What is projection? (On to other people)

[Spence94]

Specifically about projecting onto others.

Projection is you coming into a social situation and seeing the other person within the frame of your own self-agenda and biases.

Projection could be internally percieved as the 'truth' of the other person, expressed in verbal communication, or through ones actions, behaviours and emotional responses towards the person. All based on the persons own projection.

Reading Non-Violent Communication, got me thinking.

Been active on this forum this week and noticed myself projecting onto people.

Any input welcome. Open to discussion on the nature of projection and how to communicate without projection.

[Loba]

I notice this when I give advice, as I have Aspergers and do not have a good theory of mind, most of what I can rely on are my own past experiences and what works for me.  When I give advice, I am starting to add things like "take it or leave it" "just my 2c" "only take what resonates" and things like that so that people understand that ultimately they have to look into themselves to find what works.

I would hate to offer advice or an opinion that is harmful, or misunderstood so I am actively working on seeing new instances with a clear vision.  It's hard.  My personality type is also one that tends to draw from feeling and past experience rather than current data, so it's a weakness for sure, one that I see and plan to continue working on.

[Spence94]

Sometimes it's contextually appropriate to offer your experience of a situation to others, but other times it's just you throwing your shit on top of them and not seeing more clearly.

It's difficult.

[Gesundheit2]

Projection is a technical psychological term under the defense mechanisms category, often done to protect a psychological wound.

One cool thing about projection is that it can be projected onto others in a defense mechanism kind of way, which makes it ripe for abuse. Usually what I see people doing is accuse others of projecting, even though that's not necessarily the case. So they defend themselves against new unwanted information by using the projection armor.

Like you said in the later post, the distinction between experience and projection is tricky. But that shouldn't be an issue for the receiver, because it's irrelevant to the advice.

[LastThursday]

From a more philosophical point of view, it's all projection.

You only have the evidence of your senses and your past experience to go on. Having a good theory of mind just allows you to more efficiently predict people's intentions and motivations, but those motivations and intentions are still just projections coming from your own head.

Projection is a feature not a bug - to steal a phrase from someone I know.