Better Than…

Todd Hayen

It seems that the concept of “better than . . .” has completely left the human experience. And wow, what a big deal that is! I mean the entire foundation of human, as well as animal, evolution is based on “survival of the fittest.” Even if you do not believe in the Darwinian concept of natural selection (I don’t, not entirely) you have to see the positive results of attaining a level of personal excellence in one’s own lifetime.

Isn’t working to be “better than . . .” the whole drive behind living? We are always working toward behavioural excellence, physical excellence, and spiritual excellence (or enlightenment, or whatever word you want to use here) or at least we should be.

As a kid, we were focused on being “better than Jimmy kicking the ball” and winning the school soccer tournament. As we grew older that drive matured into working to be “better than I was last year” or last week, or yesterday at any particular task or state of being.

Is it really true that we have “evolved” to a point where none of that matters anymore? That we can just stagnate and never “move forward” and never become “better than . . . (fill in the blank).” Is that really what the point of being human has become? You are good enough as you are, you are the same as everyone else, and you are the same as you were when you were 10 years old and that is just fine.

People seem to be missing the fact that the essence of a human being, regardless of skills, or depth of understanding, is divine and sacred out of the box. It is the material self that may have “faults,” that may need improving, and the material self certainly should focus on developing skills and expertise.

As I said, that is essentially the purpose and meaning of being human.

And maybe what I am saying here isn’t the intention behind all of this bunk about “everyone is a winner” and “we no longer want to advocate a competitive environment” and whatever other “woke” baloney is currently going around.

If so, what is the line they feed us? “Children should not be left in the dust if they don’t have the same abilities and skills, or the same socio-economic background as the other kids. Or the same racial privileges.” “We are all equal, and we should all be treated the same even if we are not.” Yeah, that baloney.

The problem with that ideal is that it is just simply untenable. We are all born different, quite radically different in fact. And that is not only a fact, but in a very real sense is quite beautiful. Isn’t that what all the fuss about DEI is about? That we are different? At least they tell us that, but of course, the truth is the opposite of what they (the woke culture) push on us—everybody should be the same, not diverse.

Yes, we certainly do not all have the same opportunities. This is where the real fight is. Limits put on us by government and the ruling class regarding freedom to express ourselves, and the freedom to access equal opportunities (within the limits of our skills, our body limitations, and our ambition and interests). Obviously, efforts to level the playing field in these situations have gone quite a bit overboard in a number of instances. The fact is, the playing field cannot be levelled, and more importantly, it shouldn’t be.

We all have a purpose in this incarnation. Some of us come into this life at a clear disadvantage—born without legs, born a minority, born dirt poor, born without a full mental deck, born with no talent, etc. Some of us come into this life at a clear advantage—born perfectly healthy, born in a privileged class with lots of money, born with exceptional mental capacity or athletic prowess, born a musical or artistic genius. As I have said before, it takes all kinds to make this world the interesting place it is.

Our “job” as a spirit/soul living a manifest reality is to take what we’ve got and make the best of it. Maybe it is our time in this go-around to push through huge disadvantages and face nearly insurmountable challenges and obstacles. Maybe it is our time to be bullied, made fun of, face ugly bigotry, etc. Or maybe it is our time to be handed life on a silver platter and through that life of privilege learn true humility and altruism. We all have something to do, and being pushed into a “this is easy” state will certainly have an ill-effect on our ability to do what we have been put here to do.

Even if you take the metaphysical woo-woo perspective out of this statement, you are still left with an organism that was created to excel, to push through without fear, and to make the best of what it has been given. Even amoebas do this. Why is this so difficult to understand?

So, you may say, why is it detrimental to help that organism along in its arduous journey? Help is one thing, giving it winnings when no effort has gone into getting them is another. Remember the first time that you heard you should never help a chicken crack open and get out of its egg no matter how difficult the task may seem to be? If the little chick does not exert effort getting itself “born” it will be robbed of the necessary energy required to help it have a healthy heart and muscles needed to survive. The analogy is clear here. Kids, and adults too, need to face challenges in life in order to develop into healthy beings. They need to feel the “agony of defeat” to develop healthy character and to equip themselves to excel in future challenges.

As I type this, I feel like an idiot preaching to the choir, and I am baffled that people do not just naturally know what I am saying here (I am pretty certain all of you reading this know). Obviously, most people do not, because this whole topic is cause for quite a bit of mess out there.

I understand when people are set up with unfair challenges, racism, physical deformity, and poverty. But again, there is nothing we can do about a lot of these things except to continue to work on areas we can work on. You don’t work on racism, as an example, by essentially wiping away historical racism and say it never existed (as in censoring books, or creating media that rewrites history). That is an insult, and clearly an effort by the bigot class to “normalize” history. But most of the problems I am citing here do not have to do with giving a poverty-ridden kid whose family generations back have been subjected to the unfairness of racism. I don’t think there is a problem helping kids where they can be helped. But making everyone a winner just isn’t the way to go.

We all have challenges to face in life, some have more (a LOT more) some have much less, but as I have said here, we have been given a problem to solve, and we must be allowed to solve it through our hard work, our intelligence, our pure heart, and our resolve to make our lives as full and creative as we possibly can.

We must face our greatest fears and slay whatever dragons who present themselves. Only then can we find meaning and purpose in our physical lives. We cannot let this insane system take away the joy and feeling of accomplishment we experience when we have succeeded in our efforts to excel. At the same token, we cannot allow this dehumanizing agenda to rob us of the opportunity to understand our limitations and embrace our resolve to “do better” when we face defeat.

Todd Hayen PhD is a registered psychotherapist practicing in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He holds a PhD in depth psychotherapy and an MA in Consciousness Studies. He specializes in Jungian, archetypal, psychology. Todd also writes for his own substack, which you can read here