Feeling Worthless
It is so easy to tell a person to do some linear set of things and expect them to change. It’s even easier to push a person, the way you push yourself, and expect that to work for them in the same way. I say that none of this properly prepares someone for the inevitable feelings of worthlessness that come when that person fails and has no own reference point to work from.
I take certain things very seriously. For example, I cannot be left thinking that I’m a failure. If I fail, it is a malfunction, a glitch, a disruption of the whole system. Therefore, I don’t have a mature response to failure. And, following from that, I have a terrible inability to regulate the emotions tied to failure, such as disappointment, anger, sadness, and regret. And that is also immature, since it stems from a quite logical and obvious root.
But that’s me. We must also discuss the system that instills worthlessness in others, i.e. the system of comparisons, competition, envy, and of course, one’s own expectations. And furthermore, we must understand why some people feel secure in themselves, others appear so but hide failure well, and others are genuinely unhappy, no matter how accomplished they seem.
You see, depression is something we Westerners take for granted. We say that good habits will fix the issue, or an attitude change will reorient the person, or perhaps we need some over-the-counter SSRI’s. These are all suggestions, not realities, and no matter how well-intentioned, these suggestions do not fundamentally change a person on their own. The other issue is that the world is cruel, more than ever before, and compels everyone to understand the so-called ‘rules of life’, preferably by a certain age. Whatever foundation we have — whatever principles, work ethic, mindset, etc. — that implicates us in the future. But the gap between the subjective and objective worlds is not discussed in great enough detail. The reality we share comes second to the intimate reality of our minds.
I say this too because worthlessness is not a predictable thing. You don’t see ‘healthy’ people saying very often “I am worthless, I must die, etc.,” unless there’s an external reason, like being fired from a job, suffering a breakup, maybe just messing up in general. But so-called unhealthy people suffer through the same issues, just more intensely, and they also have a mindset disparity. That is not to say ‘healthy’ people have no mindset issues, but rather that they are not as significant in the manifested sense. Health, after all, is something we can only witness as observers, but whatever goes on in the subjective story of a self is beyond our knowing. We can only feel it.
You get a lot of people listening when you tell them personal stuff, and you can only get some X number of responses from them, likely because there’s a bridge between you and every other being on this Earth — it’s part of the tragicomedy of this life. I try to be careful about whom I share vulnerabilities with, but I too get severely lonely and start spilling my life to people who aren’t emotionally available enough. Life is much more unclear than a ‘sea of different people’, and things happen that transcend my expectations — sometimes, that’s enough to break the worthlessness.
I genuinely enjoy that entirely distinct people see and feel commonalities. I often see that teaching is done in a thematically similar way by many experienced people (in a particular field), or I notice that certain ways of starting an interaction seem more natural and spirited than others, and of course this leads me to believe that there’s some logic to the whole thing. But other days, I realize that the problem of consciousness is unquantifiable — we cannot measure subjective inputs and outputs and hope to understand people. And once I realized that, maybe a few years ago, I decided to accept the flaws more, particularly in others (my own flaws are a more difficult case). I realized that we are all scripted to some degree, probably because a lot of our behavior exists in a system, and that has led me to be more accepting of human beings. But worthlessness, damned be that feeling, it comes creeping up when you least expect it. It’s always when you are doing something you trust yourself in, something you expect to do well because you’ve already done it so many times. But no, it doesn’t get any easier if you can’t accept yourself. It only gets more painful if you set expectations for yourself. We would all be healthier if we lived without ego.
Where was I going with this? I think it’s that we must try to understand human feelings of depression, despair, uncertainty, and form the best model of self-esteem. Countless times I’m told that I must ‘psych myself up’ or ‘believe in myself’, but that doesn’t convince a person who struggles with their own thoughts. Nor does it help to admit defeat and escape the problem, since the benefits of ‘exposure therapy’ are considered quite serious. I just know that if we were better at understanding the system of people, motivation, happiness, and attachment, we would be a better species. We have so much access to information, every belief system we can imagine, and yet if you sit down and talk about your vulnerabilities with someone, you’ll get transparent, generic cookie-cutter answers over half of the time. I wish more people were open about their genuine thoughts.
In today’s society, a person who feels worthless does not get any help if they 1. do not have the money to afford luxuries or therapy 2. do not have good friends or a partner who can guide them 3. Cannot consult their family about their feelings 4. Lack solid principles and values that can save them 5. Are missing a long-term existential reason to justify their lives. And this is a tenuous list, since there is so much that goes into our collective struggle with ‘being worthy’ and such, but also so much that happens ‘to a person’.
My solution? I believe we must never give in to those feelings of worthlessness, even when we are on the brink. I see any defiance of one’s negative thoughts as a revolutionary act, especially when those thoughts come from a source other than yourself. Often, it is not that we take issue with ourselves, but how we perceive ourselves and are perceived. That’s very important — it implies there’s nothing the matter with us, only the way we react to perceptions. I know those feelings to be very real, especially when we struggle with failure, addiction, loss, a lack of productivity, but that is not something that ultimately defines us, unless we let it define us.
In the end, the hero is the person who takes their hardships as a blessing.
