Tag: authenticity

Fear

“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Winston Churchill uttered this famous quote as the Prime Minister of the UK during World War II, where the Germans would bomb London nightly to foment fear and break the spirit of the people. He feared not death, nor terror, nor loss of institutions or heirlooms or comfort, he feared fear. Why?

Fear is not what anyone or anything can do to us, it is what we create as we interpret external risks and threats. So fear is how we cripple ourselves and create a present that causes us to be edgy, erratic, and irrational.

Should we not be fearful of disease, crime, or meteor strikes? No. We should be aware and appropriately cautious, and once those measures have been prudently adopted, our present moments must be free of the fear that the ego wants to inject until those threats actually become realized, at which time fear is still not the appropriate response. In horror movies, what happens to the screaming fleeing person? They usually fall, alert the killer, or otherwise do things that create actual peril where there is little. The killer just walks calmly toward the flailing spaz and gets the job done. It is the fear that amplifies the danger, and the fear that prevents more productive responses to avoid harm.

Our fears are not just the big pronounced ones, like being a victim of a heinous crime, but they are small and insidious too. We fear being loved less, becoming less attractive, looking foolish, not fitting in, having our social media post ridiculed. We feel fear almost constantly and it causes us to act in outrageous and harmful ways. We buy things we cannot afford, say things that aren’t true, act in ways that certainly are not who we are, trash talk people, discriminate, hide from the world, turn a blind eye to injustice, or pretend to care about something because it’s a popular thing to do. And ironic part? Acting to avoid fears makes our fears come to fruition. It makes us lose friends, alienate family, go broke, waste time, get fired, become anxious, develop addictions, and so on. Fear is our greatest enemy, and we think it is our best friend and saviour.

Personally I’d rather live for one day absent of fear than for 10 lifetimes with fear. Fear makes us someone else. Fear makes us act detestably and sabotage our most cherished things. Fear dominates our present with future horrors, which we end up bringing on ourselves. If we spend our living years being fearful of death, we are already dead because we have killed our present. If we spend our hike fearful of a bear attack, we have already been attacked because our entire present was fixated on the emergence of the bear. So what do we have to fear? Fear itself.

When fear creeps in, you’ll likely know its presence. When you’re ready to stop living in fear, whatever it tells you to do, do the exact opposite. Literally the exact opposite. You don’t want to confront your mom because you fear it’ll break the relationship with your kids? If that relationship is so tenuous that it’ll end because of healthy conflict, it should end – so it can be built in a healthier manner. You are holding yourself hostage to a fear that is very likely unreal, and the gun to your head exists only in your mind. No matter what the fear, no matter what you believe the consequence, do the exact opposite. No matter the outcome, you will be living life authentically, presently, and no longer as a hostage or victim to what you believe is waiting to befoul you.

If Churchill recognized the paramountcy of the threat of fearful living while having bombs dropped on his countrypeople nightly, while the Nazis advanced and killed millions in awful ways and seemed poised to take over the world to impose eugenics, while the economies of the world were in shambles, while Italy and Japan were committing atrocities around the world, even after 7 years of brutal war merely 20 years after the last world war, he must have profoundly understood how fear is the most harmful force on the planet. He knew that fear is what underlies all evil, all intentional harm, all man-made suffering. And he knew that it’s what we do to ourselves.

The Pursuit of Happiness

In the United States Declaration of Independence, some inalienable rights are established to be: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

What is so very interesting about Thomas Jefferson’s phrasing is that he didn’t write, “happiness”, he wrote, “the pursuit of happiness”. It is a right to chase happiness, and whether you find happiness is up to you because some people are happier to be reclusive and some are happier to live in nudist colonies.

So we (Americans and otherwise) set out to be find things to make us happy. We like coffee a lot. Sex isn’t bad. A sunrise through a mountain vista can be nice. Oh, and eggs benny at my favourite brunch place with my pals! Oh, and when I get off the plane after being away for weeks and my family is there at the airport to get me and smiling so big.

As we’ve explored in other posts, we are fairly clueless about what makes us happy. We can’t even really define what happiness is. Fleeting sensual stimuli that come from eating, touching or seeing often just distract us from all the other unpleasant crap we do with our lives. Are we happy on vacation or just sufficiently removed from the humdrum? Are we happy at family reunions or just lucky we have people to connect with easily? Are we happy with money in the bank or just relieved from financial pressure? Is happiness what exists when the loneliness, stress or boredom cease?

I don’t think happiness is a concept worth exploring because it is one of the many words in the language that has been beaten excessively by the ambiguity stick and is also far too subjective a concept. So rather than talk about happiness, let’s talk about a life well lived.

We have looked at the purpose of life and determined that our job is to simply be our most selfiest selves. And part of our self edification is to engage our souls in activities that allow us to blur the boundaries between us and our environments (the flow concept) because this facilitates a form of activity that doesn’t just flood our brains with endorphins, it engages us in unparalleled ways. Moreover, this does not take the form of pursuit. Rather, we obey. We are impelled by internal, palpable forces beyond our control to move toward these activities because the core of our being is attracted to it like a magnet that draws us in. So the secret all along is not that happiness needs to be pursued, but rather that a life of soulful contentment needs to be followed.

A more profound and important dimension of happiness is that notion that we need to feel good to be happy. We need to smile through tough times, avoid negativity, bring brightness and humour to all situations. The primary issue with this approach is that it’s judgemental. Light is better than dark. Vibrant flowers are better than plants. Laughter is better than tears. Judgement misperceives and miscategorizes in an attempt to protect us from feeling fear, doubt, loss or suffering. Nothing is better than its complement. And like the yin and yang concept, nothing can exist without its complement. We can perceive it as such, but we do ourselves a disservice when we judge light as better than dark we same way we perceive youth as better than age. Neither is better, but some sides of a symbiotic pairing do make life easier or more comfortable, like youth makes strenuous activity easier and flowers smell more fragrant than plants.

Meaningful learning and growth do not come from comfort and ease. Learning that getting served mai tais in the sun is nice is not exactly a eureka moment.. In fact, we know that the strongest swords are forged in the hottest fire, and whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. When we start learning a new language or taking our first steps, it’s really daunting and difficult. We fail and fall and experience pain and discomfort. When we have our first romantic relationships we also fail and fall and experience loss. When we acquire professional skills we fail and fall and experience hardship and embarrassment. And by the time we’ve gotten through it we have greater competence and ability in brand new ways impossible to gain unless we are willing to struggle, fail and fall.

A life well lived is a big life. It’s a life that explores your greatest potential and experiences the most variable experiences, which also happen to be the most memorable. Life fundamentally includes pain and loss and failure. And the prize is growth and learning and richness. So do not pursue happiness. Follow your internal forces into challenges, and in doing so, live your biggest life possible.

Purpose

Eckhart Tolle in A New Earth differentiated between your inner purpose and outer purpose, which is a useful way to stratify the concept of purpose:

“Your inner purpose is to awaken. It is as simple as that. You share that purpose with every other person on the planet – because it is the purpose of humanity.”

“Awakened doing is the alignment of your outer purpose­ – what you do – with your inner purpose – awakening and staying awake. Through awakened doing, you become one with the outgoing purpose of the universe. Consciousness flows through you into this world. It flows into your thoughts and inspires them. It flows into what you do and guides and empowers it.”

To simplify Tolle’s sentiments further, our inner purpose is to be and our outer purpose is to do, where being is ‘consciousness’ and doing is ‘whatever the universe had planned for you’. So figure out if you’re a jackrabbit, and if you are, start hopping and chomping carrots.

With respect to inner purpose, “awakening” may seem mysterious. Regardless, one needs to arrive at the true self, whether it a chunk of the universal intelligence or an individual soul or set of preferences. We are born as our true selves but quickly learn how to ‘behave’ which, interestly, derives from the Old English word behabban, which was defined as self restraint. Our learned behaviour in tandem with our acquired sense of self (ego) tend to obfuscate and suppress our true selves, and even our awareness of or distress in this suppression. The good news is that the soul speaks to us often, whether it’s craving a pickle or compelling you to quit your job and start blogging, it can help to illuminate the true self.

With respect to outer purpose, being who we are, apparently, is a very challenging undertaking for most of us. We act only after having considered the likely outcomes of various behavioural approaches. We consider how to manipulate the situation to arrive at the outcome we want, and then put that plan into action. I want someone to like me so I feign interest in their story. I want to avoid potential conflict so I lower my head on the subway when the mentally ill guy starts ranting. I want to avoid negative impressions of me so I lie about my spoon collection.

Living authentically means being who you are at all times irrespective of the predictable outcome. Why? Because the manipulated outcome doesn’t belong to you. Your outcome is the one you would receive being yourself. Really think about this. If you are innately a miserable person, should you be miserable outwardly and have everyone react to you in this way? It’s unpleasant, but it’s your authentic life. Same for recipients who would encounter miserable people. In the absence of judgement, misery is just another thing that exists and should be addressed authentically and not through thoughtful manipulation and life contortion.

People believe they should be happy all the time, as in ‘the pursuit of happiness’. This will be addressed in a different post, but the general sentiment is that happiness is not a worthwhile pursuit, nor is comfort or ease. There is only one path and it’s to be exactly who you are, at all times, untainted by the ego, irrespective of the predictable outcome you may encounter, because that is your authentic life. “Be yourself, because everybody else is taken”.

So we can rewrite our inner and outer purpose as follows and add a temporal dimension since we live life moment to moment:

Your inner purpose is to ensure that you, the soul, are the being present in your moment.  

Your outer purpose is to unwaveringly be the being you are in all moments irrespective of circumstance or predicted outcome. 

Representation in Relationships

There is a funny little concept called the Gentlemen’s Queue. Three very well mannered chaps arrive at a door, and the first opens the door like a proper gentleman and says, “after you”. Not to be outclassed, gent #2, turns to gent #3 and says, “oh no, after you”. Gent #3 is of exquisite etiquette and turns to gent #1 and nods, “after you my dear sir”. These very proper gentlemen continue their most civilized exchange ad infinitum, or at least until they die of starvation. Great intentions, great approach but the execution fell short.

What we can deduce from our chivalrous loop is that sometimes by representing the needs of others we arrive at an undesirable outcome, despite our best intentions. This phenomenon is seen repeatedly in decision science and organizational psychology. The eminent John Nash was among the pioneers of game theory, which effectively demonstrates that two actors will arrive at the worst possible outcome in most situations. Or the concept of groupthink, which has been firmly established in organizations to bring groups to the one outcome that nobody wanted.

We can’t alter human nature, but we can leverage these concepts in our personal relationships. A dominant theme in couple’s counselling is that one party (Bob) feels taken for granted by another party (Ling) who oddly never gets what she wants. How could this be? This is because without provocation, Bob decides to represent Ling in the relationship. And Ling doesn’t want this. Ling wants Bob to be present and express his wants. So to prevent this lopsided representation of Ling’s desires, Ling is forced to take more drastic action, like representing Bob. What?

Let’s say Bob really likes Italian. Ling knows this. Ling really likes sushi. Bob knows this. What should they do? A wise partnership would have both parties express what they want, understanding that chivalry will result in an undesirable outcome. But instead Bob, who fancies himself a great partner, immediately suggests sushi. And Ling accepts because she wants to please Bob’s apparent craving. But tonight she wanted Mexican and tonight Bob actually wanted Greek. They were both too courteous to represent themselves, and both ended up having meals they didn’t want and have landed themselves in therapy for chronic dissatisfaction of each other assumedly because this same approach extends to excursions, purchases and all the other things in relationships that benefit from robust and accurate representation. Yet they were both being giving and well-intentioned!

Somehow having cravings or preferences is self-regarded as selfish and so we’ve taught ourselves not to express them. Curious. We have somehow coupled the notion that if we express our preferences we are bad partners. First, expression is not a decision. Decisions belong to the partnership, expression is individual. Second, information is empowerment and it is our duty in a relationship to express ourselves. Third, true partners bring themselves to a relationship otherwise it is not a partnership. No relationship needs 2 Lings or 2 Bobs. It needs the two people who decided that they liked each other for who they were at that time and so the relationship will not benefit if there’s unequal representation.

It’s a little radical, but Ling could consider saying, “I want you to be happy and tonight I’m craving Mexican”. And Bob could respond, “I want you to be happy and tonight I’m craving Greek”. Then they can each go out with their friends instead of being together. Kidding! Then one party can compromise for that evening or they can find something else that works for both of them, or stay home and cook. This way they are both present, heard and authentic in a balanced relationship and not queued at the door courteously on their way to therapy.

This same dynamic exists in all relationships. There is a great book called The Responsibility Virus where, as the name implies, we learn that the more responsibility someone takes on in the workplace, the less responsibility others take. They wait for that person to request things, dictate things, etc. and rather than contribute proactively they become reactive and expectant despite having full ability. This extends to parent/child relationships too. A profoundly insightful parenting book called Drop the Worry Ball similarly outlines how parents have subsumed worry from the lives of their children who then never live with it, resulting in a generation without many skills needed to navigate their own lives. These children rather worry about other things where they feel empowered. So parents are still feeding and cleaning up after older children, and their children are personally disempowered but worrying about things outside this dynamic like the environment and human rights.

Friendships have similar learned dynamics too. If friend A seems upset, friend B wants immediately to know ‘what’s wrong’. Friend B describes his feelings and friend A tries to move friend B back to feeling comfortable by ‘solving’ the issue. This is typical of ‘good friends’, yes? Like we learned about happiness, sitting in discomfort is a fundamental part of the human experience as it facilitates learning, experiment and growth. If someone is upset because their room is messy should you be a good friend/parent/spouse and clean their room? That may make them feel less discomfort, but what has happened? Let’s explore.

Mr Messy Room now has not learned about himself. There was some great self-awareness that could have emerged that could have been extrapolated to better understand environmental preferences, but that awareness is lost. Mr Messy could have sat in the room until he was compelled by his own internal forces to make a change. He would have discovered one of the most precious lessons – the internal forces. He could have learned how to clean his room and to what level of cleanliness he enjoys. Now he settles for whatever standard is achieved by someone else. He could have learned how being upset feels and how this scales to the cleanliness of the room. So many more lessons, and this vital portion of growth was cleaved by a ‘good person’ because they wanted to relieve some upset. A huge lost opportunity that disempowers and create expectations and dependence.

What should a good friend/parent/spouse rather do when they detect someone is upset? Bring them to awareness and then stop. Share an observation that does not end in a question mark. “You seem down today.” “I detect a difference in your behaviour today.” Sharing awareness (and only awareness) is perhaps the greatest gift in a relationship because it helps someone see beyond their limited perspective or feelings, and can subsequently trigger a soulful or free-willed response from that person. Trying to solve something impedes free will and wrecks the awareness and growth gifts that would otherwise result.

So we conclude by mixing two popular metaphors: you can bring a horse to water but cannot make it drink, and, it’s better to teach a man to fish rather than give him a fish. A ‘good friend/parent/spouse’ can bring a horse to water and show him the fish, and then say sayonara.