Understandable Mistakes
The subtle mistakes of pride and praise and blame, why we fall for these mistakes, and some healthy alternatives
Ah…that momentous feeling that swells from within you after overcoming a challenging obstacle, upon reflection of your team's victories in valiant battles, or when your child achieves a developmental milestone.
Pride.
What if I told you that we commit a subtle mistake whenever we feel proud of something? What if I told you that when you accomplish something…you don't really accomplish it?
Let's imagine you have a tough test coming up. Thanks to some hard work, you end up receiving a great grade! Naturally, you feel compelled to attribute that good grade to your diligent studying. Your hard work. Your proactive preparation. But let's dissect this a bit to examine the validity of this assumption.
First, is your studying actually done independently? You likely had a teacher who disseminated the material to you, or a group of peers you studied with. Even if your teacher was atrocious and you had no peer-group, to further your understanding you would still have had to engage with written or online resources that were produced by other people. Or, in the extreme case where you're genuinely secluded from human contact, the natural world would be your guide, which was produced by nature—not you. You could not have learned alone. In fact, we can never learn alone; our understanding of the world around us (unsurprisingly) depends on the world around us.
Okay…what about my hard work? My discipline? I did that, didn't I?
Not quite. The proclivity to work hard and plan ahead isn't some innate property you own. You inherited this proclivity, either genetically or from your surroundings. Hard work coupled with delayed gratification paid off in the survival and reproductive sense; you genetically inherited discipline from a lineage of ancestors that dates back to the origin of life around four billion years ago. Shifting our view to more recent and local influences, your family or community (school, teams, etc.) may have instilled discipline into you when throughout your childhood. Or, you may currently be surrounded by a physical (or virtual) community of likeminded hard workers who motivate you, either directly or indirectly, to do the same. Developing discipline can't be done alone, for the same reasons that you never really learn alone. We interdepend with our surroundings, whether it be our distant genetic ancestors, our next door neighbors, or the river flowing through our city.
The point I'm trying to get at here is that when we feel pride, that deeply satisfying feeling based on our achievements, we are being lured into a subtle mistake. Pride is a feeling predicated on oversimplification and exclusion. Pride simplifies, carving a boundary between you and others, or your group and others. Upon careful reflection, however, we can develop a sense that those boundaries aren't actually real—nothing really exists exclusive of other things. Everything interdepends.
Why is this mistake understandable?
To understand why we fall prey to this mistake, it helps to understand the biological forces that generate it.
All life follows a set of instructions that urges genetic reproduction, which includes surviving as a means to reproduce. Thus, life on earth consists of many competing agents that are each programmed to believe that they are more important than the rest. Intelligent self-preservation is what separates the organic from the inorganic, i.e., what separates us from a rock. And this self-centered belief is necessary to persist in the organic arena; an organism without this belief would forego all resources and die prematurely (becoming inorganic), and their genes would never be transmitted to downstream generations.
So, every human on earth operates with an implicit belief that they (and their offspring) are the most important on the planet, self-prioritizing to preserve their genetic lineage. And, by extension of us being social animals and our social groups providing survival and reproductive security, we believe our groups are the most important groups on the planet. Yet, not everyone can be the most important on the planet, nor can every group. Either, one of us is actually the most important and the rest of us are all wrong. Or, none of us are the most important and all of us are wrong. Either way, this belief cannot be true.
We have thus stumbled upon the most prevalent and fundamental delusion that all life on earth (humans included) is subject to. The mere fact that we can recognize that this belief is false is quite extraordinary. This also provides a wonderful (and perhaps the most important) example of why we should be wary of adopting morals from biology, i.e., that because something is natural it is “good” (known as the naturalistic fallacy).
This mistaken belief that we are most important, or that our groups are most important, is what misleads us into the deeply satisfying feeling of pride. It is a completely understandable mistake that we are all vulnerable to; a mistake generated by a monumental biological force. And, now that we've understood why this mistake occurs, we can avoid the other mistake of thinking less of people (which includes ourselves) who think more of themselves. Instead, we can use our newfound wisdom to see ourselves and others under a compassionate and understanding lens.
Pride is a mistake, you say? So what if I'm committing an error? What's the harm in feeling proud about my or my group's accomplishments?
The mistake with pride doesn't lie in the feelings of satisfaction, but in the subject of that satisfaction. As we saw earlier, our achievements aren't really ours, but we go on thinking they are. So, for instance, when we inevitably falter, we place a disproportionate amount of blame on ourselves. Just as easily as we praise ourselves for our victories, we blame ourselves for our mistakes. We narrow our view on just us, losing sight of the numerous relationships that contributed towards producing those outcomes.
To help us understand why it may be best to avoid pride, let's take a deeper look at the similar mistakes of praise and blame and some of the problems they generate.
Praise & Blame
We praise individuals or groups, enamored by their achievements. We blame individuals or groups, revolted by their misdeeds. Praise and blame are mistakes that delude us from understanding the truth.
Praise
When we praise someone, we're committing the same sincere mistake of attributing their achievements to just their doing. Praise for celebrities provides a useful example of this mistake, because the resulting narrow-mindedness leads to idolization. Idolization occurs when we attribute an exceptional outcome to an individual’s doing, because if they did that…they must have powers akin to a deity! We thus fabricate and attach ourselves to a character, an idol, instead of the actual person we admire, which necessarily dehumanizes those we idolize. This unhealthy relationship manifests culturally with large swaths of easily-manipulated deluded followers, whose obsession over the lives of celebrities funds parasitic industries devoted to profiting off of that obsession.
If you look up to someone, whether it be an artist or an athlete or an intellectual, try viewing them instead as a unique product of some fortunate conditions just like the rest of us. Everybody is an unlikely product of fortunate conditions, therefore everybody is a celebrity in a way. Your idols are human, just like you. They are not infallible, they will make mistakes as well, so don't be surprised (or worse, rejoice) when they do. People typically like to be treated as humans instead of superficial characters, so it's much easier to genuinely connect with people, celebrity or not, when you view them as a fellow human.
I'm not saying we shouldn't recognize, celebrate, and encourage helpful behavior, but we just have to be careful of what we’re attributing that helpfulness to. When we reduce it to a single source, we're making a mistake. And that reduction may deceive us into thinking that the source can do no wrong. The divine rays that radiate from those we praise are wonderful to look at, but keep in mind those rays also distort our vision, blinding us from the truth. Try toning down your fanaticism; throw on some shades and lean back—I promise the view is just as nice.
Blame
When someone makes a mistake, we often feel compelled to place blame on them. Rather than the mistake being a product of some combination of their upbringing and environmental stressors and genetic predispositions, we mistakenly believe that they themselves produced the mistake and punish them for it. Only a demon would commit such a vile act!
It's hard for us to consider the entire scope of conditions that produce an outcome, so we oversimplify and direct our discontent at an independent actor. That independent actor could be a rival nation, a criminal caught up in the justice system, our spouse during a relationship dispute, or that voice in our head that berates us for making a mistake.
Blame fizzles away when we develop a consideration all of the factors that contribute to a negative outcome. We'd have to blame all of the contributors. And if we look deeply enough, we can come to the realization that everything contributes—but if we place blame on everything, what's the point of blame in the first place?
I'm not saying that we should just leave people to continue doing harmful things. We still have the obligation to discipline and rehabilitate harmful individuals (and groups) to prevent further harm from being done, but we can do that all of that without placing the blame on a single source. Blame is an energy-sink, attracting us towards the simple (yet satisfying) story that exorcising the demon will solve all of our problems. Ridding ourselves of the tendency to blame allows us to expand our attention. We see the bigger picture. We can make systemic improvements, instead of dishing out simple-minded excessive punishments that just perpetuate our problems.
Pride
pride
noun
a feeling of deep pleasure or satisfaction derived from one's own achievements, the achievements of those with whom one is closely associated, or from qualities or possessions that are widely admired.
When we derive pleasure from a single source, we cling to that source and lose sight of everything else. We sink into our couch’s soft embrace and sink our teeth into soft processed foods at the expense of our health and longevity. We gorge ourselves with processed digital information at the expense of our mental well-being. We overwork ourselves chasing money and status at the expense of our personal relationships.
When we feel proud about something, the source of our deep pleasure comes from ourselves or, in the case of a collective achievement, our group. But we saw earlier that “ourselves” or “our group” is never the sole source of any achievement, so when something inevitably comes around to point out that fallacy, we freak out! The source of pleasure we cling to begins to crumble, so we make desperate attempts to hold it together.
Take, for instance, the example of a loved one raising a concern about your behavior, who suggests that your behavior potentially resulted in harm. Now, if you’re a proud person who derives satisfaction from the deluded belief that you are exceptional and incapable of doing any wrong, chances are you’re going to reject the notion that you’ve done anything wrong.
This rejection can take many forms, all with the chief purpose of protecting and reinforcing the pleasurable delusion you’ve attached yourself to. So, you may fire back with a set of your own concerns, emphasizing your loved one’s faults to downplay your own. Or, you may get defensive, claiming that you’re the victim and placing the blame (another mistake) on others. You may simply withdraw, refusing further communication to prevent further exposure of your delusion.
These vicious reactions to criticism manifest in all human relationships, whether it be romantic relationships, political disputes, or international conflicts. And all of these reactions are an attempt to defend the misplaced assumption that I am the best or my group is the best, to defend the subject of our pride—us. Those in conflict all assume they are faultless as they flail around their crumbling deluded beliefs, leaving rotten crumbs in their wake.
Laying beneath the crust of our deluded crumbling beliefs is the truth. As we relinquish our attachment to the delusion fueling our pride, I like to imagine the crust crumbling away to reveal a pristine crystal sphere, revealing the liberating truth—that everything is important.
The Cure
So, you tell me not to be proud. What's the alternative? A life of emotional dullness? Do I really have to sacrifice that satisfaction?
What about telling my child that I’m proud of them? What’s the harm in that?
Feelings of pride can be easily swapped with feelings of gratitude, so we need not live life without satisfaction. To return to the studying example, rather than feeling pleasure from the good grades obtained by your diligent study, simply feel pleasure from the good grades obtained by diligent study. Try removing you from the equation. Be grateful for the myriad of conditions that happened to conglomerate into this unique entity like no other—you. Recognize that you exist in relationship with the universe, you are not separate from it.
In the case of praising your child, you’re right, in this case there isn’t much harm done. If your child does something good, let them know it makes you happy. Encourage good behavior. Though, I don’t think that encouragement is contingent on telling them you are proud of them. Lovingly indicating that you’re grateful and happy for their good deeds will provide more than enough motivation.
Life, however, isn’t always sunshine and rainbows. We must be careful; if we (naturally) attach our sense of self-worth to our child’s outcomes, when they misbehave our sense of self-worth will also be threatened. We will attempt to discourage our child from doing harm to others and our ego. This provokes excessive punishment to account for the ego blow, perpetuating the familial traumas we are all too familiar with. Loosening the grip on our self-centric attachments allows us to dish out encouragements and discouragements with a clearer view. Your child will still get plenty of love, I promise; but, more importantly, they will avoid unnecessary hatred.
In a group context, rather than feeling proud of belonging to a particular group, whether it be a company, a religion, a political faction, a nation, or a species, I would suggest replacing that feeling with a sense of gratitude. Try replacing “Proud to be X” with “Grateful to be X”. Embrace with humility that X is not faultless. Pride is predicated on tight-gripped attachment, whereas gratitude is like a gentle hug. Loosen your grip and you’ll be able to let go if X goes in a direction that doesn’t align with your values.
Foster the underlying recognition that your groups depend on other groups, that your species depends on other species, that life depends on the earth and sun, and naturally your gratitude will expand to include those other things as well!
The point here isn't that we always need to actively consider each and every contribution to an outcome; we simply don't have the bandwidth to do that. However, we can develop a background recognition that things are vast and complicated. We're naturally inclined to oversimplify and view things from a self-centered lens, so we need to counteract this natural inclination by actively cultivating an expansive recognition.
I'll leave you with a few practices that can help you do so.
Reflect
Pick out an arbitrary object in your vicinity. This could be a pencil, your morning coffee, or a friend. For a few minutes, simply reflect on the endless relationships that were required such that this “simple” object could appear before you. In the case of the pencil, this could include those who transported the pencil, those who constructed the civil infrastructure that supported the transport of the pencil, those who designed the pencil, those who fabricated the pencil, the innumerous friends and families of all these contributors, and so on. You could reflect on the materials that make up the pencil, such as the wooden shaft which came from a tree, which came from a genetic lineage of photosynthetic life that floated around in the ocean billions of years ago, which came from a planet that floats around an ever-expanding cosmos.
Practice this meditation every so often. It is always available to you. You can do it anytime and anywhere; all you need to do is concentrate and reflect for a few minutes. This practice will fill you with a sense of gratitude and inspire awe as you are reminded of the wondrousness of the universe. The entire universe touches that one pencil; soak it in. If a pencil can provoke gratitude and awe within you, anything can.
Learn
Another way to cultivate open-mindedness is to learn more about the world. Learning expands the boundaries of our minds, with the added benefit that the more we learn the more we realize how much more there is to learn (which expands those boundaries even more). Those boundaries are resistant to change, so it takes some deliberate work to expand and soften them.
The alternative is to stay narrow-minded. If we choose this path our understanding remains limited, yielding a life of fear and confusion as the world inevitably deviates from our ignorant expectations. Lack of a learning practice leads to mental atrophy. Our mental boundary becomes brittle and fragile, so new information seems more threatening. We become more reactive as we desperately resist information that disturbs our blissful ignorance, which leads to further delusion.
The more vast our mental pasture, the more room there is to play. The more elastic our boundaries, the less threatened we are by new information as it bounces around our boundaries. Finding a system that continuously exposes you to new and challenging experiences expands those boundaries. We're fortunate to live in a time where we are constantly comfortable, but that comfort comes at a cost (see previous paragraph). Incorporate daily practices that expose you to some discomfort and, paradoxically, you will genuinely start to feel more comfortable. Stretch those cognitive boundaries!
See where your curiosity takes you, especially if it seems scary or difficult—the more difficult it is, the more you have to gain from it. Learn. Develop. Grow. This could involve doing something as simple as reading books. Or working on those projects you've been putting off. Or going out and meeting new people. Or adventuring across a foreign country. Or overcoming that mental hurdle that prevents you from exercising.
Learning need not be methodical and mechanistic—artistic pursuits can also help us learn. After all, “art is the lie that helps us to see the truth” as Picasso nicely put it. So, go! Be creative! Pursue the truth!
We're so often caught up in our personal trials and tribulations that we can lose sight of the magnificent bigger picture. Zoom out and look back; transcend yourself and your groups. Complement this transcendence with the wisdom you gather from learning. Reflect on how extraordinary it is that billions of years ago we were all stardust, and due to an infinitude of causes and conditions we now get the privilege to experience life.