The Happiness Habit by Brian Colbert

Author:Brian Colbert [Colbert, Brian]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780717151431
Publisher: Gill & Macmillan

The God Complex

As discussed in Chapter 3, psychological literature and research refers to the ‘self-serving bias’ that comes from our tendency to assume that we can do no wrong. In other words we can only be right, which is what I like to call our innate God Complex.

We don’t like to prove ourselves wrong because that makes us feel stupid and no one likes to feel or look stupid. We like to feel smart. We like to be smart and in fact we are smart, but not all of the time. Unfortunately we sometimes believe that there is no other person as smart as we are so the chances of someone coming up with a solution that we have worked flat out on for ages appears ridiculous and threatens our self-esteem. From there our natural reaction is defensive, ‘You are hardly going to come up with the solution, because I’m a smart person and I’ve thought it all through.’ With that type of background thinking the shutters come down and cynicism or exasperation takes centre stage. Then when we get offered any solutions we announce, ‘No, no there’s no point, I tried that. No that won’t work either. I am telling you, no. I’ve tried that, that won’t work. I tried that too, it won’t work.’

Very often other people can come up with the solution more easily as they are not as emotionally attached to it as you are. But you’ve got to get out of your own way for them to do that. The trick is to really listen and find out stuff that you have you not tried yet, but that you can and will try. Look at things and ask yourself who can help you. Who has been there before? Who can advise me? How can I guarantee my success? How can I be successful, no matter what? There’s a gazillion ways of doing that.

Here are some common excuses and suggested ways to challenge them:

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