When someone complains about the behavior of someone else, even when that person is at fault for doing the same thing, I've wondered if it can be considered a form of self reflection. Not just simply because they dislike their own traits in someone else, but they are realizing that the other person's behavior matches their own and that it can be bothersome.

In most cases, it may involve someone getting annoyed at someone else for being super negative when they are the same way, if not even more so. I know people like that, and I'm sure we've all done that at some point. I think it can serve as self reflection since you may not realize how your actions affect others until you see your own negative traits in someone else. That's when you may realize how it affects others or how you may come off.

The most recent example I can give was when one of my coworkers, who is naturally very negative, always has something bad to say about things, began complaining that another teacher was supposedly being negative about moving into a new high school building. In reality, the teacher was just being realistic since they kept pushing the start time in the new building back so she had the mentality of, maybe we'll move in at the beginning of January, but maybe not. We did move in the beginning of January after all.

After this discussion during a remote class, my negative coworker started talking about how negative the teacher was. I was thinking that was her self reflecting on her own negative attitude towards things. It was probably also her disliking seeing her own negative trait in someone else. There are many other examples of people doing this kind of thing too where they complain about other people doing the same things they do themselves. Do you think this is a form of self reflection? Have you caught yourself doing this as well? I'm sure we've all done it, maybe even without realizing it.