Behaving Badly or Hiding Pain?

There’s a saying in Scotland that goes something like this “A Fu’ man is a true man”. What that means in plain English is quite simply... your fellow human who has imbibed a vast amount of alcohol will eschew the niceties of social behaviour and show and or tell you exactly how it is. How they are.

FAIR ENOUGH?

Is this an accurate saying? My observations lead me to conclude that it’s too simple a platitude.. but I have wholeheartedly believed it at times, and have been deeply hurt by others drunken behaviour, believing that it was showing me who they really were. And that their true being didn’t care about me.

NARROW VIEW

It would be probably more accurate to say that not only does alcohol disinhibit one, it also blurs out what is around the drunkard. They become more self centred with a very narrow focus. Therefore their behaviour really doesn’t have anything to do with you. They have effectively forgotten you are there.

UNAWARE

It’s easy to look back at events in history where the drunk behaved appallingly...or at least ..just very thoughtlessly .. in a different context, eg. unobserved by you, little would have been thought of their actions.. some may have even applauded them.

UNKIND

But it was observed ...it did feel awful trapped in circumstances one would have moved heaven and earth to avoid. And indeed were completely avoidable. Screaming instincts weren’t enough to make sure it was avoided.

FROM POSITIVE TO NEGATIVE

Anyway ..there’s a huge fallout and this is when another wonderful quirk of the human condition can raise it’s awesome head.... and look like the truth is finally out there for all to see.. however is your “falling out behaviour” your true feelings.. . or just your hurt on display?

There had never been any conflict in this friendship before ... tension ...yes but never conflict. Suddenly boundaries were being impinged on all sides.. completely unintentionally ..but rather than it being true feelings being unleashed ....it was hurt feelings that drove the bad behaviour.

LIMITATIONS REALISED

Ultimately the friendship resided in the ensemble collective and in the great tradition of ensemble collectives everywhere .. the dissolution of the collective meant that the comforting apparent closeness of the friendship would evaporate, it may, under more ideal circumstances taken more time, but evaporate it would.

MORE EFFORT

A lot more effort would have needed to be applied to getting to know the person... willingness to make that effort.. for the sake of the ensemble or for any other reason would have to be evenly matched, or trouble would be ahead.

People’s behaviour in these cases ultimately won’t be great and it will continue to not be great for a while. Perhaps more of a “ghosting” than ongoing bad behaviour but that in itself is bad behaviour. However, it was the PAIN of the outcome that drove this .. not the faux “truth” that perhaps one was an entitled person that couldn’t accept limitations. Or whatever “story”was told....

LEARNING

Lessons? Well we just don’t get to know people as well as we should whether they be friends, lovers, colleagues or ensemble members, we all want to believe the best and that we are understood.

But it's also true the pain experienced during a falling out can drive people to act out in ways even they couldn't have predicted.

However saying how we act at the end of a relationship or friendship is who we "really" are — as if that behaviour sums up our true character — is probably an overreach because the pain of a falling out can mess with our judgement.

It’s not an excuse for bad behaviour, but it’s an explanation..know that people do things they would never normally do. Just as they may after a heavy drinking session.

They are really not in a good place.

Particularly in the absence of any previous conflict, not realising that people have the potential to be reactive during a falling out can leave us open to further hurt. It quite simply comes as a shock.

They act and speak in haste. They will block on social media or randomly turn up at an event where both parties are... and stir things up even more... even if their intention deep down was to hold out an olive branch.

They might not do these hasty things if they were thinking clearly.

Often it’s left to people to reflect later with regret, feeling like they humiliated themselves. Cue simply vanishing into the ether.

Pain, Booze and falling out a treacherous trifecta in any order!!!