Solving the Insecurity Problem
the two most
important days of your life the day you
were born
the day you find out why mark twain
i’ve heard that quote a number of times
over my years but the last time i heard
it
i versed in the tears i believe it’s
true
it’s taken me a long time but i have
found purpose that is bigger than myself
that is not even about me
my mission in life is to end the
unnecessary suffering
caused by the fear of not being good
enough
to have connected with that purpose is a
beautiful experience
as a young person looking also to find
purpose
it can be a daunting task how do you
solve the purpose problem
well let’s start with how not to solve
that problem
your purpose is not to try and inspire
people
to greatness while that is the stated
intention of many social media
influences
drawing attention to themselves by their
great achievements
triumphs over adversity with a message
that you too can be great
no one has ever been inspired to
greatness by someone telling them that’s
what they need to do
the people who have inspired me the most
have never once
stated that was their intention
your purpose is not to prove somebody
else wrong
there are people doing all kinds of
amazing things in the world right now
purely driven out of a desire to prove
the naysayers the haters
and the doubters wrong someone told them
they shouldn’t they couldn’t and they
wouldn’t
and they are driven to prove them wrong
but even when they’ve achieved the
impossible
they are no more fulfilled or satisfied
than when they begin
it is out of insecurity that many people
look
like they have found purpose yet it is
simply an attempt
to validate their own existence and
prove that they matter
your purpose cannot be to prove that
your matter that you matter
your work as you become an adult
is to discover that you do matter with
nothing to prove
and nothing to defend then you’re able
to show up in the world with your cup
full
then you have something to give then
you can connect with purpose that is
bigger than you and not even about you
to solve the purpose problem you’ll need
to solve the insecurity problem first
now thankfully throughout time there
have been people who have done just that
they have found a way to show up at
their best where it matters most
not hindered by this fear of not being
good enough and success
leaves clues my work
has been to understand the path they
have treaded to make it explicit
so that you too can solve the insecurity
problem in your life
there are seven essential practices it
turns out for people who have solved the
insecurity problem
the first one is to step into the light
yoda says named must your fear be
before banish it you can
if you don’t know what you’re fighting
how could you possibly win
people are insecure about being insecure
they run away from that fear
while it is dangerous and vulnerable
until you
become clear about what you feel what
your fear really is you cannot begin the
process of changing it people are
imagine they’re afraid of failure or
rejection
that is not the deepest level of fear
both those two things are outside of
your control
the fear is the fear is far more
personal than that
having failed or been rejected what do
you fear that says about you
now it becomes personal that i am a
failure
or that i’m not worthy of love the
universal fear
under all others is that we are somehow
inadequate
each human being must face this fear
this fear left unaddressed
causes suffering the first process the
first practice is to name that fear
to be clear about what your opponent
really is
from there the second practice is to
hand back the victim card
this was a game-changing idea for me in
my own process of solving the insecurity
problem
made possible by the knowledge that as
human beings we are storytellers
we’re sense making creatures we go into
the world and we tell stories about our
experience
from the moment we have any conscious
awareness we are asking and answering
two questions
but everything we see hear and feel why
did this happen
and what does it mean about me
now psychologists teach us that in built
in our dna
is a negativity bias designed to keep us
safe
so you can imagine how this questioning
plays out especially when we have
children
in the face of pain in the face of loss
in the face of disappointment
asking why did this happen and what does
it mean about me
affected by negativity bias we tell
negative stories about ourselves
these stories become our beliefs
they become the narrative that we live
out of they become
self-fulfilling prophecies they become
our insecurity
see when people discover they’re
insecure then they go work out why
people think they’re insecure because of
what has happened to them but that’s not
how the world works
life is not about what happens to us
it’s about the meaning
we place on the things that happen to us
when i discovered that
it changed everything i discovered i was
not the victim
i was not the actor in the story
someone else had written i was the
storyteller
i was the one with the pen i was the one
deciding
i was no good it was all me i wasn’t the
victim in the story i was the bully
when i got that i realized if it was me
that had created this story
then i’m the only one who can change
that
the third practice for people who have
solved the insecurity problem is to dial
up the pain
now pain is a gift designed to protect
you from future and worse pain
designed to move you toward safety when
you put your hand on the fire
it’s supposed to hurt that is pain
lovingly tell you to get your hand off
the fire so you don’t destroy your hand
feeling no good about yourself is
supposed to hurt
that’s the point that is pain telling
you that is not the way it’s supposed to
be
that is pain pleading with you to change
to deal with that at its core
and move towards safety real safety pain
is a gift
people have solved the insecurity
problem have used pain this way
most people use pain against themselves
see every cell in our bodies is designed
to avoid pain and pursue pleasure
most people have linked pain to change
to the uncertainty of the
unknown linked pain to dealing with
dysfunction
therefore pain is resisting your
progress
if you are to solve the insecurity
problem you will have to
focus on the pain of being here of
feeling no good about yourself
and create a threshold moment
where whatever pain is involved in
change it cannot be as much pain as
staying here
now you have what it takes to proceed on
the journey
while all change starts with a focus on
what you don’t want that is never enough
to sustain
a meaningful lasting change journey
there must also be a focus on what you
do want
which is practice four everyone who has
solved this problem has had a compelling
vision for their life
which is not about moving just away from
pain but moving toward pleasure
solving the insecurity problem is like
the hero’s journey
you are the hero in the story and the
hero needs a quest
there’s got to be a mission drawing even
when it gets hard
without a sense of desire for what it is
that you really want your life to be
about
there is nothing strong enough to keep
you making progress in the face of pain
and fear
what do you want is the most difficult
question in the world but it is the
adult question
what do you want and what are you
prepared to do about it
it means you’ll maintain progress even
when it gets hard
now as the hero in the story at some
point every hero
realizes they need help
but it’s not just any help it’s the
right help
there’s a gandalf there’s a yoda
there’s a dumbledore
who come and equip the hero to do what
the hero needs to do
now when i when i discovered this
patterning around help there was an
interesting distinction
in order to solve the insecurity problem
you must get help from someone who
doesn’t care about you
people who care too much about your own
self-esteem can get in the way out of
that caring
they will try and solve it for you
i grew up on a sheep farm in rural new
south wales
when i was 12 years old my dad who was a
wool class up
took me into the shearing shed and asked
me if i thought wool would burn
i didn’t think it did he said watch this
took some wool been freshly shot and lit
a match underneath it
it caught on fire straight away he took
the match away however
and the fire went out just as quickly as
it had started
lanolin the oil in wall is flammable but
only when exposed to an external flame
paper on the other hand needs a needs a
spark it will continue can sustain its
own fire
my dad said something to me which i’ve
never forgotten jamin this is
this is what it’s like working with
people it looks like they’re burning
but it’s all you the moment you stop
doing what you’re doing the fire goes
out
the hero knows he needs a spark the hero
knows
he needs fire but the hero knows
this is dangerous but the wrong help in
the wrong way
would trick him in to think he’s making
progress
and keep him or her disempowered and
stuck
finding the right help was essential the
sixth practice
sooner or later the hero was alone
realizing that no one is coming to save
him the sixth practice is to go fight
the dragon
while it’s confronting to realize that
no one is coming to save you
there is no other way the insecurity
problem was not created outside you by
someone else’s words
is your own opinion of yourself if
someone else’s words could have fixed
this for you already
it would have if someone else’s
encouragement
could have actually made you feel good
about yourself long term
it would have had alright it would have
already if affirmations and kind words
from others could have worked
a quick glance at instagram and the
first three memes
would have solved the insecurity problem
for you
that’s not how it works
at some point the hero knows
they must face the dragon they must
discover for themselves are they
good enough or are they not this work of
being the hero means going all the way
back to the beginning
the origin the inception of that story
to face that fear
all the way back to the start to
deconstruct that story
incredibly confronting but there is no
other way to prove once and for all that
you matter
having deconstructed that story having
rendered it make no
sense
the final practice is to rewrite the
story
so you are already the one with the pen
you wrote the first story so you’re also
capable of writing the next one
in solving the insecurity problem the
question is not who are you
the question is who do you want to be
we’re storytellers
people who succeed in life do so off the
back of the stories they tell
they tell better stories than those who
don’t
having the pen and paper having cleared
the slate you are now free
to define who it is that you are and
what are you going to do
you are now responsible for your own
identity
that is solving the insecurity problem
you are then free to show up in the
world at your best where it matters most
with your cup full now you have
something to give
now you are free to connect with purpose
that is bigger than you
and not even about you in order to solve
the purpose problem
you must first solve the insecurity
[Music]
problem