Peace of Insight, Part 1:Everybody Has An Agenda

Do you sometimes wonder why people do crazy things? Do you have friends, colleagues or acquaintances whose behavioral patterns you don't understand? Then this article might give you a useful insight.

Do you watch House M.D.? The leading character in this show, Gregory House, has a basic rules that says, everybody lies. This piece of wisdom helps him solve a number of his cases, figuring out that patients lied about their medication, eating habits or sexual escapades. Good for him. You should keep this in mind, I recommend. Please don't assume that everybody lies all the time though. Not only is that not true but karma dictates that by doing so, you will concentrate on the wrong type of people who actually do lie more than others. Not a good idea if you ask me.


Why People Do What They Do

Anyway, I wasn't satisfied to know that people lie and do things that you and I would never even consider considering. I wanted to know why all that happens.

I have met a vast number of people in my life, through all sorts of occasions from short meaningless dates to sex-driven online-hook-ups, to periods of being a devoted tourist host, to summer vacations in the US that lead both to some of my best friendships and troublesome encounters that while at it, I wished I didn't have to endure. Encounters have made me laugh and cry, sometimes both. Saying good-bye has been very easy at times and extremely difficult at others. Among the people I have met have been men from all over the world, from celebrities to guys next door, from ultimately sexy men to those that flew under my radar, those I considered just right to fuck their lights out to those I wanted to be lifetime friends with.

An important factor in encountering others is our vulnerability, our openness to new things, our love for contrast. If we are afraid of insecurity we are likely to rather soothe our own fears than to be open for what's generously offered to us right then, right there. Every situation in which you feel uncomfortable and deal with although there is no way out, will soften your heart and ease your mind.

In all these encounters I have learned why people do the things they do. It is because everybody has an agenda.


What Agendas Are

Agendas are our behavioral pendant to our fears.

We all are afraid of something, and we all yearn for love and affirmation, protection or security, sometimes all of the above. That's why we strive for something. If everything was perfect nobody would accomplish anything. And why should they? Things are already perfect.

But sadly, agendas are by far not only responsible for our positive achievements. Much rather, they make us do everything that involves (even subconscious) feelings, from giving the most beautiful presents to taking our moods on to others, denying the most obvious facts, sliding into devastating debts, lying, cheating on people we like, saying the ugliest things, stealing, hurting others physically and mentally, and all the other things I forgot to mention. You know what I'm talking about.


How Agendas Are Created

As agendas are caused by fears, there are vast numbers of situations that can cause or contribute to our agendas. Although I am not an expert in this area and although I am at this point unable to refer to studies to prove or support my point, one thing seems rather obvious to me. Our childhood is a huge factor in the creation of our agendas, not because our parents were such bad people but simply because we came to face most of our fears when we were kids. The fear of being abandoned, of not being loved, of doing wrong things, or countless other things, all of them are so deeply rooted that unless we have a concrete reason to work on them (e.g. because we fall back to them in our adult relationships), we might be completely unaware of them.

But only our imagination limits the situations that can lead to fear, which again leads to the alteration of our agendas. Were you mocked at school because you were fat or stingy, or scored low at tests? Were you turned down by somebody you wanted to be together so badly that you couldn't sleep? Did you abuse drugs or fall into other addictions, resulting on rapid loss of social status or friends? Do you hate your body for any reason? Are you unhappy at your job; do you even think you're worthless because you didn't reach a level of education that all your friends have? Do you consider yourself poor or lonely? Have you ever felt judged unfairly? Do you have the feeling that no matter what you do, you always fuck it up?

The possibilities are endless even though they usually circle around a core of experiences that's often similar in several people.

Most of us have no clue what our agenda is or even that it exists. Agendas are so deeply rooted in and defended by our subconscious that we need to dig equally deeply to become aware of them. Yet we all follow them. It is everyone's own decision to change their agenda but unless we do, we are like puppets.


How To Detect Somebody's Agenda

Knowing everything I have written so far doesn't help if you just don't know what somebody's agenda is. Truth is that in order to understand what's going on with somebody, we need to know him or her fairly well. When you're lost for an explanation why somebody does something, you're probably missing important facts. However, the more similar somebody's agenda is to yours the more apparent it will be for you. Whenever we want to understand how we tick, we basically need to contemplate others, and when it comes to understanding others, it helps a lot to be mindful of your own motives and behavior, your own agenda.

If you need help figuring out your agenda there are several possibilities for you. Some people ask friends or parents, some write diary, some others again meditate. I have found all of these methods to be useful in one situation or another but be assured, no matter what you do to find out what your agenda is, you're doing a lot more than the vast majority.

However, one way has proved to be especially efficient.

I call it the mirroring technique. Have somebody mirror your fears back to you. Have them ask specific questions and state concrete moments at which you fall back into your agenda. The biggest problems with this are that you will need somebody who is – at least up to a certain point – aware of your agenda, which practically means that he has to be an agenda that in some parts equals yours.

An example of my past:

Not too long ago I was talking to a man I was visiting in California. He was extremely sexy, and I had looked forward to meet him for months. However, having arrived there I noticed that he wasn't at all happy about my being there because he felt under a huge amount of pressure, having invited me over to come to California and then “turning me down”. This caused a huge amount of discontentment in me, not only because I felt bad for being his cause of pressure but, much rather, because no matter what I did, this handsome man would just not let me get closer to him. I felt rejected, which is one of my biggest fears, if not the biggest one.

The talkative and open-hearted person that I am, I talked openly about this part of my agenda. I told him that I had done several things in the previous days not only – but also – because I wanted him to like me. From the way he talked it was obvious that this part of me resonated in him. He just knew too well what was going on in me. The most interesting part for me was that he actually had understood so well that at one point he said, “See? You're doing it again!”

I'm sure he rather meant to support his own point in that situation than to help me get an important insight into myself, but it helped a lot to be told openly.

The week I spent in close contact with him taught me a lot. Dealing with my own fears has made them shrink, and I look back on my unpleasant periods in life as my biggest chances to grow.
The stronger somebody's agenda, the less likely we are to meet him instead of his behavioral patterns that work around his fears.


Please Do Not Call Agendas Issues

A lot of people have a different name for agendas. They call them issues, and when I listen closely to people talk especially in the gay scene in the US, I get the impression that everybody has huge ones.

While I'm sure most of us have things to work on that you might actually call “issues”, the way the word is usually used conveys both a momentous judgment of others and a dangerous self-contentment and -deceit. It's always the others who have issues, you think, never you. Too bad that depending on whom you ask, “the others” includes you.

Please do yourself a favor and refrain from using a word that mainly aims to judge others. We all have fears that we should work on. As soon as you judge others instead, what you are doing is merely another part of your way to deal with your own fears, another part of your agenda.

Everybody has an agenda.
Be mindful next time.