The Courage to Be Disliked: How to Free Yourself, Change Your Life and Achieve Real Happiness

by Ichiro Kishimi

None of us live in an objective world, but instead in a subjective world that we ourselves have given meaning to. The world you see is different from the

one I see, and it’s impossible to share your world with anyone else.

Your life is not something that someone gives you, but something you choose

yourself, and you are the one who decides how you live.

against that. Adlerian psychology is a form of thought, a philosophy that is diametrically opposed to nihilism. We are not controlled

judgement of oneself. Then, what on earth could this value be? Okay, take diamonds, for instance, which are traded at a high value. Or currency. We find particular values for these things,

and say that one carat is this much, that prices are such and such. But if you change your point of view, a diamond is nothing but a little stone.

In other words, value is something that’s based on a social context. The value given to a one-dollar bill is not an objectively attributed value, though that might be a commonsense approach. If one considers its actual cost as printed material, the value is nowhere near a dollar. If I were the only person in this world and no one else existed, I’d probably be putting those one-dollar bills in my fireplace in wintertime. Maybe I’d be using them to blow my nose.

YOUTH: And at the base of that, there is an intense feeling of inferiority? PHILOSOPHER: Of course.

don’t know much about fashion, but I think it’s advisable to think of people who wear rings with rubies and emeralds on all their fingers as having issues with feelings of inferiority, rather than issues of aesthetic sensibility.

In other words, they have signs of a super...

Those who go so far as to boast about things out loud actually have no confidence in themselves. As Adler clearly indicates, ‘The one who boasts does so only out of a feeling of inferiority.’

If one really has confidence in oneself, one doesn’t feel the need to boast. It’s because one’s feeling of inferiority is strong that one boasts. One feels the need to flaunt one’s superiority all the more. There’s the fear that if one doesn’t do that, not a single person will accept one ‘the way I am’. This is a full-blown superiority complex.

LIFE IS NOT A COMPETITION

And one becomes able to celebrate other people’s happiness with all one’s heart. One may become able to contribute actively to other people’s happiness. The person who always has the will to help another in times of need—that is someone who may properly be called your comrade.

In the first place, the rightness of one’s assertions has nothing to do with winning or losing. If you think you are right, regardless of what other people’s opinions might be, the matter should be closed then and there. However, many people will rush into a power struggle, and try to make others submit to them. And that is why

A lot of people think that the more friends you have the better, but I’m not so sure about that. There’s no value at all in the number of friends or acquaintances you have. And this is a subject that connects with the task of love, but what we should be thinking about is the distance and depth of the relationship.

DO NOT LIVE TO SATISFY THE EXPECTATIONS OF OTHERS

business like your brother has, they may very well disown you. But how to come to terms with the emotion of ‘not approving’ is your parents’ task, not yours. It is not a problem for you to worry about.

Does one choose recognition from others, or does one choose a path of freedom without recognition? It’s an important question—let’s think about it together. To live one’s life trying to gauge other people’s feelings and being worried about how they look at you. To live in such a way that other’s wishes are granted. There may indeed be signposts to guide you this way, but it is a very unfree way to live. Now, why are you choosing such an unfree way to live? You are using the term ‘desire for recognition’, but what you are really saying is that you don’t want to be disliked by anyone.

It is true that there is no person who wishes to be disliked. But look at it this way: what should one do to not be disliked by anyone? There is only one answer: it is to constantly gauge other people’s feelings, while swearing loyalty to all of them. If there are ten people, one must swear loyalty to all ten. When one does that, for the time being one will have succeeded in not being disliked by anyone. But at this point, there is a great contradiction looming. One swears loyalty to all ten people out of the single-minded desire to not be disliked. This is like a politician who has fallen into populism and begun to make impossible promises and accept responsibilities that are beyond him. Naturally, his lies will come to light before long. He will lose people’s trust, and turn his own life into one of greater suffering. And, of course, the stress of continual lying has all kinds of consequences. Please grasp this point. If one is living in a such a way as to satisfy other people’s expectations, and one is entrusting one’s own life to others, that is a way of living in which one is lying to oneself, and continuing that lying to include the people around one.

An adult, who has chosen an unfree way to live, on seeing a young person living freely here and now in this moment, criticises the youth as being hedonistic; of course, this is a life-lie that comes out so that the adult can accept his own unfree life. An adult who has chosen real freedom himself will not make such comments,

and will instead cheer on the will to be free.

‘freedom is being disliked by other people’.

It’s that you are disliked by someone. It is proof that you are exercising your freedom and living in freedom, and a sign

that you are living in accordance with your own principles.

However, if you were to break away from your organisation, for instance, you would not be able to gain real freedom. Unless one is unconcerned by other people’s judgements, has no fear of being disliked by other people, and pays the cost that one might never be recognised, one will never be able to follow through in one’s own way of living. That is to say, one will not be able to be free.

don’t be afraid of being disliked.

My relationship with my father had always been a rocky one, even when I was a child.

It’s true that my father and I had a complicated relationship. He was a stubborn person,

I could never imagine his feelings being able to change easily.

there was a strong possibility that he had even forgotten ever raising...

When we speak of interpersonal relationships, it always seems to be two-person relationships and one’s relationship to a large group that come to mind, but first it is oneself.

Please, there is just one more thing I want to ask you. PHILOSOPHER: What is it? YOUTH: In the end, were you able to repair your relationship with your father? PHILOSOPHER: Yes, of course. I think so. My father fell ill, and in the last few years of his life, it was necessary for me and my family to take care of him. Then one day, when I was taking care of him as usual, my father said, ‘Thank you.’ I had not known my father possessed such a word in his vocabulary, and I was astonished and felt grateful for all the days that had passed. Through the long years of my caregiving life, I had tried to do whatever I could, that is to say, I had done my best to lead my father to water. And in the end, he drank. I think he did.

Repairing the relationship with ones father.

‘I am I, and you are you.’

etymologically speaking, the word ‘individual’ has the meaning ‘indivisible’.

Etymological Roots of the word "individual".

In Adlerian psychology, physical symptoms are not regarded separately from the mind (psyche). The mind and body are viewed as one, as a whole that cannot be divided into parts. Tension in the

mind can make one’s arms and legs shake, or cause one’s cheeks to turn red, and fear can make one’s face turn white. And so on.

that forming good interpersonal relationships requires a certain degree of distance; while people who get

too close end up not even being able to speak to each other, it is not good to get too far apart,

Then, when those expectations are not satisfied, they become deeply disillusioned and feel as if they have been horribly insulted. And they become resentful, and think, That person didn’t do anything for me; That person let me down; That person isn’t my comrade anymore. He’s my enemy. People who hold the belief that they are the centre of the world always end up losing their comrades before long.

what happens when a globe is used to represent the world? Because with a globe, you can look at the world with France at the centre, or China, or Brazil for that matter. Every place is central, and no place is, at the same time. The globe may be dotted with an infinite number of centres, in accordance with the viewer’s location and angle of view. That is the nature of a globe.

You are a part of a community, not its centre.

Well, suppose that you, as a student, regarded the community that is ‘school’ as absolute. In other words, school is everything to you, your ‘I’ exists because of school, and no other ‘I’ is possible without it. But naturally, there will be occasions within that community when you run into adversity. It could be getting bullied, or not being able to make friends or keep up with your schoolwork, or not adapting to the system of the school in the first place. That is to say, it’s possible that with regard to the community that is your school, you won’t have that ‘it’s okay to be here’ sense of belonging.

you will end up without a sense of belonging to anything.

That is to say, they have intense, hidden feelings of inferiority.

attachment to self. You are saying that one has to stop being attached to the ‘I’ and make the switch to ‘concern for others’.

‘God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom always to tell the difference.’

Adlerian psychology is not saying ‘have confidence in others unconditionally’ on the basis of a moralistic system of values. Unconditional confidence is a means for making your interpersonal relationship with a person better, and for building a horizontal relationship. If you do not have the desire to make your relationship with that person better, then go ahead and sever it. Because carrying out the severing is your task.

Right now, you are only concerned about the times you were taken advantage of, and nothing else. You focus only on the pain from the wounds you sustained on such occasions. But if you are afraid to have confidence in others, in the long run, you will not be able to build deep relationships with anyone.