Psychology and Mind: The Odd Paradoxes of "Self-Improvement"

Life is often contradictory and paradoxical.

For example, it was while learning something at a Self-Improvement workshop that I decided to back away from the whole notion of "self-improvement."

One of the workshop presenters pointed out that when someone claims to be seeking enlightenment, they are almost directly making a statement that they don't have enlightenment. Because seeking something you already have doesn't really make much sense.

In most cases, people seek to pursue some form of "self-improvement" because they feel like something is "broken" in their lives.

On more careful reflection, our lives are often not actually broken, we're merely discovering that there are elements of them that aren't unfolding the way we'd hoped for, or planned for... and we set out to try to fill a gap that seems to be empty.

In a broad sort of sense, self-improvement is a relatively new concept in the human experience. If we look at that a little differently, we also saying that the idea of our lives being "broken" is a relatively new idea.

It's a new idea in the sense that many of the things that happen to people during their relatively brief stays on this planet have been happening for centuries and even millennia.

Which reveals the fact that what's actually new is the notion of expecting our lives to provide us a certain level of satisfaction, and/or happiness.

We've somehow latched onto this notion that life "owes us" more than it did, in days gone by.

During one of my somewhat protracted periods of being in therapy (another from of self-improvement...), I remember my therapist asking me whether my parents had a "happy marriage."

After considering this carefully... between sessions... it occurred to me that "happy" didn't really seems to have been one of the objectives of my parents' marriage. They had something that more resembled a business partnership that enabled them to work together well to reach various objectives, perhaps with more success than they could have hoped for, on their own.

"No, they didn't have a happy marriage," I eventually replied, "but they did have a somewhat FUNCTIONAL one."

At least until my dad's womanizing and gambling issues had annoyed my mom one time too many!

I'm not suggesting that self-improvement wasn't a positive thing for me, nor that people shouldn't undertake it. I learned some quite positive things, mostly relating to examining what was already in my life from a more positive perspective.

And that's perhaps one of the problems we face: We address even the slightest bumps in the road of life like they are "a big deal," rather than simply recognizing that they are part of the natural ebb and flow of existence.

Nobody promised anyone that life was going to be an easy journey with smooth sailing the entire way! And actually expecting that would be folly!

There came a time — my "exit point" as it were — when I started recognizing that so many people in life were actually using the notion of "something being WRONG" as part of their life definition. In a sense, a completely new take on "misery loves company!"

People joining self-improvement movements for the sake of belonging to a "club" of "something is wrong with my life, and I am working on it."

Again, not trying to make light of those who have serious trauma to resolve... but dabbling in the shallow waters of "something isn't quite right with my life" is hardly beneficial... other than allowing you to say that you are "working on" your life, rather than actually living it.

As a wise person once observed: "Don't spend so much time PLANNING and DREAMING of your perfect life that you forget to LIVE the one you already have!"

Thanks for stopping by, and have a great weekend!

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Created at 2023-05-13 00:40 PST
0828/2083