What Everyone Really Wants

we're often in situations of wanting to help and be kind to other people but of not quite knowing what they might be in need of we'd like to deepen our connection to them and be of service and yet we lack a real grasp of what we could plausibly offer them their minds seem impenetrable their problems opaque at such moments we would do well to remember that we all possess a superpower a capacity to give people something we can be sure they fundamentally require founded on a primordial and basic insight into human nature that all of us are in deep need of reassurance life is a more or less ongoing emergency for everyone we are invariably haunted by doubts about our value by concerns for our future by shapeless anxiety and dread about things we've done by feelings of guilt and embarrassment about ourselves every day brings new threats to our integrity and except for very rare moments when we and the world feel solid there is almost always a background throb of unwellness in our minds it doesn't matter whether they're old or young accomplished or starting out at the top of the tree or struggling to get by we can count on one thing about anyone we meet they'll be beset by a sense of insecurity and beneath some excellent camouflage to a greater or lesser extent of desperation that means that more than they perhaps even realize they will be longing for someone to say something soothing to them a word or two to make them feel that they have a right to exist that we have some faith in them that we know things aren't always easy for them and that in a vague but real way we're on their side it could be a very small and barely perceptible remark but its effect might be critical maybe that something fascinating they said sticks in our minds that we know the past few months might not have been simple for them that we found ourselves thinking of them since our last meeting that we've noticed and admire the way they go about things that they deserve a break and that they are we can see carrying so much it's easy to mistake the work of reassurance with flattery but flattery involves a lie to gain advantage whereas reassurance involves revealing genuine affection which we normally leave out from embarrassment in order to bolster someone's ability to endure we flatter in order to extract benefit we reassure in order to help furthermore the flatterer tells their prey about their strengths the reassurer does something infinitely more valuable they hint that they've seen the weaknesses but have only tolerance and compassion for them on the basis of sharing fully incomparable examples i think you're going to be fine everyone goes through things like these you've got nothing to be ashamed of the words we need to say to reassure aren't new they can be the most apparently banal of sentences but we need to keep hearing them because our minds are extremely bad at holding on to their nourishing truths they are furthermore lines that are a great deal more valuable and inclined to stick if someone else addresses them to us than if we try to rehearse them by ourselves in 1425 the florentine artist masaccio painted a rendition of adam and eve's expulsion from the garden of eden on the walls of florence's church of santa maria del camine we need not believe in any of the supernatural aspects of genesis to be profoundly moved by the horror-stricken faces of the banished couple and if we are so it's because what we see is a version of an agony that is essentially universal for all of us have effectively been cast out of the realm of comfort and plenty and obliged to dwell in the lands of uncertainty humiliation and grief all of us are beset by woes all of us are worried to the core longing for rest and in urgent need of forbearance and gentleness part of the responsibility of living in a time that broadly no longer believes in divine reassurance is that we are each of us given a role to play in delivering part of that reassurance ourselves to our fellow sufferers in ordinary moments of our ordinary lives we cannot generally know the precise details of other people's travails but we can always be sure of a few vital things from the outset that they are at some level in a mood of pain and self-suspicion that certain very big things will not have gone right that there will be intensities of loneliness anxiety and shame at play and that it could hence make a very big difference indeed if we were able to say something however modest and even unoriginal to bring a little reassurance into their day if you enjoyed our film please subscribe to our channel and click the bell icon to turn on notifications our online shop has a range of books and gifts that address the most important and often neglected areas of life click now to learn more

Channel: The School of Life

Views: 583,568

Keywords: the school of life, schooloflife, education, relationships, alain de botton, philosophy, talk, self, improvement, big questions, love, wellness, mindfullness, psychology, how, to, hack, what everyone really wants, secret to happiness, depression, loneliness, anxiety meditation, how to be happy with yourself, how to be happy and positive all the time, how to be happy alone, the school of life anxiety, the school of life love, the school of life breakup

Id: dRk7B0AGyQQ

Length: 5min 33sec (333 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 20 2021