Opt Out of Cynicism

ITT: Instead of being an overt narcissist, be a covert narcissist! :)

An apparently popular and easy way not to complain about problems is to simply stop yourself from perceiving them. The bigger the problems get, and the more you are confronted with them, while you forbid yourself from recognising that any conflict exists, the more it begins to look like the problem is your own lack of faith or "positivity". So the worse things get, the more you double down on your faith by putting increasing amounts of energy in to maintaining a delusional belief system designed to deal with problems or conflicts by explaining them away as an internal problem with yourself or your own emotional tate.

Does this sound like a recipe for improving your situation? Or anyone's situation?

To me, it sounds much more like a reliable method for the cultivation of increasingly bizarre thoughts and erratic behaviour.

What if you, instead, did the bracelet trick for every time you avoided a confrontation with the world that you know is necessary? What if you just console yourself with the fact the the world has problems and the vast majority of them cannot be solved by you (since you are not the omnipotent force)? You do realise that you don't have to stop caring about the problems, right? You know that it's just not worth investing energy in to worrying about things that are completely out of your control, right? That isn't cynicism, it's the picture postcard of mental health.

The reason is, you have pre-decided an emotional polarity and you're consciously expending effort to compulsively fit the reality to the emotional polarity that you desire. That is the opposite way round to what you need if you desire both accurate perception AND healthy emotional regulation.

Anyway, good luck with it.

The article mistakes nihilism for cynicism.

It’s kind of obvious that a nihilist doesn’t want to effect change in society. It’s not true at all of cynics.

In fact, most people who influence large scale change display some degree of cynicism.

Now the article also equals cynicism with “people who complain”, which is also incorrect.

Really what the OP means is “if you want to change society you shouldn’t be a nihilistic asshole.”

That is difficult to disagree with…

> By realizing that the world is always changing, and by stopping to complain, we opt out of seeing the world through cynical glasses, and become part of the change. When we realize that our life can change, we can change it.

i think cynicism is a survival tactic that people adopt, when facing a reality that they can't possibly change. Change is not always an option, unfortunately. Also cynicism isn't synonymous with complaining - it's more a way of looking at things, that also comes with its own kind of humour.

i think that "cynicism" is a loaded term, and that creating a dogma against it can be a form of toxic positivity. pretending that something is good, when it obviously is not, is gaslighting plain and simple. gaslighting is a form of abuse that breeds actual, lasting cynicism, and it must be avoided at all costs.

that said, non-constructive complaining can also create and spread caustic and degenerate mindsets.

like everything, it's a balance.

applying habit tracking to one's own complaining is a great idea though!

You seem to be focussing very much on the problems with other people, and with society. It is true that society has major problems and that, in your life, you will regularly encounter predators of all stripes. And that those predators apparently enjoy comfort, success and even admiration that others find difficult to access.

But on the other hand, I would feel pretty sad if it is the case that you (or anyone) are so consumed by this that you cannot find joy or purpose in your own life.

Sometimes it is the more profitable strategy to realise and accept that it is very difficult or impossible for one person to fix the major and obvious failings with reality. But it is actually quite achievable, through introspection and rational thinking, to identify and modify our own reactions to those things when our reactions are negatively impacting our ability to experience a quota of joy and happiness that is sufficient to keep negative ruminations about the world to a manageable level.

At the end of the day, we are just animals. And for whatever reason, nature has seen to it that we are quite capable of experiencing a reasonable amount of joy and happiness just by going through the activities required of us to sustain our lives. Breathing, drinking, eating, moving around, fighting, cooperating, resting, attempting to reproduce, and so on.

If it were not so, then what would be the likelihood of our continuing to be here? Given that we must go through many years of this stuff, without giving up, in order to pass on our genetic material before we either kill ourselves or die.

Have a nice day, friend.