Johari Window

Not a home fixture but rather a tool for measuring one's relationship awareness. (click here for explanation)My class was made to do this exercise during our tutorial for our psychology class. Where all of us pasted a blank piece of paper on our back and let everyone else in the class write something abt what they think of us. After in which the information written are classified in the Johari window. This is where you learn about your relationship with others.

I thought I might get some surprise information about myself but there was none, all the things written was already known to me. The thing that surprised me however, was that there were only two negative things written about me. I know my outspoken and direct nature sometimes pissed people off, but I guess my classmates are just being polite. The two negative points are;

1. Very frank, can hurt others.
2. Blunt direct at times.

Well, frankness and honesty are what I strive towards. But hurting others is definitely not intentional, I believe the truth always hurt. And sometimes I probably lose that delicate balance. Other times, people are just accustomed to hypocrisy and flattery, in fact I think this is the defacto standard of the society in large. In this case, I am more than happy to join the non conformist camp.

I actually know who wrote the first comment and I can totally understand where he is coming from. But I was surprised that during the share session after the exercise, he claimed that he was surprised himself that someone actually wrote that he was childish. I guess he just doesn't know himself at all.

Having an exercise like that opens up a big can of worms for those who don't know what they themselves are like and how others perceived of them. I've got one classmate who was so bothered by one remark written about him having no insight that he went around trying to find out who wrote that. For me, I'm totally at peace with all the comments written about me, especially the negative ones.... :)