A few days ago, a girl named Rou walked into my psychological counseling room and said she wanted to talk about the pressure of her studies. In fact, it is more appropriate to say that it is pressure than disgust with the major.
Rou is a Chinese major in the first year of graduate school this year. In the past few months, rou has been depressed and complaining almost every day. In her opinion, the Chinese department is at odds with itself everywhere, and professional teachers are boring; Homework is not difficult, but because I don't like it, I am too lazy to write it; Group work can be pushed. She is always the one who contributes the least in the team, which makes the members of the group dissatisfied.
Rou said, "I know it's not good. I'm the one who wastes. But I just can't force myself to like it."
She studied politics at the undergraduate level and then moved to the Chinese department at the graduate level. Rou told me: "in fact, I prefer politics. I have loved it since I was a child. After the college entrance examination, although my parents wanted me to read economics, I still insisted on reading politics. My parents didn't beat me."
I was puzzled and asked her, "since I like it so much, why should I change my post-graduate stage?"
"Because I didn't learn well!" Soft answered frankly. "My undergraduate grades are medium. If I choose Bao Yan, I will have to meet with those students who are better at learning than me day by day at the graduate stage. They have pressed me hard enough at the undergraduate stage. I want to change my environment. At that time, I thought, maybe I like politics, but I have more talent in Chinese!"
Listening to Rou's description, I suddenly had a picture in my mind: two children aged 7 or 8, with childish faces but a serious look, sitting opposite each other in a game of chess. One of them, seeing that he was about to lose, angrily pushed the pieces on the plate to avoid facing the failed outcome.
In fact, what's the difference between Rou's move to the Chinese department when she didn't learn well in her favorite political major and the 7 - or 8-year-old children? Nothing more, they dare not face failure!
two
Indeed, compared with success, the word failure is not very pleasant. Especially when failure is associated with intelligence and ability, it makes people feel a fear of "turning over".
As a result, many people would rather pretend to be relaxed in front of others and make fun of their "late stage of lazy cancer", rather than admit that they actually worked hard late into the night. The reason is that once you fail, you can use "I didn't work hard" as an excuse, so that you won't lose face when others say "it's still so bad to work so hard".
We have more or less such friends around us, or ourselves, is one of them.
Playing cards together, you can only win but not lose. If you lose, you can either sigh or simply turn around and leave; When working on projects in the company, always only those with the ability to do so will be accepted, and the slightest difficulty will be pushed to others; If he catches up with being criticized by the leader, he will try every means to explain and blame the mistakes on his colleagues
You may vomit a few bad words and feel that they are glass hearted and can't afford to lose. In fact, in their hearts, there is always a voice reminding them: you can't lose, you can't be bad, you can't fail.
As one of my visitors said to me, I have hated a job for many years, but I have been afraid to give up. I am not for salary or development. I am only afraid that if I change it, I will be laughed at if I fail to do it well.
I asked, "is it the end of the world for you to fail in changing jobs?" He smiled and said, "that's true."
Such people may hide in their comfort zone and avoid many opportunities for failure, but they also successfully bypass the possibility of success again and again. As Austrian psychiatrist Adler said in his book "inferiority and Transcendence": "a person who just wants to avoid difficulties will inevitably lag behind others."
Who doesn't get up and pat the soil while wrestling, sum up the lessons, and then move on without stopping? You are so afraid of losing. How can you cultivate the skills that lead to success if you hide quietly in the same place and haven't even seen the scenery on the road?
No one can advance all his life. When you meet classmates, colleagues and friends who are better than you and have better talent than you, try to bend down and lower your attitude, and ask them how they achieved today's success, which is far more useful than hiding and deceiving yourself and others.
Yes, you will not always be right, successful and glorious. No one can!
three
In fact, many people who are afraid of failure and can only win but not lose are narcissistic.
You say, narcissism is not all self conceited, always arrogant, full of pride? Why are those people mentioned above somewhat timid and frustrated, as if they just want to hide in a narrow space that "will not fail"?
In fact, there are two kinds of narcissism. One is self expansion, look down on others, feel that you are unique, and everything is the best. We call it "cheeky narcissism".
The other is just the opposite. They are depressed, shy, afraid of being the focus of the public, and are often overly sensitive to other people's reactions. We call it "thin skinned narcissism". "Thin skinned narcissists" will somehow think that they are the center of the world and should belong to the top of the mountain. Therefore, once they are mediocre and incompetent, they feel that the world is gray.
Neither the "thick skinned narcissists" nor the "thin skinned narcissists" can present a person's true self-image. The former exaggerates and the latter belittles. Also because of this excessive debasement, other people's eyes are not good, in his view, it is very. This is why it is more difficult for him to bear failure.
If you are also a "thin skinned narcissist", I suggest you say to yourself "I'm really not that good" in your heart rather than building confidence. Just don't forget to add the word "temporary" when saying this.
I'm just not that good for the time being.
On the one hand, he pulled himself from the imaginary altar of "perfection" back to reality and admitted that he was flawed and imperfect; On the other hand, give yourself room to breathe and grow, so as not to take "failure" too seriously.
Yes, you will fail, you are not so good, so what?! Who doesn't find the way to success after countless failures.