‘PERSONAL GROWTH: Part 2’
CAERS SUBSTACK ARTICLE #46
‘That which does not destroy you makes you stronger’ can be a comforting and even inspiring sentiment. Many of us might agree in retrospect that we have often learned about ourselves, and grown the most, more through adversity and failure, than through good fortune and success. The term ‘resiliency’ attempts to capture that to some degree. The author Nassim Taleb goes even farther by stating that humans have a quality referred to as anti-fragility: not just the resiliency of surviving misfortune but actually needing it and thriving on it. However, we do not always recognize such truths in the moment; pain and fear can compromise our ability to appreciate the potential for personal growth that hardship can often provide.
All living things have instincts designed for survival of themselves and their species. The most ancient parts of our brains are home to the powerful and near-instantaneous nerve impulses that control the reflex fight-or-flight feelings and behaviours required for our own survival. The same is true for the reproductive drive that ensures the survival of the species.
Fear is a universal experience, and perhaps more than any other feeling it is responsible for our very existence. Without it, living things would have died out many millions of years ago, so we should not be ashamed of something so useful. But raw fear can backfire at times; it can prevent us from engaging in rational thoughts and actions that might be more beneficial in the longer term. Though difficult, it can be very helpful to put time and space between raw fear and action when safety allows. Doing so offers us a chance to process our fear and thereby engage in activities that may give superior results. We can learn to forego many of the immediate behaviours based in irrational, reflex fear and instead opt for more deliberate behaviours based in a more rational fear.
Learning to rise above our brainstem reflexes to reflect upon the many options available is likely part of personal growth. It is interesting that if you ask people whether they are more knowledgeable or wiser now than they were ten years earlier, most would answer in the affirmative, and sometimes with an embarrassed cringe. But if you ask them if the same will be true when questioned ten years from now, their response may not be nearly so modest. At any given moment we may seem quite self-assured and confident in our understanding of ourselves and the world, and yet clearly that will change for most of us during the next ten years ahead. How often do we recognize that in advance? How much do we allow that to humble us to the point of being more open-minded and willing to change now? How many of us will spend the next ten years taking full advantage of such an opportunity for growth?
How much better, and less gruelling, might personal growth be if we could just seek wisdom from our future selves? But how willing would we be to heeding our own advice from the future? Disappointingly, we seem resistant to even learning from mistakes made by those who have gone before us as well. There is more than ample evidence that ‘l’histoire se répète’— history repeats itself—because we don’t learn from the past very well either. Is it the nature of humans to want to acquire life lessons for ourselves through firsthand experience, despite the pain involved? Is the struggle itself a crucial part of the teaching? Maybe we are more anti- fragile than we recognize or care to admit?
Perhaps if we valued more highly the perspectives of those who have gone before us or who are further along in their journeys, we would be better off. If we could humbly accept their often painfully acquired insights, might the world would be a different and more loving place? Are we prepared to dig deeply to find the lessons the pandemic has to offer? Even more importantly, will our future selves be willing to listen?
J. Barry Engelhardt MD (retired) MHSc (bioethics)
CAERS Health Intake Facilitator