The Phrasing and Ideas series elaborates on the thousand-plus entries I’ve collected in a document by the same name. These entries have been scavenged over several years through plenty of different situations and mediums. Every article visits one of the entries and gives it additional context, from where it was taken from, what it means to me, who I was when I found it, how it has grown with me over time, etc. For more information on the ‘Phasing and Ideas’ series, you can click below.
The Celestial Phrases
This is another celestial phrase. The celestial phrases are entries from my document revered further from the rest. These phrases are foundational to my life and how I wish to live — they are fundamental aspects of my ethos. To read about the first celestial phrase I wrote about, click below.
Origin
At its core, this is a phrase that illustrates the idea that you represent those you are closest to. You represent them by association. In essence, how you reflect on someone is going to contribute to how that person views other people they associate with you — from your parents, your partner(s), your friends, your associates, etc. The impression you leave on others impacts so much more than just you and your image.
I think I found this phrase on another forum. Probably a feels thread on 4chan if anything. You have to sift through a lot of shit on those boards but, to me, sifting through all the hate speech, gore, porn, and other degenerate BS is worth it to find these, what I consider, gems. Perhaps this is just a mental model I’ve constructed intrinsically to cope with all the time I’ve spent (and wasted) on these websites/on the internet in general.
My Mother, Her Friends, and Reputation
I remember when I first met this phrase, I instantly thought of my mother and all her friends. I thought about how whenever I met one of my mom’s friends they would analyze me by my demeanour towards them and other people: how respectful I was, my consideration for them; as well as things like what I was doing with my life, my accomplishments, what my partner at the time may or may not have looked like, etc. They analyzed me to create an opinion that would later reflect, negatively or positively, on their views of my mother.
You’ve probably been in a situation similar to this, reader. Whether it be with your parent’s friends, partner’s friends, family members, friends of friends, etc. What’s even easier to relate to is flipping the situation around where you become the assessor.
Picture this: you’re meeting a friend of your friend and they are a total scumbag. They’re difficult to converse with, uninterested in hearing your thoughts on topics, or downright disrespectful to your opinions on things, perhaps they’re pretentious and critiquing you and other people at the gathering, or they’re condescending in their tone, etc. I’m sure if you’ve been the poor beneficiary of a situation similar to this. You, like me, potentially thought ill thoughts on the mutual friend you share with this individual — thinking to yourself, ‘How are they friends with this?’
Let’s use the positive counterfactual for this situation though, a much better scenario. Instead of the friend of your friend being a total scumbag, you instead get to meet an absolute superstar of a human being — someone you instantly hit it off with or someone you instantly wish you could be even closer friends with just from one conversation and observation their idiosyncracies briefly in a very small sample size. If you’re anything like me, you instantly think ‘My god, friend X surrounds their life with such amazing people. I’m so glad to know them.’ In this scenario, that friend of yours is painted in a brighter light due to the impression someone associated with them presented to you. In this case, that friend of a friend not only represents the image of themselves to you based on how they conduct themselves, but they impact the image you have of your mutual friend as well with their actions (or inactions).
Representation as a Function of Closeness
Using this concept, the higher the degree of love the associated parties have for one another, the stronger the representation of one another each party has when conducting themselves around other people. This relationship is not determined by the two individuals, however. It is a closeness determined by the assessor.
From the earlier examples:
If that scumbag friend of a friend you met was someone your mutual friend invited because they’ve been classmates for a couple of months, hit it off, and this is the first time the mutual friend is seeing this individual outside the classroom setting — then your mutual friend might get a bigger pass on any negative views you have on them now as a result of them being responsible for you having to interact with this difficult individual. You can give them the benefit of the doubt that they sincerely didn’t know that they (the friend of the friend) would act like this. The idea of love isn’t very strong here.
On the other hand, had this scumbag person been the best friend of several years to your mutual friend, things would likely reflect more poorly on that mutual friend because you’d begin to question what you really know of them based on the folks they associate themselves with.
These scenarios represent the two opposite ends of a dipole that is what love represents in this phrase. It’s not quite the conventional phrasing of love, but rather, an idea that these are the people you hold dearly to your life and have significant relationships with. It is a measurement of the calibre of relationship you have with them, or closeness. The more you love an individual based on this phrase, the more you indirectly represent them in the eyes of other people — assuming the assessor knows the calibre of the bond. Present yourself poorly, and it will undoubtedly reflect poorly on their reputation too, and vice versa.
The figure attached above is a visual representation of what was just written about, for the multimodal learners in the audience.
Remember reader, reputation is what people who don’t know us, think about us. With regards to this entry, it is what people who don’t know those you associate with, think of them through their impression of you.
This phrase always served to me as a reminder that how I reflect on others doesn’t always just impact that direct relationship, but all the relationships those folks have with the people they associate with me, impacting most: the people I love. You might not always care about how others perceive you, and it might not always be the case that how they perceive you, positively or negatively, impacts how they see those they associate with you, but it is a good reminder to treat people with decency, even when you sometimes find yourself in situations where you don’t want to. You never know whose reputation you’re also representing in the eyes of that person, and the relationship the person you might be representing has with them.
Concluding Remarks
You represent more than yourself navigating through the world, and I bet you want others to see the people you love in your life in just as magnificent a light as you see them. All of that starts with you and how you represent yourself. We carry the impressions of so many others with our conduct in day-to-day life.
This isn’t an absolute obviously, but it’s a phrase that represents a nice mental model to remind ourselves that how we engage with the world will often reflect on more than just us and our perceived singular, isolated reputation. It reflects additionally on the reputations of the folks we carry with us day in and day out, those people whose companionship helped mold us into who we are in so many little, sometimes hard-to-articulate ways. In many ways, we are an outlet of them in how we act, how we speak, how we love, how we help, how we play, how we conduct ourselves, and how we represent.
They’re the people who make us, and I suppose that’s why we love them.
To read the next entry in the Phasing and Ideas Series, click below.