One key to understanding life’s paradoxes is to see how “First-Person Experience” is different from “Second-Person Experience” in relationships.
For example, if you, in the First Person, genuinely don’t care about “getting respect” from others, then mature people, in the Second Person, will actually respect you more. But if you, in First Person, seek and strive to “get respect” from others, then mature people will lose respect for you in the Second-Person.
If you, in your First Person experience, genuinely humble yourself with no agenda within your social group, mature people will delight and want to lift you up in their Second Person experience of your self-humbling. But the moment you, in First Person, strive to lift yourself up above others in your social group, mature people, experiencing that in Second Person, would rather you to be humbled.
If you, in First Person, choose to be appropriately vulnerable in a safe setting, mature people will delight in how courageous you are in their Second-Person Experience of your vulnerability. But if you, in First Person, choose to be inappropriately invulnerable in a safe setting, mature Second Person observers will see how fearful you actually are.
