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We all know a person,
maybe that person is you,
who opposes, denies and doubts.
Who has no faith in human goodness,
who is so pessimistic and so skeptical
that it seems like they either have no belief in
or maybe even an animosity towards or contempt for pleasure,
hope,
faith and positivity.
Society calls this a cynic.
I'm not here today to sell you on the concept of positivity.
It's a really outdated concept.
Especially just fighting against pessimism with optimism.
What i'm here to do today
is to make the argument that cynicism is not a character trait.
It's a coping mechanism.
To cope is to make a specific alteration
mentally, emotionally or physically
so that you can manage or adapt to something that's causing you stress.
A coping mechanism is a specific procedure, process or technique
which manages or creates adaptation to stress.
And therefore it is the opposite of change.
Because it is to adapt to a stressor,
rather than to change a situation so that there is no longer a stressor.
To understand this more in depth, watch my video titled:
How to Let Go of A Coping Mechanism
Cynicism is a coping mechanism
that most likely saved your life
at one time.
It's also a coping mechanism
that can destroy your life.
And it makes other people
end up in so much pain
that it actually creates a vicious spiral
of self-fulfilling prophecy.
To understand this pattern of cynicism,
we have to go back to the onset of this coping mechanism
to begin with.
Because people are not born cynics and skeptics.
When was the last time you met a cynical or skeptical, baby?
If you are cynical
at some point in your life or many,
most likely many,
you experienced catastrophic letdown.
Catastrophic sudden shocks
or disappointments relative to the positive elements of your life.
For example, a situation or many
that caused a catastrophic blow to your belief in others,
hopes, dreams, goals, trust,
faith, desires or expectations.
This experience was so psychologically,
so emotionally
and maybe even so physically traumatizing to you,
that you decided
that at all costs you had to avoid
the vulnerability of positivity.
Essentially you got into that situation and decided that
positivity, state of positivity puts you in such a vulnerable state,
that you had to buffer yourself against that for all time and eternity.
No matter the cost.
As a result,
you started to use negativity
as this way of buffering yourself
against the vulnerability and the positive states.
But this negativity,
other people on the outside perceive to be so painful
that it causes them to go into defense
and to start to act hostile.
That's what defense mode does, causes you to be hostile, right?
And that hostility
further reinforced your belief that you had to buffer yourself,
which makes them even more hostile,
which reinforces your cynical behavior,
which makes them more hostile,
which reinforces your cynicism.
And this is the spiral that just keeps on going
and we could consider self-fulfilling prophecy.
It is ultimately your right to remain cynical towards the world.
In fact, you have every excuse to be.
The reality is,
There's no reason, given your life experience,
for you to feel optimistic.
There is no reason given your life experience
to be trusting.
So you have all the reason you want in the world to stay cynical.
that's completely your choice and actually your right.
The thing is, is that this state of being
may just be preventing you from the very life of well-being
that you are meant to come here to live.
Living in a constant state of pessimism and letdown
is not really living.
It's also a coping mechanism,
much like positive bypassing,
smoking, cutting, gambling or suppression.
For example.
For this reason
if you are interested in letting go of the coping mechanism of cynicism
I've got some suggestions.
#1:
Be brave enough to see what you're getting out of cynicism.
I don't mean this in this obnoxious self-help way
or like: "What are you getting out of this horrible behavior?"
No, I mean like really look at: "How does it keep you safe?"
How is it benefiting you?
Because it definitely is, otherwise you wouldn't be doing it.
Is it true that it's causing you pain?
Is it true is ruining your life? Yes!
But it's also benefiting you somehow.
What is that way?
When you feel hurt and afraid and disappointed
but you can't face those emotions directly,
you turn against the world and begin to push things away.
We use cynicism to make sure we never ever get our hopes up,
only to be let down again.
Essentially we disappoint ourselves
before the world can ever do it for us.
But cynicism paints the lens you see the world through dark
and it also separates you from genuine awareness.
Whenever you have an antagonistic perspective about something
that someone else feels positive about
or whenever you want to deny or doubt or feel pessimism creeping in,
stop caring about whether you're right or wrong.
Guess what?
You might be either.
You might be very right.
You also might be wrong.
It doesn't matter.
Whether you're right or wrong
shouldn't stop you from being able to step back and ask yourself:
"All right...
In this situation,
how is this pessimism...
How is my:
"Yeah, right, that's not going to happen" actually serving me?
What is it protecting me from?
How is it keeping me safe in this specific situation?"
For example,
let's say that you sit down to dinner with a friend and they're like:
"You know, what?
I feel like this next year is gonna be great."
And you can feel yourself going:
"This person is an optimistic idiot".
Notice yourself having that reaction.
And really think about it.
"All right,
what does believing that this person is an idiot
and believing that next year is going to be crappy,
do for me?
What is it preventing me from experiencing?
How is this keeping me safe?"
#2:
You're gonna have to see yourself as a scapegoater.
Now, this should be extremely painful for you.
Why? Because most people who turn into skeptics
were actually scapegoats in their family dynamics.
And you know how painful that was
to always be made the problem even when you weren't the problem.
Why do I say that you're a scapegoater?
Because instead of making the person who let you down the problem,
You made the fact that you got your hopes up, the problem.
You scapegoated positivity.
Many cynics do this scapegoating of the positive
so as to preserve their relationships
with the very people who cause them the trauma in the first place.
In other words, it isn't dad that's the problem,
it's that I got my hopes up, that's the problem.
That way I can control not getting hurt again.
Not having the solution be in dad's hands
and still hang out and be close to dad,
without there being a problem between us
and still feel a sense of belonging.
Moving beyond cynicism is about getting really real.
I mean deeply into reality
about what the real problem was and is,
instead of the scapegoat
of the hope or the faith or the optimism
or whatever else it is you've been scapegoating.
Getting into reality about what the real problem was and is
so that you can create real solutions to it.
So...
What was the real problem
relative to things not coming to fruition?
Hopes and our expectations not being fulfilled,
disappointments and negative trends.
You gotta do this rather than scapegoat the optimism,
scapegoat the positivity,
scapegoat the hope or the positive expectations
#3:
Recognize that you set out to prove everything wrong
so as to not feel so wrong yourself.
If you prove everything else wrong,
you're not wrong, right?
Many skeptics feel like in life
other people either made or tend to make everything their fault.
So if they prove that the fault lies with other things
and people in the external,
they don't have to feel
that deep down fear that everything is their fault.
This is the insecurity that you can't face.
Anything outside facing this insecurity is avoidance.
And this is the real reason why it doesn't work
to argue with a cynic or a skeptic.
And if you're a cynic or a skeptic,
it doesn't work for you to argue with people
and for people to argue with you.
Why? Because when you do this
it simply reinforces this original wound of:
"You're wrong!"
#4:
If you are a cynic,
you're going to have to accept
a very vulnerable truth about yourself...
And that truth about yourself
is deeply hidden
under all the ways you act towards other people.
I mean all the ways you act are basically used to disguise
the truth of you.
Which is that deep down
your ultimate need is kindness.
What you really want is kindness,
but you would never dare reveal this vulnerability
or set yourself up to have your hopes dashed again,
and so you would never admit to it
or ask for kindness directly.
If you're a skeptic,
you tend to isolate yourself.
You tend to push people away
and give the impression that you don't really need or want other people.
This isn't true.
As a cynic
you don't want to be alone anymore than anyone else does.
It's just that you associate people with pain.
You want a relationship that feels good
and feels like ease
with people who are kind and considerate and who really value you
and don't let you down.
Here's the thing;
Your cynicism which is this coping mechanism that you've developed,
it hurts other people.
They associate you with pain.
Right now to be in a relationship with you,
they have to be willing to be hurt,
they have to be willing to be kicked,
they have to be willing to be pricked.
You're perpetuating the very cycle
that hurt you in the first place.
So what are people going to do
when they're so wounded by you?
Because this behavior hurts people,
that's what it does.
They don't want to be around it.
If you want society to change,
you can't be sitting there
waiting for them to change first,
so that you can change.
If you want to have people in your life who are kind
and who are considerate,
and who value you
and who don't let you down,
those are going to be the qualities
that you've got to offer other people.
Currently all people feel is stupid and wrong and unvalued by you.
This means they can't really share themselves.
This means they can't really develop intimacy with you.
I want you to sit with this for a minute.
Sit with the truth of this and sit with how sucky it may be.
What I mean by that is:
Sit with the idea of:
"How can I make myself safer and more pleasant
for other people to be around?"
Ultimately, do you want them to feel good around you
or do you want them to feel like crap around you?
If you want them to feel like crap around you,
you can continue doing what you're doing.
But most likely when you sit with this you're going to be like:
"Yeah, I would like if people feel safe around me,
I would like if they feel like i'm kind and considerate."
Okay, so how might you act in a way
that gives them that feeling around you?
And also sit with the side of you that's like:
"This sucks!
I don't want to have to be the first person to give this crap to people
when they're not giving the same thing to me."
I want you to sit with your resistance to doing this.
And also the part that may be interested in doing this.
The thing you're going to have to swallow
regardless of what you do relative to this point,
is that you're going to have to accept that the impression you give off
is that you don't want and need
exactly what it is that you want and need.
And that's not a recipe for getting what you want and need.
#5:
Most cynics come from families
where there's already a problem with happiness to begin with,
regardless of what is said.
Now, why do I mention this?
Because it's quite common in dysfunctional families
for a parent to say something like:
"All I ever cared about was your happiness."
When in reality,
any time the kid got happy,
the parent turned it against them.
The parent got frustrated.
The parent called them selfish.
Whenever the kid got its hopes up,
the kid got shamed for getting its hopes up.
So even though the narrative in a household may be:
"I cared about your happiness",
really there was an in general issue
with positive emotional states in general.
If you're a cynic
the vulnerability of positivity is what you're trying to avoid.
For this reason, it's critical to understand
your negative association with positivity and happiness.
And see that positive emotion
could in and of itself be a trigger for you.
Negating anything positive
is how many cynics control their rather wounded
and therefore fragile emotional system
by maintaining a predictable feeling of negative or monotone
so as to create predictability.
It's a "no real dramatic ups and downs
if I keep myself at a predictably low emotional altitude" thing.
But this is not the life you came here to live.
It is also not a recipe for fulfillment.
To understand this dynamic fully,
watch my video titled:
When Happiness Is A Bad Thing
#6:
Be brave enough to look at the wounding
that is hiding underneath this coping mechanism.
This means you're going to have to be attuned
to the subtle negative emotional trigger you have,
as a result of positive things.
Like people telling you good news,
or feeling hope creep up in you
towards what might happen in this new relationship,
or, you know... Anything that stirs
any kind of positive expectation in you.
You can use this discomfort that arises
as well as any accompanying thoughts like:
"This person's only doing this for their own self gratification".
or: "That's never going to work out" or: "The world's going to shit anyways"
as a doorway to this original experience.
And this way,
you can create resolve with that original experience
which changes your world today.
To do this,
I want you to use The Completion Process
Doing this process will help you to answer the question:
"When did I experience a trauma
in which my faith in people or my positive goals
or hopes or expectations or faith was dashed?"
When did I feel totally blindsided?
When did I become disillusioned?
What painful disappointment was too much for me to resolve?
To learn how to do this process
you can pick up a copy of my book titled quite literally:
The Completion Process o
r visit: thecompletionprocess.com
And select a practitioner to lead you through it.
You can also watch my video titled:
How To Heal The Emotional Body
And because disappointment is so often the deep wound beneath cynicism,
it would benefit you to watch my video titled:
Disappointment (How To Get Over Disappointment)
as well.
#7:
Like so many of the best coping mechanisms,
by this point
it has wound itself into your self-concept
so as to make it a part of your self-esteem
and therefore ego.
Your self-esteem and self-concept
is dependent upon cynicism now.
If you're a cynic
you maintain the coping mechanism
partly because you tell yourself that being cynical or skeptical
makes you more intelligent,
more experienced and worldly,
i.e. better.
Your sense of superiority is derived
from seeing what you call
the harsh reality of others in the world.
You tend to drive self-esteem through how dumb
and innocent and naive and inexperienced
you think others are when they're positive.
The reality is when you experience this original letdown
you didn't just turn against and scapegoat positivity,
you also turned against yourself.
Instead of making the real problem,
the problem which was the person who let you down, for example,
you made yourself the problem.
"I'm such a freaking idiot
for getting my hopes up in the first place."
Now whenever you see anyone else
who mirrors that original way that you were
when you had your hopes up at that moment,
it triggers you to respond to that person
the same way you responded to yourself:
"You're a naive freaking idiot."
This probably means that some work needs to be done
about that little part of you that got its hopes up,
that had faith and optimism
and positive expectations for the future.
#8:
Start the practice of 'And Consciousness.
And Consciousness is by far a better idea
to include as your self-concept
or part of your self-concept,
than cynicism.
Because it's far deeper in reality.
In fact.
Reality is comprised of polarities.
And Consciousness is a state of mind
where you develop the ability to hold space for extremes.
This is an extremely important part of the development
of both mental and emotional maturity.
In the moment we acknowledge a contradictory truth or state of being
and expand wide enough to be able to hold both
as if holding both is okay,
we have disidentified from both extremes.
We've ceased to become either or
and instead have become the thing that is holding both.
Reality includes both positive and negative.
Both faith and doubt.
The most conscious person in the world
is not a person who uses one to negate the other.
Or who recognizes one and not the other.
It's a person who is able to hold both
as a picture of the reality.
In other words,
it's not any more aware of a person
to be only aware of the negative,
than it is aware of a person to be only aware of the positive.
#9:
If you're a cynic, you're going to have to swallow the fact
that you are relationally traumatized.
What is relational trauma?
It is trauma that occurs within the context
of interpersonal relationships.
And that's you.
Whenever trauma happens in interpersonal relationships
a person loses their sense of trust in others.
Guess what?
You're a deeply distrustful person for a very good reason
and anybody who tells you: "You just need to start trusting people"
is not in reality.
Because to just decide with your free will to trust someone,
isn't actually possible.
But...
Trust in relationships is a key component of relationship success
and also personal happiness.
This means it's time to master trust.
To understand how to do this
or to take your first two steps,
watch two of my videos.
The first is:
Trust (What is Trust & How to Build Trust In Relationships)
The second is:
How to Create A Safe Relationship
#10:
As a cynic
you are trying harder to buffer yourself
from suffering and pain,
than you are trying to really see truth
or see reality as it is.
That being said,
I think one of the very best things about you
is that unlike a lot of people
you actually genuinely do have a desire for reality.
You want to be in reality.
I consider this
a crazy awesome trait.
You may be currently leaving the picture of positivity
out of the picture of reality,
but you want reality nonetheless.
And you're more brave than most
when it comes to seeing those unsavory elements of reality.
The opposite polarity from the one that most people want to look at.
You have broken out of many patterns of ignorance and falsehood
and discovered more of what is real
and you have seen the genuine problems in this world.
This knowledge can give you power in fact.
After all, your only access of power is to be in reality.
So I want you to ask yourself:
What have you become disillusioned with and why?
What is that disillusionment showing you
that you do want?
And how might you take steps
in the direction of creating what you do want?
Once you have that answer, do those things.
For example,
if the issue with the world is that people aren't kind,
and if you had to be the one to show people by example
what it looked like to be kind,
what would you think say and do?
As a skeptic your negative assessments are a defense against suffering.
You are deeply afraid of expecting anything
that turns out to be less than what you want or expect.
You spend your life disappointing yourself
and letting yourself down and countering hope and faith
before the world can do it for you.
This was a brilliant strategy,
but all brilliant strategies
can wind up being the very thing that harms you.
In your case, the very thing committing you to a painful life.
I'm not here today to make a case for positivity.
I'm not here today to convince you that the world is good
or the people are good, because let's face it...
You have so much proof to the opposite, it's almost ridiculous.
What i'm here today to do is to make a case
that you're living in a coping mechanism.
Not in reality.
And it just so happens to be a coping mechanism
that is preventing you from living the life you actually came here to live.
Have a good week.
If you liked this video,
be sure to share it, like it, and also subscribe to my channel
so you can see more content like this.
But I want to personally thank you for taking the initiative
and having the bravery to step into the space of awareness
not only for yourself, but for the benefit of those around you.
Subtitles by: Tanya Duarte