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We make a mistake with a letter – and the SMS becomes ambiguous, we click the mouse in a hurry – and the mail goes to the wrong addressee … Modern technologies speed up the rhythm, increasingly putting us in awkward situations. What are our “blunders” talking about?
“After a month of separation, my friend finally had to return from a business trip,” says 38-year-old Larisa. – I sent him an SMS: “I’m looking forward to it! Come back soon.” About an hour later, my ex-husband rang at the door. Turns out I got the wrong number…”
New technologies, in theory, should facilitate communication. But it is precisely because of them that we increasingly find ourselves in an awkward position. A new kind of communication allows us to act spontaneously and does not require preliminary thinking about what we write. And we get into the habit of not rereading messages before hitting send, preferring to act quickly. As a result, the number of slips, “accidents”, and oversights is growing.
E-mail, chats, endless messaging – we selflessly indulge in these activities at almost any moment of our lives. The possibility of instant contact gives the impression of its lightness and simplicity. We no longer have this intermediate stage – pens, paper, we are no longer obliged to honor the rules of spelling. There is an impression of freedom, we do not feel restrictions, and this state to some extent resembles a childish feeling of omnipotence.
“We act impulsively, and when we lose control of ourselves, we unconsciously do what we would consciously want to avoid,” says Jungian analyst Lev Khegai. “In oral speech, these would be reservations, but in writing there are typos and typos.”
Misprints at lightning speed expose the most secret thoughts and desires, flaunt what we tried to hide from ourselves
Virtual media has another attractive feature: we feel more relaxed, it seems that we can say whatever we want without fear of consequences. After all, the person with whom we communicate is not next to us. This means that we do not have to refine or polish what we say: without seeing his reaction, we can surrender to our imagination, plunge into fantasies and no longer follow where this may lead us.
Hidden desires
The example of Larisa, who is still thinking about her ex-husband, or the story of a girl in love who was in such a hurry to answer the long-awaited offer of a date that in the response SMS instead of “in an hour” it turned out to be written “through the penis”, show what a predicament we can be led to these unintentional oversights.
In contrast to the dreams that remain in the sphere of our intimate life, such typographical errors reveal with lightning speed the most secret thoughts and desires, expose what we more or less unconsciously tried to hide even from ourselves.
Electronic means of communication seem to push us to make mistakes: having become accustomed in the virtual space to the fact that we can be anonymous and go unpunished, we involuntarily transfer this habit to personal communication, as if forgetting that we are authorized and can be recognized.
“I sent my friend a description of my intimate experiences, but it turned out that the whole forum sees it,” 29-year-old Irina is horrified. “By the time I figured out how to close this message from prying eyes, everyone had already read it!”
Did it happen by accident or not? “An inexperienced user, not knowing the codes that “close” the message, of course, can make such an oversight,” comments psychoanalyst Marina Arutyunyan. — Before sending a very personal message, it would be worth reading them. But behind this mistake, perhaps, was Irina’s unconscious desire for someone else to find out about her experiences – for example, their culprit, her partner.
“Such involuntary erroneous actions can also satisfy the need for demonstrativeness, publicity,” adds Lev Khegay. “Perhaps Irina needed the attention of others, and the publication of her personal story helped her achieve this.”
What if we made a mistake?
- Don’t blame yourself. Our reservations and unsuccessful actions can offend someone. But by apologizing and making excuses, we partly acknowledge responsibility for the mistake, while there may not be any reason to feel guilty. And sometimes, in the depths of our souls, there is relief that we finally told the truth, confessed what we were silent about.
- Wait a bit before talking about it. It is better to first think for a while about what our oversight could mean, and then we can calmly return to this topic. In addition, our interlocutor also needs time to think about this unexpected truth, to ask himself some questions, to question something.
- Laugh. Humor helps to survive a moment of awkwardness with minimal losses, it gives relaxation, relieves tension, and facilitates the perception of what happened.
Aggression in search of a way out
Embarrassing behavior also exposes our aggressive impulses. We gossip about a friend by e-mail and “accidentally” send him a letter. Or we hang up the phone badly and loudly express our annoyance at the person on the other end of the wire …
Consciousness obliges us to strict censorship, forbidding us to show negative feelings in public and private life. But the unconscious sometimes rebels, prompting us to speak frankly against our will. More often this happens in difficult moments for us, when we can not cope with our feelings.
“The more important the essence of the subject is for us, the higher the risk of a sudden slip of the tongue, an oversight associated with it,” continues the psychoanalyst. “The more we try to control ourselves, the more active our unconscious becomes.”
That’s why these misfires often crop up in our work emails, creating a sea of awkwardness just where we’re trying so hard to appear perfect.
New technologies increase the potential for such misses, but at the same time reveal the truth that we do not notice.
It turns out that new technologies provoke us? “No,” says Lev Khegay, “before they appeared, our unconscious behaved the same way. The only difference is that before we “didn’t notice” that the one we were scolding was standing next to us. But with the advent of new means of communication, we began to communicate more intensively and, accordingly, make more mistakes. Our contemporary who forgets to delete messages from his new lover on his mobile phone is not much different from the cheating husband of the last century who forgot love notes in his jacket pocket.
The power of self-exposure
36-year-old Vera sent a short congratulation to her friend: “Happy birthday!” “When congratulating a person, we, of course, are only talking about good things,” explains Lev Khegay, “but if we have long-standing grievances, unresolved conflicts, they can suddenly erupt at the most inopportune moment. Yes, such an error can be just a typo, and if the relationship is good, the recipient of the SMS need not worry. And if this is not the first time this happens, then you can think: is it by chance? And maybe talk frankly with each other.”
“I receive SMS from a friend,” says Marina Harutyunyan. – Question: “Are you on the vomit?” Such a message can be considered as a manifestation of one of the protective mechanisms of the psyche, projection: my girlfriend works very hard, without days off. Of course, she herself knew that she was tired, she just did not know to what extent: to the point of nausea.
The founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, wrote that “behind every unsuccessful action is a successful action.” New technologies increase the potential for such mistakes, but at the same time help us live in harmony with ourselves – they reveal the truth that we do not notice.
If we have a deep desire to be exposed, it is impossible to carry it with us for a long time.
Social networks increase the risk of erroneous actions by offering to post a variety of information about yourself. So, often on Facebook and Odnoklassniki, high school students post their photos from parties for friends and “forget” that their parents will probably see them. Drunk, made up, half-dressed … and adults are horrified.
“Adolescents seem to throw off that ideal image of an exemplary child that adults want to see,” Lev Khegay explains. “Through social media, they spontaneously communicate to their parents that they cannot and do not want to be perfect.” And they declare their need to be accepted for who they are.
The secret, as you know, always becomes clear. “If we have a deep desire to be exposed, it is impossible to carry it with us for a long time,” the analyst adds. – The feeling of guilt that it causes is getting stronger every day: dreaming about what is taboo is not accepted, indecent. This feeling can be interpreted as a desire for punishment… whether it will actually come or not. But in any case, the situation from fantasy will become real and can be resolved.
Messages to yourself
We are concerned about the impression our blunder has on others. But such misfires also tell us something important about us.
“I always carefully monitor what I write and send,” says 38-year-old Boris. “Then one day I sent an unfinished email by mistake. It was still a draft, by which it was possible to follow the course of my thoughts, doubts, contradictory assumptions … My addressee did not even notice this, and I almost collapsed from shame. This made me think that, it turns out, I still have a strong fear of being not up to par … “
When we are very tired, or want to sleep, or our attention is scattered, then the devil of the unconscious pushes us by the arm.
How we interpret the slips or slips of others can reveal our own projections and anxieties. “When the boss misrepresents my name and writes “Ana”, I react very painfully,” Anna, 34, admits. “But in a letter from anyone else, I would take that as a typo.”
The unconscious shows up only when we want to know something about it, it only talks to those who really want it.
“Our missteps introduce us to our own feelings,” says Lev Khegay. “When we are very tired, or want to sleep, or our attention is distracted – in a word, when the control of consciousness is weakened, then the devil of the unconscious pushes us under the arm.” Sometimes it seems dangerous – and this is no coincidence. After all, he makes us see what we turned away from, what we hid not only from others, but also from ourselves.
Tricks of the unconscious
Mistakes, slips of the tongue, reservations, lost things – it seems that this happens to us only because we get tired, become inattentive. The creator of the theory of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, was the first to prove that this is a manifestation of our unconscious intentions, behind which is the desire to be free from feelings of guilt, remorse or fear.
“It will certainly seem incredible to you that any intention of ours is involved in the loss, which we often perceive as an unfortunate accident,” wrote Freud. “But there are many observations, such as the following. A young man has lost an expensive pencil for him. The day before, he had received a letter from his brother-in-law, which ended with the words: “I have no desire to indulge your frivolity and laziness.” The pencil was a gift from this brother-in-law.
Without such a coincidence, of course, we could not argue that the intention to get rid of this thing is involved in the loss of the pencil. Similar cases are very common. Objects are lost when you quarrel with the one who gave them and whom it is unpleasant to remember, or when you stop liking the things themselves and you are looking for an excuse to replace them with other, better ones.