Today I learned about a seemingly normal human thing, called “norm-matching.” Apparently, we do it all the time. For example, being in a restaurant with your friend or partner and noticing they only eat half of their steak, or stopped eating. Our “natural” response is to match that behavior and also eat less/stop eating. Of course, it’s peer pressure and “herd behavior,” which I was often spectacularly bad at, even though I keep trying.
I have one, out of only a handful of childhood memories. I am in Kindergarten. I learned how to tie my shoes via a practice piece made of a small square of cardboard with ribbon on it to practice. There were two colors, blue for boys and red for girls. I have a distinct memory of sitting, by myself, at a table, just meticulously practicing tying the bow. I remember not wanting to go outside and play with other kids. I also remember hiding under a table to not be found, waiting until they were all out in the yard playing and screaming, while I stayed behind to tie my bow. This memory says it all.
My mom, teachers and pretty much everyone else would always accuse me of being off in my own world. The remarks from my school teachers, as well as my first manager at the court, when I did my apprenticeship, all noted that I need to concentrate more. To them I seemed distracted, off in my own world and daydreaming. I remember one comment in my apprenticeship report card “Carmen is very intelligent and could easily be the best in her class, if she would apply herself more and not be so lazy.” My mother also thought me lazy, but she figured it had to be due to me probably being on drugs, which was utterly ridiculous, but that was her explanation of my scattered mind that seemed to struggle to fit in and stay present.
When I read the article about norm-matching, a lightbulb went on in my head. For years I have been pondering why people who are actually lazy, incompetent, fake, dishonest, mean and opportunistic are so successful in business. I would look around in disbelief and wondered why no one else saw what seemed so obvious to me. Of course, I concluded that I was wrong, that there was something wrong with ME, not them, because if I am the only one noticing it, and the NORM does not, it must be me who is off. How did I learn that it wasn’t me? Well, often years later, I would find others who would start telling me their observations about a certain person and without my input, would share things like “ this one was definitely one of the laziest people. I’ve never seen them work a day in their life, but boy, are they good in tricking others to think they are amazing.”
I think what scares me so much about norm-matching is that I am quite frankly frightened by what is considered normal. It spans from the conduct within corporations, who gets put into leadership roles and promoted or hired, to how people treat each other, how countries are run and what people do in the name of ideology. I do not find the “norm” something I am aspiring to, even though it feels as if it is killing me to not fit in.
So, here we have it. If we are not “normal,” or better, do not fit the neurological norm, how can we actually fit the “normal” world and function in it successfully? I guess, I’ll have to keep trying to figure that out.
