Everyone Hates Being Little
Everyone hates being little.
And we are all little.
We are all ants wishing to be whales.
But when you are little and you want to be bigger, you have to find something that makes you feel bigger.
For some, that comes from accomplishments. A trophy, a promotion, or even an encouraging word from your boss can go a long way towards making someone feel bigger.
For some, that comes from belonging to a community or organization with a goal. By belonging to a group of other little people achieving something big, a person can forget how small they are.
For some, that comes from love. To feel love to is to feel that illusion of bigness. That sense of being involved in something greater than the sum of its parts.
For some, it’s helping others. By shoring up the faults of other little people, you can bleed bigness into the world.
For some, it’s gaining a skill and using it. If you can build a bookshelf, fly a plane, fix a car, craft a bowl, or calculate an equation that allows us to move forward, you feel useful.
The problem with wanting to be big is that if you have no accomplishments to speak of, no real love in your life, no true skills, no organization to belong to, and no urge to help others, then the only way to feel big is to look down on other people.
It’s what enables people to kill others branded as inferior.
It’s why Alan Turing was pushed to suicide even though he enabled us to win WWII.
It allows people to dismiss the successes and lifetimes of hard work put in by women, homosexuals, people of other races, and transgendered people. They might have accomplished more than you but you can still look down your noses at them.
Everyone hates being little
And we are all little.
tags
And we are all little.
We are all ants wishing to be whales.
But when you are little and you want to be bigger, you have to find something that makes you feel bigger.
For some, that comes from accomplishments. A trophy, a promotion, or even an encouraging word from your boss can go a long way towards making someone feel bigger.
For some, that comes from belonging to a community or organization with a goal. By belonging to a group of other little people achieving something big, a person can forget how small they are.
For some, that comes from love. To feel love to is to feel that illusion of bigness. That sense of being involved in something greater than the sum of its parts.
For some, it’s helping others. By shoring up the faults of other little people, you can bleed bigness into the world.
For some, it’s gaining a skill and using it. If you can build a bookshelf, fly a plane, fix a car, craft a bowl, or calculate an equation that allows us to move forward, you feel useful.
The problem with wanting to be big is that if you have no accomplishments to speak of, no real love in your life, no true skills, no organization to belong to, and no urge to help others, then the only way to feel big is to look down on other people.
It’s what enables people to kill others branded as inferior.
It’s why Alan Turing was pushed to suicide even though he enabled us to win WWII.
It allows people to dismiss the successes and lifetimes of hard work put in by women, homosexuals, people of other races, and transgendered people. They might have accomplished more than you but you can still look down your noses at them.
Everyone hates being little
And we are all little.
tags