’t judge me on my actions solely. I want to be given the benefit of the doubt. I want to offer the assumption that your intentions were good, and I want that in return.
Now, my intentions with this essay are just to explore these two terms and their intersections. And that they both matter. Maybe in different ways.
Last week, I went to a dinner where the person I was assigned to sit next to had been broken up with earlier in the day via text. Currently, is breaking up with someone via text more “honorable” than ghosting? Is it still important to have the conversation in person? Why do we value that? This seemingly straightforward situation has so many complications. I don’t want to assume that this was heartbreaking. But let’s assume it was. For both parties. In this situation, why is it so bad to break up with someone via text?
As I felt the judgments boil within me for both parties (like, who breaks up with someone via text unless… there must have been something else), I felt myself trying to figure out what this complete stranger needed to hear at this moment. I told myself it was for them. My intention was to be a listener if they wanted to talk. To be a neutral person without a stake in the game. So I asked questions. Hoping that this would make them comfortable, and open up in ways that could offer comfort and acceptance at the moment.
It went horribly. As you might have foreseen. I was telling myself that I was doing all of this for her, but also, I was doing it for my comfort. I don’t like sitting with people who are uncomfortable. Who are in pain. This was kinda like sitting next to someone who has just cut their finger off and having no medical expertise. You just have to sit with them and watch it bleed.
My methods proved ineffective. I didn’t go so far as to ask something like, “how did you not see this coming?,” but I got close.
As always, thanks so much for being here with me. And thinking about these things. Perhaps will help you offer yourself and others a little bit of compassion in showing up just as we are - humans.
This was one of the first thing we learned in grad school for counseling psychology: intent vs impact ... the idea there was mostly that despite our best intentions we impact people in myriad ways and that self-awareness requires understanding this.
We practiced the story script: “I felt x when you y ... the story I am telling myself is z ... I want to check if that’s true”. It felt super cheesy to work with it but it’s a great tool. It acknowledges that something had an impact and we’ve created a whole story around it but are willing to listen to what the intention actually was.
Such a great topic! It can be complicated but it also can be simplified in some ways. In regards to your dinner companion I say give yourself a lot of forgiveness. It was not your problem to solve and more to the point, not the place or time for them to overshare personal struggles at this dinner. They had choices:
not to go to the dinner
not to share their pile of woes with you
...but they did. It was thier choice to make you a captive audience to a problem you had no responsibility in the out come however it ended. It begs the question why did they choice this action vs what was the intention behind it? No matter what they meant by this overshare, you were placed in an awkward social dilemma which I think you handled gracefully. Look, part of them wanted this break up to be witnessed and so with the default invitation to examine this sad turn of events I say grants you full license to ask any question and share your opinion because you were invited to this drama without your consent.