From Effect to Affect: Afia Mansoor

I firmly believe that our intent calibrates our world. Leave aside what goes on elsewhere on the planet; good or bad. For you to proceed onto the ladder of maturity, it is crucial to understand the link between your intent, your response and what you encounter post response.

This insight crystallized for me after a set of events I shall share in this post. Around that time in my life I was struggling with a person who greatly irritated me. The sole purpose of sharing this difficult phase in life is to show the readers that one can walk out of a seemingly impossible situation by calibrating one’s intent. I do not mean to dishonour the person; in fact, the person proved to be an ally later because our transactions helped me to improve myself.

Anyhow, the person’s demeanour towards me greatly exasperated me and the more exasperated I was, the more the drama intensified and entrenched me. I tried being polite, I tried being nice, I tried ignoring the whole deal and then I tried responding with an inward and outward scowl. I tried being nasty too. Nothing worked. It came to a point where I felt my progress as a person was hinged on my dealing with the issue appropriately. It just didn’t feel right to carry on the burden of relentless:

Why me?
What did I do to receive this?
Hell what’s the person’s problem anyway?

Thankfully, by about this time, I had made a very sincere wish that I be guided on the matter and the guidance came in a sitting with Etsko Schuitema in Lahore when we had a group of friends who participated in a session called ‘Reading the Bones’. I asked Etsko after the session that what must one do to deal with such a situation as mine appropriately. What if someone ruffles you up and continues to do so in spite of your varied efforts?

What he said greatly helped me though at the time it looked as if it was just too simplistic. Etsko said, “Keep asking yourself why the person’s behaviour affects you in a series of iterations. So for instance, the first question could be ‘Why did it affect me so much when the person said this to me?’  And then, when you arrive at the answer to this question. Move on to the next question and so on. Till you will learn to be amused by the whole deal (not in a demeaning manner but in a truly pleased and amused manner). You will not only find the person’s attitude amusing but you will be more amused by your ego’s response to such attitude. You’ll be piqued by your response and your awareness of you will lead you to appropriateness.”

From that day, I started asking myself a question each time I felt irritated. Soon enough, I started arriving at answers that increased my own perception of my Self. I realized that the issue was not as much about the person as it was about me. I realized that I had tried being nice and polite because I wanted reciprocation of niceness…hence I was being nice for my sake…not for the person and hence I was being conditional in my behaviour. My self-significance wanted respect from the person and the more I wanted this the weaker I got. Because it wasn’t in my power to make the person amicable towards me. My ‘conditional niceness’ was funny because I could see the lengths my ego was going to secure a comfort zone for itself.

I became more curious of myself than the person. Without realizing it, I was moving into my own space rather than wondering what all the ‘nonsense’ was about. Soon enough I began to detach from the drama because I found my own behaviour intriguing and insightful. As I had intervened on my own self, I somehow became more powerful. I was not the angry, resentful, reactive and vocal me. I rather became inwardly quiet, observant and unreactive. Interestingly, I was not also fighting my ego to be proper but rather amused by it.

As if by magic, the more I perceived, the more the situation unfolded in a newer way. Till I began to see the person’s own suffering and felt affection. My behaviour was neither nice, nor rude. It was in fact, suited to each transaction that took place between me and the person. When I became completely detached, circumstances became such that the person left the scene without any friction. I washed my hands off the affair and the matter washed its hands off me. I read the page and the page turned.

Keep asking yourself why the person’s behaviour affects you in a series of iterations.

I also realized that your appropriateness may or may not result in circumstances going your way as you wished prior to your transformation. In this case, the person did not leave becoming amicable towards me. However, if you are truly unconditional towards the matter, or detached, the outcome really doesn’t matter. As long you know in your heart that you put in your best effort that suited the moment.

Summarily, I think when you arrive at the final answers that liberate you, you begin to see things with love. Love is a gauge that tells that you are headed in the right way. That you see things as they are. That it does not matter in the long run.

Intent indeed is a powerful tool. A tool that calibrates our world. May we all find that power within us to calibrate our world towards benevolence.