Committed to Being Right?
Photo by Arnab Halder
Committed to Being Right?
Fundamental #17: Be Dedicated to Personal Growth: Be a lifetime learner by challenging yourself to take risks and operate outside your comfort zone. Solicit feedback, learn from mistakes, and apply that learning. The magic happens when you understand problems as opportunities for breakthroughs.
Being dedicated to personal growth is something I’ve pursued for as long as I can remember. It started when I was young and quite confused about what was true and what wasn’t. I remember asking the people around me for an answer and getting five different answers. It would drive me crazy and leave me feeling even more confused than before.
Somehow, all that confusion didn’t diminish my dedication. It’s actually where the journey started.
And it is a journey—a lifelong one. I can see the ways in which I’ve grown as a human being. I can also see that the learning curve never ends. I still have eye-opening moments—moments that reveal ways in which I falter that I truly couldn’t see before, even with the best of intentions.
I want to tell you about the most recent one.
The Story I Believed
I recently had an issue in a relationship. I truly felt that the other person was at fault. If only they had responded with greater tranquility and kindness, the problem wouldn’t have escalated the way it did. And this wasn’t a conclusion I reached in the heat of the moment; I had believed it about this person for a long time.
Then a few things happened. I had a conversation with the person. I processed the matter on my own. And I talked with someone I consider a bit of a mentor—someone who helps me clarify things.
What I finally saw was my own part in it. I saw how self-centered and egotistical I can be. I saw how, in a very subtle and logical manner, I can make the case that the other person should have responded differently—and that if they had, none of this would have happened.
What Are You Committed To?
It’s interesting what we can do with language. We can create an argument for almost anything and back it up. I’m quite good at this. I’m logical, I argue well, and I’m not wrong very often. That’s exactly what makes my own blind spots so hard to see. It’s remarkable how convinced you can become of your own version of the truth.
So there’s a question I often think about, and I invite you to ask it of yourself: What are you committed to? Are you committed to being right? Or are you committed to what you actually want—the goal, the relationship, or fulfillment?
We See Things as We Are
There’s a line in Anaïs Nin’s novel The Seduction of the Minotaur: “We do not see things as they are; we see them as we are.”
This is true for all of us. It doesn’t matter what your level of education is, how worldly you are, how much you’ve worked on yourself, or how open-minded and wise you believe yourself to be. By the way, I fall into the trap of thinking I’m all of those things. But that doesn’t exempt me. I’m still a human being, with plenty of ways of being that simply don’t work—and that I don’t always see clearly.
In the story I just told you, it took me a very, very long time to see my own faults in the matter. And I can see why. I’ve built a life in which a lot revolves around me and almost nobody questions me. I’m good at making arguments, so the story I had constructed about how the other person should have acted differently stood there, sounding reasonable, for a very long time. Nobody questioned it, least of all me.
A Lifelong Commitment
The truth is that being dedicated to personal growth is a lifelong commitment. I will undoubtedly keep finding things about who I am and what I do that don’t fully work. The journey isn’t an easy one. It’s quite uncomfortable, in fact. But I’m committed to it, and I believe it’s the only real way to be effective and have harmonious, healthy relationships.
Fundamental #17 says the magic happens when you understand problems as opportunities for breakthroughs. That has been my experience. This problem was exactly that—an opportunity to see something about myself I couldn’t see before.
So let me leave you with the question I often ask myself: What are you committed to? Are you committed to being right? Or are you committed to what you actually want—the goal, the relationship, or fulfillment?
I’d love to hear your thoughts.'
~ Eduardo
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Fundamental of the Week #17: BE DEDICATED TO PERSONAL GROWTH
Be a lifetime learner by challenging yourself to take risks and operate outside your comfort zone. Solicit feedback, learn from mistakes, and apply that learning. The magic happens when you understand problems as opportunities for breakthroughs.
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