On this foggy, drizzly Sunday afternoon, I'm reflecting on difference—on how people process their feelings in such different ways. Some people like to have people around so that they can always talk about their feelings; other people want to avoid being drawn out, and prefer to ponder their responses internally. Some people quite like to have their feelings confirmed and validated, or else sharply contradicted, by people around them; other people are suspicious of such confirmations, recognizing how people can be influenced to make snap judgments that may not have the weight of truth in them. Some people are very aggressive in pursuing what they want, while others prefer to let things come, to make gentle movements around the target of their desire.

And, too, no person seems to me pigeoholable. Each person who I take up in my mind, trying to put him or her firmly in one camp or another, also offers facts to contradict my first categorization.

Take me, for instance: Am I aggressive or passive? Do I move directly or arcwise toward my goals? Do I try to absorb other people's positions, when making a decision, or do I first assert my own and expect resolution to come from the contest of opposing views? Do I mainly mull things over in solitude, or do I expect the social process to draw me out?

The answers are complex! In domestic questions, I believe I'm easy-going, allowing things more often than restricting them, but then I keep to myself and expect not to be bothered much. In interpersonal interaction, I tend to make much allowance for what others want, often hoping to get everyone's participation up front. But in professional matters, as my co-workers will likely attest, I'm aggressive: I tend to have a vision that I want to impose on the work, and I expect to force my co-workers into that mold.

Everyone I think about seems to have a kind of in-built balance, though I don't find it to be predictable. I think "He's quite a pushover, isn't he?" and then I think, of the same fellow, "He's quite obstinate in this area." Or, "She's quite loud and tough," but also, "She's quite tender in these other ways."

I wonder if we do tend to balance ourselves, in unique, individual ways, by responding to our own self-image. I don't particularly believe in a yin/yang split with certain traits on one side and certain traits on the other—I suspect the balancing is much more idiosyncratic, with each person finding his own personal response to his own biggest traits.