The Problem With Being Right

<p>If you haven’t realized, I have a bit of a stubborn streak. I like to be right. It’s a thing I do. Once, when I was arguing with someone because I <i>knew</i> I was right and I just couldn’t let it go, he said, “I can tell you really like to be right.” It was just an observation - not a judgment. He even said it kind of nicely. “You really like to be right.”<br /> </p><p>And I was like, “YES, I like to be right? Why would I <strong>not</strong>? Do <strong>you </strong>go around letting people think things that are wrong?” And he looked at me like, yeah, that’s an option. </p><p> </p><p>Blew my mind. And I wasn’t sure I agreed. </p><p> </p><p>Years later, I looked back at this moment and realized that sometimes, it’s not all about being <strong>right - i</strong>t’s also about being <strong>happy i</strong>n this precious life we have. And we often thing being right will help us feel happy...but that’s not how it works. So I started to wonder… <strong>Why</strong> was I – and so many others - so driven to be right?</p><p> </p><p>One reason is that we are trying to protect ourselves. There are a lot of us out there who have a limiting belief that we are somehow damaged, broken, not safe, or not good enough (or all the above!). These ideas usually started from the messages we received when we were a lot younger from our primary caregivers and others who had a lot of influence in our lives.</p><p> </p><p>Most of the time, when we have this type of belief, we also try to keep it stuffed away because it feels pretty crappy. Maybe we start to see glimpses of these beliefs arise in meditation or in our disproportionate reactions to certain things – but usually, but we try to keep it all tucked away so it doesn’t interfere with how we’d like to see ourselves.</p><p> </p><p>One way we do that is through this psychological defense mechanism called reaction-formation. This means that when we have a really painful thought, we turn it into its opposite. Like the insecure guy who acts like a pompous ass acting better than e