How old does this plane look? First, think on this – “We judge ourselves based on our intentions. We judge each other based on observable behaviors.” Keep it in mind. We’ll come back to it. If you are, at all, accustomed to air travel you probably have a series of things you look for whilst flying from point A to point B. Things like:How close is the lavatory? By the way, does anyone else call their bathroom a lavatory?
Did I remember my headphones?
No matter how many times I fly, did I sit on my seatbelt again? I don’t fly as much as those that do it for business every week or month, but I’m up there enough to know that there are a few things I look for in particular. One, I don’t have a thing with heights, but I need to know which way is up. If we’re in a cloud bank and I don’t know which way the ground is, that’s when I get discombobulated.
The other thing is turbulence.
I’ve gotten to where I can handle minor bumps and whatnot but when things start to heat up, I usually look at the flight attendants. These folks are ig database trained to smile through anything, to keep passengers calm and collected. If they’re not smiling, I usually tighten my seat belt and hang on. If the captain is telling flight attendants to be seated and strap in, that’s not good. That means he doesn’t want one of them to wind up on the ceiling.
It’s that observable behavior that
Gives me all kinds of information. On a flight from Dallas Love Field to San Antonio a few weeks ago, a short hop, we hit some rain on the way in and price can also be creative things got a little rough. At one point, after a particularly hard dip, a trim piece of the overhead bin actually fell off. The flight attendant seated nearby not only wasn’t smiling, but her eyes got as big as quarters. That observable behavior told me we were in a rough spot of turbulence and that we were either on an old plane and/or the flight attendant was wondering how many people saw that.
Now, back to our original thesis
We judge ourselves based on our intentions. We rich data judge each other based on observable behavior.” Another way to interpret that statement is that non-verbal communication plays a huge role in our day-to-day interactions with friends, co-workers and family. It also means that if we’re really searching for understanding of any given statement or situation, we need to ask deeper questions and avoid taking anything on face value (no judging books by covers.