I saw 30 brief seconds that I thought explained so much about human behavior. It was a brief shot of the crowd at a July 4th fireworks event.
The first fifteen seconds showed young children.
They were loving the attention of the camera. They were dancing being goofy and trying to push each other away so each one of them could have more and more attention from the camera.
The next fifteen seconds showed several young adults.
They were not loving the camera and were obviously wishing the attention was somewhere else. Whether it was shyness or insecurity it was a situation they feared.
Here in fifteen second windows you could see the strongest drive of human behavior. The desire to be known.
The young children wanted the attention. They wanted to be known and they were doing whatever and pushing whomever they could to get more and more attention.
The young adults were afraid of doing something that might hurt their chances of being known. They were insecure and paralyzed by the fact their chances of being known could be damaged.