The day before yesterday I met up with a friend. In our conversation, she said "my sister is exactly the opposite of me". She doesn't have a good relationship with her sister. I told her not to describe her and let me guess.
I said "Your sister must be dumb". She laughed: yes, you could say that. "Your sister must be unfriendly". No, not quite. "Your sister is probably into fashion", yes very much. Then she described a vain person who dates for money.
I then told her: "my brother is also the opposite of me", and she played the game: "your brother owns a lot of stuff". Not really. "Your brother cares a lot about money". Kinda, only when you ask him for it. "Your brother is a womanizer"—ouch! She knows I'm a monk.
It made me realize: it is our self-concept, our ego, what separates us from others. The "opposite" she thinks from me is different from the "opposite" I think of myself. She and I probably have more in common with our siblings than we care to admit, but it is our identity which leads us to believe that we are "very different" from them.
I explained that my brother is a Mormon. He likes rules and is organized. He has a very traditional outlook on life. He is close-minded (though I admit he has opened much over the years). This revealed my self-concept (or my ego): I think I'm not religious. I think I dislike rules and that I'm chaotic. I think that I have an unconventional outlook on life. I think that I'm open-minded (note the "I think", I'm not actually what I think of myself).
Then she asked if my brother was "stupid". I asked why would she think that. "Because he's a Mormon". Oh, I would never associate religious belief with intelligence. But Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon are obviously bullshit, you gotta be stupid to believe that. Oh there are plenty of smart Mormons, just as there are smart Christians, Muslims, and name-your-religion. But science yadda yadda. You're not gonna like what I'm going to say, but you belong to the religion of science, I used to belong to the religion of science but now... wait a minute. I have a religion, in my religion I think I understand both religious and non-religious people. And feminists and chauvinists. And Israelis and Palestines. Right and Left. Top and down. Gay and straight. In my religion, the person who doesn't think as I do only holds a partial truth. I think I'm clever but I'm not.
And so we changed the topic.