Why You Think You Are Better (Or Worse) Than You Really Are
From the Writer Who Got His Work Translated into 81 Different Languages
It was a few years ago when I was in the thick of my teens that I first (and so far, the last) came across one of Paulo Coelho’s books — The Zahir. Maybe it had too much about marriage and erections and other “stuff” someone as young as myself could only have been so close to figuring out. But when I started reading it, it felt like I was about to be offered something as worthy a stockpile to deplete what could help me grow from as I could ever have.
It brought me down to my element of thinking.
So, here’s an illustration from the novel that I found vaguely interesting, and disturbingly accurate:
Let’s suppose that two firemen go into a forest to put out a small fire. Afterwards, when they emerge and go over to a stream, the face of one is all smeared with black, while the other man’s face is completely clean.
So, which of the two will wash his face?
Of course, we all say the one with the dirty face will wash his face.
But no, the one with the dirty face will look at the other man and assume that he looks like him. And, vice versa, the man with the clean face will see his colleague covered in grime and say to himself: I must be dirty too; I’d better have a wash.
We look for reflections of ourselves in other people.
The way we talk, the way we find it suitable to place our beliefs on certain things, how we make important decisions, why some of us find it hard to not feel like the less attractive ones in relationships, how some others never get into relationships thinking they’re that lanky kid from a place no girl has ever heard of, and why it doesn’t make any sense — but it always does to us:
It’s because of that. The grime on the other person’s face that we think we too must have complemented in having. Or how the other person is pretty clean that we think we too are, just by association.
This happens to me, this happens to you, this happens to everyone. A large part of your life, right up to when you have achieved your goals, you spend your time oblivious to what you follow: To what brings change in you, to what makes you feel good, bad, satisfied, or contented.
People who fall short in life, they do so by their own volition. They want to be successful, just like every other person, but they only see how lucrative their lives can be, how peachy and comfortable, rich and appealing their lives can someday become.
They don’t see anything beyond.
Not what they should do to get there. Not how much time in a day they have to invest in solitary preparation when the rest of the world is having a party than spend on matters that don’t pay off dividends. Not the resources they have to be able to give up now to harvest the kind of lifestyle they want to have as theirs in the future.
One brutal truth about success nobody learns early on in life is how the vision of success is what makes it elusive.
When you only see how beautiful your life can someday become, you don’t see the “grime” of diligence that has to precede for a long time up until.
So you see accomplished people, and equate yourself up to their standards.
You try to find ambiguous solace in whatever prospect, in whichever place, and in whomever you seem fit. You try to feed your vulnerability, your pain, your sorrows, your cowardice, and all that you lack in to everything that doesn’t.
You see a girl at the end of the bar, and wish to talk to her, but you can’t.
What do you do?
You ask your friend if he has the courage to ask her out.
If he does, you are satisfied that having been tagging along with him for the whole while would qualify you for nothing less.
If he doesn’t, you are convinced you probably shouldn’t do anything about it.
This is something you do all the time. You don’t know you do that, but this is kind of your usual hangout in a bamboo forest, where you are supposed to just hide behind a stick. It does amazingly good (or bad) things to your ego, gives you reasons to not change, molds you into having positive thoughts for yourself, but lands you in a contradictory position all the same.
This is how you will pan out if you are afraid of standing in front of a mirror, biting your tongue, and just accepting the truth.
If you don’t acknowledge you have values you have to reflect on to know where they went wrong, or which among them has to be changed, you are not going to want to change yourself.
This is where most people go wrong. They get along with other people, get absorbed into their habits and resources as their own, smear themselves with all the grime, but forget to nurture and reinvent what they have.
And that’s why you have to go to ends to make it right. You have to make sure you are not just falling under the light a person left in his wake, or the darkness that could be characteristic of some other.
You have to stand up for what you know, what you don’t, and acknowledge to yourself in front of a mirror you aren’t just going to spectate your life.
And that’s the only difference between people who reflect on themselves and the people who don’t:
The former have better perception of reality, what they are better or worse at, know what kind of relationships to look for and indulge in, what values to add, and what habits to discard for newer and better ones.
And that’s the whole point.
