Emotional intelligence, at its core, is the quiet acknowledgment that every human lives two lives — the one they truly are, and the idealized version of themselves, where they stand as the most perfect specimen of mankind. Most conflicts in life arise not from what people do, but from the gap between who we expect them to be and who they actually are. Viewing others through this perspective can make our journey through life a lot smoother— by making us see through the net.

But does that mean we should apply this lens whenever we meet someone? Should we pull out our weighing scales and start measuring them, rather than having a genuine interaction in the moment? 

It takes several interactions with a person to truly understand who they are — and still, you are only ever reading a version of them.

A solid example might be, when someone lies to you multiple times, what you once considered a genuine relationship may turn out to be false. The natural response is anger, or a sense of betrayal. But with this perspective, something shifts — you begin to realize that the person hasn’t necessarily lied to you. It’s just that their true self was always misaligned with the version you were interacting with. The deception wasn’t personal. It was more or less structural.

Now here is where it gets interesting. The instinct, at this point, is to eliminate such people from your life entirely. And sometimes, that is the right call. But more often than you realize, you will find yourself doing something more nuanced — using this understanding to quietly recalibrate. You learn what to expect from them and what not to. You stop being surprised. You engage on your own terms. This acknowledgment allows you to embrace their complexities while also knowing exactly when it’s time to step back.

Ultimately, perceptual dissonance — the gap between the self a person projects and the self they actually inhabit – is one of theessential mental models to grasp. Practicing this is not a cynical act. It is, in many ways, a generous one for yourself. It allows you to stop holding people to a version of themselves they were never going to be. And honestly, it saves you a great deal of time and energy.

P.S. Before settling on ‘On Reading People,’ the working title was ‘Perceptual Dissonance Recognition.