Cause & Effect

One of my most dreaded classes going to in university was Communication Culture & Media Theory, so in this moment I can’t believe I am actually going to refer to it to in this post. Edmund Burke was an Irish philosopher and spoke on the theory called Dramatism, which has a lot to do with guilt. Burke states guilt is all around us, in everything we do and we constantly attempt to purge our guilt because of its discomfort. Purging ourselves from guilt is a notion I never forgot and still continue to think of. Think about it, have you ever gone to your friend and told him or her everything bad you ate that day? When in reality telling your friend you had 10 cookies doesn’t make those 10 cookies magically stop setting up camp on your hips making your jeans tight, but it does relieve your mind of guilt from eating those 10 cookies. Can the same be true in relationships and dating?

I have this friend who’s been told, in the recent present, that she would look good naked from a guy who has a serious girlfriend. I thought to myself, why does he feel the need to tell her that? A comment like that isn’t like being told you have nice eyes, it’s a comment that makes you feel uncomfortable because he should be telling his girlfriend that she looks good naked. This person has no intentions of leaving his girlfriend, so is he just purging his guilt of his attraction to my friend by telling her these inappropriate comments? Is it fair to say he is only saying this so he can go about his daily routine feeling better that he’s not cheating on his girlfriend by making my friend, now, feel uncomfortable? Are we complimenting people or are we projecting our guilt onto others? What I always question is what the true meaning behind these words are? To myself, the spoken words do not have a lot of meaning, unless there is action behind them. Being single do we have vulnerability for people to purge their guilt onto, because we have no one standing in front of us? I knew this guy who went through a transition period with his current girlfriend and to the unfortunate circumstance one of my good friends got caught in the middle. During their transition period words were thrown around colliding with others, but to him these words had no meaning at all, or at least the severity of those words weren’t as deep. When we are spiraling out of control or feeling guilty for our thoughts or actions it’s not safe to say that you will not impact anyone else. Cause and effect; every action has a greater or equal reaction, I think, should be the basis of our actions and even our words. We all have choices, choices, which lead to actions, and actions, which can either, create growth or deny it and bring opposition. Are we jaded and so narcissistic to think that every word or text message sent to us has 100 per cent everything to do with us or is the person from the other side just purging his or her guilt?

Cause and effect, I can’t help but think what the cause of our words can be and the effect onward it has. In different personalities, words can be more detrimental to some more than others. I read in a Myers and Briggs personality test that people are who more introverted hang onto words more, they can remember what was said; they can be more observant and more internal, especially when dealing with problems. Is this what we should be like? Think before we speak, take a second before we act, or would we be doing ourselves a disservice by not acting and speaking exactly what we feel and exactly what we think at the drop of the hat. Can you think of a time when you wished you had said what you actually felt in those moments of dismay, heartache or anger? For myself, those words only come to mind when I am lying in bed at 2 a.m. wishing I could have mustered up the courage, instead of the tears, to say what I really felt. My downfall is that I hate losing people, so when faced with this circumstance when I can say cutthroat jabs, I usually don’t, from fear of abandonment.

I will leave you with this last thought. How far are we willing to go to purge ourselves from guilt?Could we go as far as revealing our deepest darkest secrets? Sleeping with someone we’ve lusted over to get it out of our systems? Or as simple as telling the Starbucks barista you attempted to make cookies but accidentally ate all the dough? Maybe ask yourself next time is this guilt that I am getting rid of or can I continue through my day not causing effect on everyone I talk to.