Of course, it's meant as a bit of a put-down, a 'win-lose' strategy ('I elevate myself at your expense') and it is rather amusing, although I wouldn't want someone to use it on me. So the fact that initially I found it amusing no longer sits comfortably with me. Had I automatically put myself in the role of 'giver' rather than 'receiver'? Why would I find it amusing from one perspective but not the other? So it got me thinking, what is the difference between 'description' and 'insult'? And why does one seem to matter more than the other?
Well, firstly, as I've just hinted, one important difference is that of intent. A description implies a neutral stance, one of simply communicating a 'truth' that is 'out there'. 'Insult', on the other hand, implies that there is an intent attached to the narrative - there is an outcome attached to the 'description' - there is a lack of neutrality which is designed to achieve some aim or other. An insult is designed to hurt and we feel it because it often attacks our sense of identity or we feel humiliated. This particular statement works as an insult because it is attempting to form an equivalence between a person's opinion and an objective truth. (ie 'I'm not just telling you what I think, it is also a fact, therefore true and indisputable'.) It also implies that the receiver has failed to understand (and therefore there exists a difference in intellect) and also that the receiver has now walked into a carefully laid trap, which he only discovers at the moment it is too late to do anything about it. It is saying 'Game, set and match - and if there is an audience to witness my expert humiliation of you, all the better'.
Let's leave aside the philosophical argument about whether there exists an objective world out there that can be described. Minds much greater than mine have pondered this and I would add little to the debate! What really struck me about this quote is that, more generally, it sums up what the job of a coach actually is. In many circumstances the role of the coach is to separate 'facts' from 'interpretations'. The popular psychology approach of Neuro Linguistic Programming (developed by Richard Bandler and John Grinder) is one where the subjective experience of the individual is put at the centre of the field of study. It proposes that we convert the world of objective reality to our own highly individualised subjective experience through the processes of Generalisation, Distortion and Deletion. These are necessary and inevitable processes, but lead to a version of reality that is very different from the 'world out there'. Uncovering just how someone has converted the facts to an interpretation can give some powerful insights into why they act the way that they do, while also providing useful pointers on how the person can change, should that be what they desire.
Sometimes these interpretations are deliberate and conscious. (Have you ever felt the need to protect yourself, by blaming someone else, when an objective hasn't been achieved?). More often than not, these interpretations are largely unconscious and have been established over time. The longer they exist, the more they start to feel like 'reality' and we forget that they aren't really facts at all, just our perceptions. At times, if left unexamined, these patterns can lead to limited choice and behaviours that don't always get the results we want.
A good coach can help to recover the difference between the two and in doing so, open up greater choice for the coachee.
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