The Dangers of Insecurity and Ego

 

The Dangers of Insecurity and Ego

I’m afraid I’m angry with the world again. But to be fair,there’s a lot to be angry about at the moment…

I’ve always suspected that at the heart of the majority ofhuman beings is an innate insecurity, an uncertainty about one’s place in theworld, one’s position in the tribe, what kind of person one is going to be,that nags at us all deep down. This can manifest in many ways, in the need tofind a societal box to fit into, in the need to de and re-box, in anger, inself loathing or self embrace, in reassurance or kindness, in malice and hatred,and, in some, in the need to heavily bolster one’s ego and feel powerful inorder to make that frantic, insecure voice go away.

And this is the territory of the school bully.

That thing the parents of a bullied child will say – it’snot you, darling, the problem is theirs – you know what? It’s true. It’s hardto believe and accept sometimes, especially from the receiving end, but Ihonestly believe that at the heart of every school bully who menaces and humiliatesthose who are not like them lies that insecure little voice. And that voicesays – I need to feel powerful, I need to feel strong, I need to prove I am rightin who I am and I am the one who matters so I must tear down anyone who is differentto me. I must prove that only people who are like me and agree with me matter.I must be in charge and make everybody answer to me. I must be the striker ofthe blow and not its victim. Otherwise, what am I?

Perhaps just that nagging, insecure little voice…

Some people grow out of this unpleasant stage with the endof adolescence. But some people don’t. Some people grow up to be adult bullies,people who try and force their will on others to make themselves feel betterand silence that voice behind a wall of ego by holding power over others. Otheropinions are irrelevant to them, all that matters is what they want and whatthey need and that their world be ordered as they want it. Some of these peopleare just irritating or nasty berks, but others are more narcissistic, moredangerous – some are domestic abusers, even killers, some unpleasant racists,sexists or trolls. And most terrifyingly of all, sometimes these people grow upto be world leaders.

And as I think the current state of the world shows, theseare the most dangerous of them all. Because if you scale up a school bully witha narcissistic ego to feed and a frantic insecurity to drown out and put themin charge of a nation, I think we’ve all seen what we get, both over the lastcentury and much more recently. You get people who say – I can’t let those peopledisagree with me, I have the power so I shall force them into my orbit. I shallmake them obey or I shall crush them. I will kill thousands or even millions ofpeople just to prove to myself that I can. I have the power. I can’t hear thatvoice. I can’t…

And the trouble is these people are pretty much incapable ofdoing the only thing that we can ever do that will make the world a betterplace – agreeing to disagree. The planet is never going to conform to one wayof being, one religion, one society, one culture – it’s too diverse for thatand the bloodshed needed to create such a world would be horrendous. The onlyway any kind of world peace could be achieved is, simply, for people to getover themselves.

Because if rather than looking at difference and seeingsomething to be replaced, we looked and just saw difference – what then? Ifpeople could just say – I don’t agree with the way you live/worship etc but Irespect your right to do so… there’s no war. You are different to me but youhave the right to exist. I agree to disagree with you but will leave you be.That’s all it would take. As long as a way of being doesn’t require the harm orsuppression of others, what’s wrong with being different? Why can’t we talkabout things and try and understand each other instead of retaliating? Why can’twe all just leave each other alone?

But as I said, until our leaders start thinking like this,as a species, we stand no chance. Until the ego trips stop and people stophiding their own insecurities behind massacre, the world will learn nothing.For what a nice place the world would be if we’d all agree to disagree…