Near the beginning of my meditation journey, I did a lot of reading on the topic. And by a lot, I mean a lot. One of the books that seemed to influence me the most was 10% Happier by Dan Harris. In that book, Dan mentions his father telling him, “The price of security is insecurity”. As someone who naturally worries a lot in his day-to-day, the quote struck me. He later amends the quote to “The price of security is insecurity, until it’s useful”. This stayed with me.
A few months later, as I was working on my relationship with my girlfriend, this quote came back to me. We both have dealt with insecurities in our relationship with each other and this quote kind of helped me put it in perspective. Now, I’m not writing this post to say that insecurity is bad. I’m a tad bit more nuanced than that. But borrowing from Dan, I’d like to say that insecurity is great for our relationships, as long as it’s useful.
The following are the ways our insecurities can be viewed through the scope of our relationship –
When Insecurity can be beneficial |
|
If your partner’s eating habits inspire you to adopt a healthy lifestyle. | If your partner’s eating habits cause you to have |
If your partner’s attractiveness causes you to pay more attention to your own image (to a healthy level not bordering on vanity). | If your partner’s attractiveness causes you to be |
If your partner’s charisma inspires you to improve your own conversational skills. | If your partner’s charisma makes you actively avoid or skip social situations with them. |
If you are comfortable with your partner having their own hobbies and friends. | If you fear that your partner may abandon you if they pursue hobbies outside the relationship. |
When your friends/family’s approval of your partner makes you happy. | When your friends/family’s approval of your partner makes you jealous or feel terrible about yourself. |
If your partner’s past doesn’t affect your relationship with them. | If your partner’s past makes you insecure and causes issues & arguments in your relationship. |
More often than not, we tend to push away negative feelings like insecurity to the side and bottle them up so that we don’t have to face them. If you’ve heard me talk about mindfulness, I believe that the only thing that leads to is basically an active volcano that’s going to explode one day. Even an emotion/feeling such as insecurity, one that has such negative connotations attached to it, should be explored.
Exploring our emotions is the key to understanding ourselves and ultimately, bettering ourselves. If you have any questions or need any advice, feel free to reach out to me at mohan@bebetteratyou.com and make sure to follow us on Instagram as well!
Insecurity & our relationships.