In the past, I was happy to see when people made any mistakes because it made me feel superior. I was more than willing to correct them in most humiliating ways. Nowadays, I am more cautious with my actions and words, but still sometimes show my arrogant inner self. I believe that the reason for that is my extremely low self-esteem. Deep inside I feel inferior to people around me in many ways and to (over)compensate for that, I think about them in condescending ways. Also, I have a very distorted image of myself in my dreams and fantasies (pornographic or not), I always imagine myself having some kind of superpowers, being genius, athletic, and very good-looking. There is a huge gap between how I imagine myself and how I actually feel about myself, and it's killing me. Are you experiencing this too? What do you do about it?
The answer is yes and you're right on the money. Truth is, I wouldn't discredit your talents. But you have to empathize that not everyone can be everything. Some people just don't improve and it's a fact of life. I would spend some time getting real with yourself. Do you really have what you think you do? If so, great. If not you need to accept your flaws and see that having them doesn't make you less of a person. Nor does the flaws of others make them less than. Its a pain but you have to face the fact that being real and human isn't about being better at things than others. I used to pride myself the same way and yes, it was my own inner insecurities. You have to just get real with yourself and others. You are admirable for doing what you do but it doesn't earn you anything over the value of others.
But... being arrogant is all my personality consists of! Thank you for your insight. Humility and kindness (both to myself and others) are things I'm attempting to practice in order keep my arrogance (brought about by my own low self-esteem) in check.
You know, I heard an interesting theory once about how the internet has perpetuated this kind of low self esteem and comparing ourselves to others in an unhealthy way. You see, we watch some video about a guy who is a star athlete. Then we read a blog post from a woman who is an incredible mother and always doing fun activities with her kids. Then we listen to someone with an incredible voice, or watch our friends video upload of the new song he wrote on guitar. And we put all of those people and those talents together in our mind to create one super-human who is amazing at all of those things, and we compare ourselves to that fictional person who we can't possibly live up to. The truth is, that mom who spends time with her kids all day and works hard to be the bets mother she can be, probably doesn't have time to be a pro guitarist or make 5-star meals every night. We can't be everything. You just need to figure out who you are and be the best you that you can be. Oh, and also, don't forget to enjoy life while you're at it. And don't be too hard on yourselves.
By realising this about yourself, you are already ahead of many people. Your ego is the enemy! You are not your ego or your thoughts. Listen to The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle (you can find it on youtube or soundcloud), or read the book. Very insightful!
I think you're spot on about that. There is no doubt that the internet has deformed the social skills and understanding of young people. I don't think it can be helped though.
Fantasizing is a form of Distraction. It can be a way of avoiding what is real and true for us in the moment. A way to live vicariously through the images and ideas fed to us by others. It’s a way to feel a sense of accomplishment, all while sitting on our couch, alone. Most recurring fantasies we have about ourselves are reactions to our insecurities. When it becomes a habit, it begins to sustain our sense of self worth. So we raise our standards for ourselves to try and meet a perfectionist ideal. Because we're so far from that ideal, we feel inferior. Then we end up lashing out on others out of insecurity.
Your insecurities may include being non intelligent, weak / lazy, physically unappealing, and somebody that isn't special or doesn't stand out.
To keep people happy dont tell them the bitter truth just give themm a sweet lie. This one is working for me since i read it and it is really helpful. Sugar coating also works just fine if you have difficulty ignoring the strange haircut and telling them they look good.
Best solution for this conundrum is -" help strangers,people you know,without expecting anything in return.This will keep you grounded,along with boosting your confidence and self esteem.Help your friends,relative. 2nd best things-Interact ,play with small chidren,buy them gifts.You would start feeling good about yourself.
Yes mostly because most people just want to stay where they are....and i hate it. Even if they improve they usually improve one thing and get average or above average at it... they are so short sighted and pea brained that they dont get anything.. this is specially true for people in my area most probably because i live in an under developed country... what i do for it is that i just let them fuckoff and focus on my mission... it is the only thing that makes me happy. the level of these people is so low that i never met a single person in my entire 18 years of life who could at least tell me about the theory of general relativity, (this is just an example). And if someone knows about these thing he is treated as if he was newton(my physics teacher says i am newton) and i say what the fu*k these are simple concepts of science and you call me newton for knowing them.. in reality i am not newton and you are all losers who know nothing... "People would rather die than think... in fact they do" and this type of society is very depressing for me
My friend, this is exactly an example of the arrogance I am talking about. You see, I don't want to make them happy. I want to stop being a jerk myself. My friend told me, "Go clean a room or wash dishes."
I used to be like that and you are right the reason is low-self esteem. It is also the wrong thinking about the world particularly about perfection, scarcity and competition. Deep down inside you think that you need to be perfect, better then the others if you want to ever have happy life (have a good job, have good friends and good girlfriend, etc) because you think that there is a scarcity of these things in the world and huge competition of people fighting for them. And if you want to win over your competition to get it you need to be better than them. It was a long windy and treacherous road that took about 2-3 years to get out of this thinking. Now I genuinely think I live in world of abundance where is enough for everybody (beautiful woman, money, opportunities, etc.), I dont need to fight with anybody, dont need to be better then anybody, I dont even consider any competition because I know that there is enough for me without any need of fighting. In some way it is very liberating. Right now I am thinking about myself that I am nice shining precious diamond. Despite that I dont think I am better than anybody, because I feel like everybody is actually a diamond even if they dont know about it. Some are more shining (already polished), some more rough, or just unearthed from ground so you even cant tell there is diamond inside. But there is. With some work, with little cutting and (personality) polishing everybody can become nice bright diamond. So instead of showing that you are better than others or even inferior, there is no need for that in world of abundance and therefore you will enjoy opposite: the process of cutting, polishing and raising others to become better people or to show their full potential. There is no reason why not to do it since there is enough for everybody and it is damn satisfactory to give back in this way.
mindfulness meditation helps you become less reflexive like a programmed bot and enables you to make choices . I was in a similar position as you and over the years learnt to be less critical of myself , and my mistakes . this in turn makes you less critical of others.
Yes but I realize most of these "thoughts" aren't real because they often come from the past or about the future. We are on a never ending continuum of life until we die are past doesn't define us and we cannot tell the future all we can do is be here now and "choose" to feed those thoughts or just acknowledge that they are there and do our best to act in love and understanding. After rebooting I saw my harsh self criticism of others and myself came from my upbringing and I'm choosing to get rid of that mindset. Most of the time when we have those negative thoughts they are from the past or the future just become aware of your thoughts because they are just thoughts ultimately we need to make a choice.All of us have egos and the ego feeds off fear and wants us to separate ourselves from others when we are all human and are more alike than different
At work I am surrounded by people who are way cleverer than me. I like that. They constantly challenge me to learn new things and to see the world in new ways. I have been there way too long, and I ought to move on and experience something new, but I just cannot walk away from such a dream job. I am a clever guy, and to be surrounded by such exciting people is amazing. I don't think I have low self-esteem, though I do feel imposter syndrome. Like you in your fantasies I think highly of myself. Perhaps that's one difference, I think of being surrounded by people who are better than me as a positive thing whereas you see it as frightening. Are you able to look afresh and see the benefit? Lots of people are stuck in jobs surrounded by people they cannot learn from. On the train ride to the interview for what became my first job after my doctorate I was sat next to a teenage girl who was reading a girls' magazine called Seventeen. The page I could see (yes, I am terribly nosey) was about "three traits for a successful career". They were Be confident Be directed Be considerate I am considerate, so that one was easy. I am yet to work out how to be directed (or if I want to!) The one that got me thinking was "be confident". I am not a confident person, but I decided that when I started work I would pretend that I was. I have been doing that ever since (i.e. since 1991.) The odd thing is that pretending to be confident and being confident turn out to be more-or-less the same thing. If someone at work does something great I will be the first to praise them, even if inside I am worried that everyone else must be comparing their success to my failure. If someone needs help, I will help them. The net result of all that is that people see me as confident, and I actually feel it. Try it. Instead of thinking about people in condescending ways try and celebrate their successes, as a confident person would. I think you will enjoy it.
i tried changing my behaviour... guess what i accidently fucked up my personality and became like them... it took me about a month to revert back to that "arrogance" ... i think it is nature's way of achieving eqiulibrium... to balance good people like you it make guys like me who are meant to be the way they are... my hero stephen hawking passed away today... he was my greatest inspiration... he had a goal to understand the working of this universe. Life denied him his goal but he took it as a challenge and won.. he is truly inspirational....
Nothing taught me humility more at 18, after finishing high school, than finding the only job available to me was short-order cook in a shopping mall. Nothing taught me humility more at 22, after finishing university, than not being accepted to an government recruitment programmes and having to continue working my book-binding job at my alma mater. By the time it came around to me ending up with a blue-collar job in the railway, having to clean fecal matter off of walls and out of drinking fountains, I was a lot more grounded. I'm not saying you should throw in your prospects for whatever, but manual labour for the greater good can help with your disposition.
Bro i have a serious suggession for you. First thing is to meditate as often as you can it will increase your self awareness.. Second thing I think it is not killing you but the feeling you have is telling you that it is possible to be good at anything you want to be good at...i have experienced that "killing" feeling. Use this trick next time when you get that feeling convert it into your drive... use it to push your limit.. that feeling is like a burst of energy.. instead of wasting it use it to decrease the gap between how you feel and how you imagine yourself...i think you'll start to feel good about yourself and it will boost your self esteem and this will help you to be nice with people... and the most important thing is to never ever degrade your self .. you can achieve what you imagine if you set your mind and soul in the right direction... if any human can achieve something you can also achieve it since they are all humans and you are also human (atleast more human than me)... i hope this will be helpful.
