Nurturing the Relationship with Ourselves
Understanding Integrity, Grit, & Anxiety
“How can a man come to know himself? Never by thinking, but by doing. Try to do your duty and you will know at once what you are worth.”
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (Maxims on Life and Character)
The Overlooked Self-Relationship
People are relational creatures, and we do not pay enough attention to our most important relationship: the one with ourselves.
We put so much care and attention into how we relate to our work or loved ones but rarely think about how we relate to ourselves. This is peculiar because how we relate to ourselves impacts us far more than how we relate to anything external of ourselves. The most significant influence on our experience of reality, life satisfaction, and peace of mind is ourselves.
People are constantly looking outward to change their lives or find happiness. The inconvenient truth is that everything we desire is within.
How we know ourselves dictates our life satisfaction, abilities to take on new things, and potential opportunities.
The relationship with ourselves is the total of all our achievements and failures that we observe in ourselves.
We subconsciously keep score of everything. Whenever we say we will do something but don’t, we create a relationship with ourselves that suggests we aren’t reliable. Every time we’ve done the impossible and surprised ourselves with our abilities, we create a relationship with ourselves that proves we can do amazing things in the face of adversity.
Everything we do is kept on record with ourselves.
We are the only ones who have been with us since the beginning.
No one understands the experiences and situations we have been in better than ourselves, and it is through this understanding that we develop a relationship with ourselves.
Growing from an Imperfect System
Admittedly, the education system, at least in the United States, needs a lot of rework. However, we can gain something invaluable from our education.
Our current education system provides students with an opportunity for them to prove to themselves what kind of person they are.
Are you the kind of person who gets things done when the going gets tough, or do you quit the first chance you get?
We can choose who we are, but first, we must discover our relationship with ourselves. We can ask ourselves the following questions to get a quick snapshot of what our relationship might look like:
To what degree is it damaged?
What can we do to make it better?
Do we trust ourselves?
Do we believe we are capable of helping ourselves?
What kind of person do we think we are?
What kind of person are we?
The good news is we can build a relationship with ourselves no matter where we are. First, we must know what our relationship is like, then work on ways to prove to ourselves that we are the person we want to be.
Our relationship with ourselves constantly transforms and refines with every situation we encounter. Since most kids spend most of their time at school or working on their education, a large portion of their relationship with themselves is rooted in how they handle their academic responsibilities.
This starts with our integrity.
Integrity
A standard definition of integrity is what you do when no one looks. People with integrity are typically considered moral and trustworthy because we know that even behind closed doors, they will still make the right choices. This definition of integrity is fantastic, and if we look at our relationship with ourselves, we will see that integrity is crucial because we are always looking. We are constantly watching ourselves, and we know how we would act behind closed doors.
People with integrity have a healthy and strong relationship with themselves because they know exactly what kind of choices they will make.
I believe there’s another definition that is much more useful and powerful. Integrity is also known as a state of being whole or undivided. Every commitment we make to others, or ourselves puts a little crack in our integrity, and every aspect of our lives that is not aligned with our chosen commitments also puts a little crack in our integrity.
When our integrity is imperfect, we are prone to negative emotions and lose the ability to live in the present, leading to intense dissatisfaction with our lives.
Living with perfect integrity is better than anything we can ever experience. It’s comparable to true peace of mind and contentment.
We aim to seek out what does not make us whole and undivided and reorient that part of our lives so it serves us, or at least does not hold back.
When we have perfect integrity, our relationship with ourselves is pristine. We get out of our way and become our biggest ally.
When we have a commitment or vision for our lives, we create a value structure that deems specific actions as “good” (they bring us closer to our goals) or “bad” (they get us away from our goals). When we stay on the path, we operate with perfect integrity and create a positive and powerful relationship with ourselves. If we were to stray off the path and make a “bad” decision, we wouldn’t be able to have perfect integrity until we make up for the damage done.
This is why the world religions have this mechanism built into their structure. Human beings must stay on a path towards something they find valuable. This is clear when we have a goal or a commitment. However, sometimes, we may choose to act in a way that does not align with that path.
In archery, they call missing the mark a sin. In a religious context, not staying on the path is a sin. I’m saying that from the perspective of developing a relationship with ourselves, not saying on the path is a sin, in the technical sense of the word.
When we sin, we must correct our trajectory to return to the path. The world religions have their ways of doing this, but I believe they all contain the same basic mental exercises.
To restore integrity, we must:
Admit that we have missed the mark
Understand the impact of our sin to the highest degree that we can
Discover methods to make up for the sin
Implement those methods in the real world
This can look like an infinite number of ways.
Kintsugi is the Japanese practice of resorting to something broken by filling the cracks with gold. The newly restored item is more robust than before it was broken, and I like to believe that restoring integrity is the same way.
The Role of Grit
Grit plays a pivotal role in strengthening our self-relationships. It empowers us to persevere with passion and resilience toward our long-term goals. This is indispensable for navigating life's challenges and realizing our true potential.
The “talentless” can surpass the naturally gifted individuals and reach unimaginable heights as long as they cultivate the grit within them.
Grit is a positive, non-cognitive trait based on an individual’s perseverance of effort combined with a passion for a particular long-term goal or end state (a powerful motivation to achieve an objective).
It is the key to stellar performance in any field, and the best part is anyone can create it within themselves.
The simplest way I think about grit is as passionate persistence.
Developing a relationship with ourselves where we know ourselves as gritty individuals gives us armor when we encounter internal resistance or external obstacles.
Grit has five characteristics. Focusing on developing each of these characteristics in ourselves will help us cultivate grit as a whole.
The 5 Characteristics of Grit
Courage—developing courage does not mean ridding ourselves of fear. It means accepting the fear within us and acting anyway. To create a relationship with myself where I know I am courageous, I have to pay attention when I’m more afraid, decide the best course of action, and take it.
No withdrawing or freezing in hopes that things will go away independently.
Conscientiousness: Achievement-Oriented & Dependable - Being conscientious is a valuable trait to develop because conscientious people work like mad. Knowing ourselves as someone focused on achievement and dependable makes us invaluable in any industry at any level. Conscientious people tend to rise to the level of expectation, but only because they prove to themselves that they can over and over.
Rome wasn’t built in a day, but they laid bricks every hour.
Long-Term Goals and Endurance: Follow Through – nothing is worthwhile without follow through in the long term. Things that take longer are usually better, and designing our lives is a long game. We need to know ourselves as people who can follow through even if the goal is years later. We need to know that we can maintain vision over the long term. Sometimes, I think the test of success is just keeping a vision over the trials and tribulations.
Resilience: Optimism, Confidence, and Creativity – we will encounter hardship and challenges that rival our wildest dreams. The only way through it is to know ourselves as resilient. If we know what it takes to get through it, we will. The only thing is that we’ll need to know how to get through most challenges.
Knowing ourselves as optimistic will help us keep faith and push forward. Knowing ourselves as confident will allow us to push the boundaries into unexplored territory. Dragons lie in the unknown, but so does treasure!
Knowing ourselves as creative will give us the means to solve some of life’s toughest puzzles—the challenges that impede us from obtaining the life of our design.
Excellence vs. Perfection—We are frozen forever if we know ourselves as perfectionists or people who produce perfect work. Our superegos would be too strict, leaving no room for action. However, if we know ourselves as excellent or people who create fantastic work, we will inevitably put our best effort into everything we do.
Going the extra mile is tough if you don’t usually do it.
Utilizing Anxiety
“We should not try to ‘get rid’ of a neurosis, but rather to experience what it means, what it has to teach, what its purpose is.”
Carl Jung (Civilization in Transition)
“The distinctive characteristic of the human being, in contrast to the merely vegetative or the merely animal, lies in the range of human possibility and in our capacity for self-awareness of possibility. Kierkegaard sees man as a creature who is continually beckoned by possibility, who conceives of possibility, visualizes it, and by creative activity carries it into actuality.”
Rollo May (The Meaning of Anxiety)
Human beings have a remarkable capacity to project possible scenarios into the future. We can think about how events could play out without actually having to act them out in real life. A lot of this type of processing happens in our prefrontal cortex. This gives us a huge advantage when it comes to survival and undoubtedly contributes to our reign over the animal kingdom.
But it’s not without a price.
Choosing which potential projection to bring into reality is how we create our lives, but it’s also one of the sources of our anxiety. In this way, humans must contend with their freedom like no other animal must. We ask questions that other animals cannot ask themselves.
Which potential reality is best for me?
Which potential reality will bring me danger?
What do I do about potential threats in the future?
Søren Kierkegaard, the renowned Danish philosopher, suggests the escape from a life of passivity, stagnation, or mediocrity lies in our willingness to attend what he calls The School of Anxiety.
Kierkegaard believes anxiety has two sides to it.
One side is demonic and can ruin our lives. This is the side we traditionally think of when we think about anxiety.
The other is constructive and guides us toward developing the Jungian Self. Anxiety can act as a direction in the journey of circumambulation.
Most people advise to follow one’s dreams, but Kierkegaard advises to follow one’s anxiety.
Avoiding and rejecting our anxiety leaves us blind and frozen. Our anxiety gives us a glimpse into which possible scenarios we ought to take. Anxiety can tell us what to direct our energy towards. It lets us know what we find important.
“The capacity to bear anxiety is important for the individual’s self-realization and for his conquest of his environment. Every person experiences continual shocks and threats to his existence; indeed, self-actualization occurs only at the price of moving ahead despite such shocks. This indicates the constructive use of anxiety.”
Rollo May (The Meaning of Anxiety)
As May suggests, moving forward through our anxiety is the way to a greater version of ourselves.
Greatness lies on the other side of anxiety, as long as we are willing to push ahead.
Unfortunately, much of the typical attitude toward anxiety is to reject or avoid it. Having anxiety is seen to be a problem that we “shouldn’t” have, and feeling negative emotions has been made to be “bad” & “wrong” in modern society. This is because the constructive elements of anxiety are not easily visible to the masses.
This rejection and avoidance are so resounding that some claim not to desire a more extraordinary life.
When our comfort and security are more appealing than the anxiety lurking in the unknown, resignation becomes standard practice.
This is precisely why the trap of passivity, stagnation, and mediocrity lies in the rejection of anxiety.
When we refuse to move into the possibilities that make us anxious, we sentence the side of us seeking self-realization and the more extraordinary life to death. This isn’t a clean death; it’s slow and sloppy. Repressing this side of ourselves breeds a violent shadow, and I would go as far as to say that it is like repressing the will to live itself.
The tension within ourselves created from willingly seeking self-realization or circumambulation gives our lives meaning and stimulates the deepest parts of ourselves.
To access the constructive parts of anxiety, we have to understand two things:
We can always take action, even if we are enveloped with anxiety.
Believing that we have to get rid of our anxiety before we can act puts us at a severe disadvantage for a couple of reasons. It facilitates procrastination, and it can lead to a severe dependence on drugs or alcohol.
Holding on to the idea that we need to remove anxiety to act makes us weak.
No one can do this for us except for ourselves.
Realizing that nothing in my life was ever going to change unless I did something to make it change was one of the most anxiety-inducing, but empowering realizations I’ve ever had. I was able to switch my locus of control. This realization helped me see the constructive side of anxiety.
We need to pay more attention to the possibilities that stress us out. The anxiety is an opportunity to exercise our divine abilities, and it’s the call of the hero’s journey.
“One of the most important [revelatory] moments is when the client grasps that no one is coming. No one is coming to save me; no one is coming to make life right for me; no one is coming to solve my problems. If I don’t do something, nothing is going to get better. The dream of a rescuer who will deliver us may offer a kind of comfort, but it leaves us passive and powerless. We may feel if only I suffer long enough, if only I yearn desperately enough, somehow a miracle will happen, but this is the kind of self-deception one pays for with one’s life as it drains away into the abyss of unredeemable possibilities and irretrievable days, months, decades.”
Nathaniel Branden (1930-2014)
Enhancing our levels of articulation is another constructive and effective way of coping with anxiety.
We experience anxiety when we find ourselves in too much chaos.
When things don’t work out the way we expect, our brain responds by trying to prepare for whatever potential danger is lurking around the corner.
Let’s say we’re pre-med and get an F on a test. We are thrown into chaos when we receive that F because we aren’t sure what the F symbolizes.
Did we get one question on the test wrong?
Did we forget to study a concept?
Did we not correctly learn the prerequisite material from the last class?
Do we need to change our lifestyle choices?
Are we incapable of learning this information?
Are we not good enough to get into medical school?
Are we too stupid to take this class?
Are we even good enough to pursue anything more significant than us?
It’s easy for these questions to spiral out of control because we don’t know exactly where the error lies. Maybe we forgot a concept, but we might not even be cut out for our goals!
Anxiety comes from our mind trying to prepare for all of those scenarios at once.
Our body's threat detection systems are put into overdrive, making it challenging to do many things.
However, once we specify what we can prepare for, the anxiety begins to subside.
If there was some way of knowing exactly where the error was, then there would be no need to prepare for everything at once.
Enhancing our levels of articulation helps us direct our energy towards something definitive, which keeps anxiety at bay, rather than letting our minds run while trying to plan a new career path, prepare for a panther attack, and an alien invasion all at the same time.
We will constantly have to choose between avoiding or moving forward. What will aid us in moving forward isn’t wisdom, intelligence, or even new information. It is the integration of the Jungian Shadow. Creating a relationship with ourselves that captivates the sides of ourselves, we tend to reject, ignore, and avoid will provide a steady mechanism that can propel us to act even when our reason tries to stop us.
Sometimes, our instincts are wiser than our evolved executive cognition. Accepting the sides of us which yearn for chaos gives us the advantage in utilizing our anxiety.
Life is too short not to take the bold risks a fully lived human life requires.
“For believe me: the secret for harvesting from existence the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment is – to live dangerously!”
Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay Science)
When we try to understand ourselves truly, we find guidance in Goethe's wise words, lessons from our own education experiences, and the empowering concepts of integrity and grit.
It is more than just self-reflection; it's about taking action, showing resilience in tough times, and staying true to our beliefs.
It's about seeing our anxieties not as barriers but as signposts, pointing us toward what matters and encouraging us to grow.
It teaches us that the key to fulfillment doesn't come from external accolades but from nurturing a deep and honest relationship with ourselves.
By weaving these ideas, we learn to navigate life with a sense of purpose and courage, driven not by the pursuit of perfection but by the pursuit of a genuine life. This blend of self-awareness, determination, and embracing our authentic selves offers a blueprint for a life that's not just successful on paper, but richly rewarding in the ways that count.