Book Review – The Courage to be Disliked - How to free yourself, change your life and achieve real happiness
Review by Casey Douglass
I must admit that the
title of The Courage to be Disliked certainly jumped out at me
as I was browsing in my local Waterstones. Nestled amongst all the
books purporting to tell me how to get people to like me, was one
seemingly turning the issue on its head. That’s not to say that
it’s a manual for how to be an effective internet troll or
professional gobshite, it’s a book that looks at how chasing
certain things, such as being liked, takes away our freedom.
The Courage to be
Disliked draws heavily on the theories of psychologist Alfred
Adler, one of the three big names of twentieth century psychology,
alongside Freud and Jung. The form of the book is one in which there
are conversations between a philosopher and his pupil. These take
place over a number of nights and use the conversational manner as a
way to impart ideas, much like the Greek philosophers of old. I’ve
selected a few things that jumped out at me and written some thoughts
about them below. The book itself does a good job of threading things
together and going into the pros and cons of certain viewpoints with
a bit more finesse than I can, and it also weaves in other notions
and ideas that aid the reader in their understanding.
Early on, the
philosopher talks about the difference between aetiology and
teleology. The first is the usual link between cause and effect. X
happened in my past so I am Y now. Teleology turns things on their
head and looks at the potential purpose of a given state or
affliction. I am Y now because I don’t want to face X. Or, more
simply, I might want to get rid of my shyness so that I can talk to
the pretty woman across the cafe, but the shyness might be there
because it gives me an excuse not to talk to the pretty woman. I must
admit that for some situations and circumstances, I can see how the
teleological viewpoint makes sense, but for others it seems hard to
find out what the purpose might really be.
The philosopher
explains the differences between feeling inferior (which can be a
good thing if it creates a drive for growth) and an inferiority
complex, a state in which a complicated group of emotions feeds into
this inferiority, and it all starts to become an excuse for things
being the way that they are. In this latter case, what Alfred Adler
refers to as “apparent cause and effect” comes into play. For
example, some people say that they can’t easily get married because
their parents got divorced when they were younger. While the
aetiological view would see this as traumatic, and cause and effect
playing out, the teleological “what is the purpose” type view,
would basically call bullshit on that.
The sections about the
desire for recognition, and on freedom, were probably the most
interesting for me. They go into the idea of “the separation of
tasks”, how these can relate to a person’s interpersonal
relationships, and how all problems are interpersonal relationship
problems. Basically, the separation of tasks comes down to working
out who’s life task a particular “thing” is. The example given
is a child who needs to study. No matter what the parents do, it is
ultimately the child that has to do the learning, the parents can’t
study for the child. So in this case, studying is the child’s task.
Learning to separate your tasks from other people’s is key to
finding a bit of freedom, and living a little more true to yourself.
Relating this to “being
liked”, what other people think of you is their task, something
that you can’t do anything about. Sure, you can live in a way in
which you might hope people will like you, as no-one really wants to
be disliked, but living your life in the hope of recognition and
being liked will only lead to living your life for others, and
discarding a lot of your own tasks and goals. Only you can live your
live, that’s your task.
Another useful topic is
of how feeling that you have something to contribute to the community
(and community can be a vast thing in Adler’s terms) is what can
cause you to feel happiness. The issue of life as a journey vs life
as a dance also appears in the final section, the power of living the
“now” as best you can, and viewing life as a series of moments
rather than a linear straight line.
The last section also
touches on having the courage to be normal, which is something I
hadn’t really read much about before. Soo many books are about being
special, by way of your actions and achievements, but The Courage
to be Disliked has no qualms about looking more closely at this
drive. It asks “Why is it necessary to be special? Probably because
one cannot accept one’s normal self.” It then goes on to say that
when people fail at becoming specially good, they are quite likely to
switch to being specially bad, and I’m sure we can all think of
people who go for that kind of recognition. It also states that being
normal doesn’t equate to being incapable, which is something a lot
of the more bombastic self-help literature would do well to reflect
on, in my opinion.
I enjoyed reading The
Courage to be Disliked. Alfred Adler’s ideas are some that I’ve
only fleetingly come across in the past, but this book reminded me
that I would like to learn more about what he said. Some of the
concepts are very intriguing, even if some don’t really ring true
for me. This is a simple yet densely packed book, the kind of book
that needs a couple of readings, with space in-between to digest
things. On my first journey through it, I came away feeling largely
happy with what I’d learned, and even the things I was familiar
with, I heard about in a fresh way that brought about new insights
for me. If you fancy reading something that avoids the furrows
ploughed by the usual self-help fare, you might want to take a look
at this book.
Book Title: The
Courage to be Disliked
Authors:
Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Koga
Publisher:
Allen & Unwin
ISBN:
9781760630492
