We all find early in life that there are things we are especially good at doing It doesn't matter to us whether the thing is safe, productive or valuable to others. Some of us find we're good at things that society judges at criminal, addictive or self destructive. All that really seems to matter to us is that we're good enough at to succeed, get our way or do better than some others.
Whatever we have that works for us usually gets us into some trouble. We may become overconfident in our abilities and proven successes. We may idealize the thing into being the very best. We may get the idea we can do this thing flawlessly and meet perfectionistic standards of approval. We might even think there are not no limits to what we want do successfully or accomplish according to our plans. We may assume the satisfaction in this comes from others' approval, admiration and payment.
Any of these misconceptions is a "bubble". We become full of ourselves and extremely inconsiderate of others. We've inflated our expectations of how much of life we can control and which consequences we can escape. We become conceited about thinking we're right while assuming we're merely confident in our outlook. We're stuck on ourselves as if nobody else matters to us. We're overcompensating for another side of our personality that we refuse to admit to ourselves.
Whenever we've got caught up in a bubble, we're asking for the kind of trouble that will burst that bubble. We're need of a slice of humble pie or someone to knock us off our high horse. We could benefit from a reality check to deflate our expectations. We could use some feedback about how we come across to others and what impression we make on them.
When our bubble gets burst, the "meanie" who did it to us seems inconsiderate, malicious or vindictive. There's no way they we're acting as a friend, had our best interests in mind or saw how to help us get around a blind spot in our awareness. We experience our confidence getting shattered, our thinking getting refuted and our ambitions getting trashed. We typically fall into the pits of despair from what proved to be very shaky ground. It's dark down there in the pits as if we have become nobody in the midst of nowhere with nothing to do. We wallow in self pity or indulge in depression. We experience this place at painfully empty and frighteningly out of our control.
Some us of never get out of these two places. We go through life oscillating between inflation and deflation, more bubbles and getting each one burst. There's seems to be no alternative worth considering or within our reach. We opt for continually experiencing the trouble with bubbles.
There are many ways to stop going back and forth in bubble trouble and get into a new way to live. I've explored many of alternatives here:
- Taking a broader perspective to consider what incidents mean to you personally, how they show you new possibilities to consider or indicate a change to work on.
- Getting out of a stuck place by making a move at a deeper level
- Taking an interest in others' interests to really relate to things they care about, get motivated to explore further and enjoy even when nothing comes of it
- Becoming a different person by discovering how much freedom you already have to see, choose and respond differently to present circumstances
- Playing different roles among the people you know as if everyone is continuing to learn about themselves and others
- Becoming more aware of our baggage to find the purpose it served and others ways to satisfy its objectives
- Create some sensible winning to get ahead in ways to seem more personally significant and valuable than mere conquests
Each of these strategies, and many others, will bring an end to the trouble with bubbles in your life.
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