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Do you think you're special?
Probably a common feeling that many eventually "grow out of". So I guess the follow-up question is if that happened to you, what made you change? And if that didn't, how did you manage to hold on to the belief?
Hell yeah. You are too.
Ha! I believe Syndrome would have something to say about this.
Thats something I always found kinda off about The Incredibles, how they act like that idea so sinister.
Like, at the end of the movie the "happy ending" is that Dash finally gets to join the track team, and Im just like, why would he even want that?
He doesnt need to train, he doesnt need to try hard, he doesnt need to apply himself consistently, hes not doing his best, none of the normal reasons a child would feel pride in athletics. Hes just getting cheers and applause for being inherently superior to others.
But he still has to show up for practice every day, and specifically not exercise so as to avoid revealing his powers. If I were Dash Id be super bored waiting around all day just to slow walk down a 100 meter stretch.
Ever been better at something than others?
Did you enjoy participating in that with others or were you bored because everyone else was beneath you?
I mean, I ran track in middle and high school. And once I actually got good at it, it was less fun, honestly.
Its way more interesting to be in the middle of the pack, and to be competing and passing people and trying not to get passed and stuff.
Once you get pretty good though, youre kinda just doing your own thing most races. Youre focusing on trying to get a PR and improve your time more than worrying about place, until the end of the year. Which is also still rewarding, to see yourself improve from your efforts.
But that means nothing to Dash, because hes intentionally going slow the whole time. A PR is meaningless to him.
Exactly. He's not chasing a PR, he's participating in a sport with friends, celebrating their achievements, building relationships, having fun. Winning isn't everything.
That's just one reason I've never understood the hullabaloo over trans athletes in school sports. Even if there was evidence of boys claiming to be trans just to dominate girls' sports (a patently ridiculous notion pretty much on its face), do we really need to be so precious about the sanctity of school sports competition? Will society crumble if a kid on puberty blockers manages to get to a podium?
Seems to me the most useful aspect of sports is that it gets kids being active together with other kids and forming social bonds. That's a greater good than finding the best shotputter in the 13-15 age bracket, by my lights.
I lack that bone in my body that gets a person super sweaty about competition though, so maybe I'm off-base.
That would require parents to realize and admit that their kids aren't special.
By and large, their kids are average, but they won't admit that. So another child that might have an advantage that they, the parents, can ostracize they will and will blame their child's lack of accomplishment on instead.
"Forming social bonds" with trans kids is just as much a nightmare for these people. What if, * gasp * , those kids become accepted into their groups and society!
THE HORROR! WHO COULD THEY BLAME THEIR OWN MEDIOCRITY ON THEN‽
When ever I hear the "Men in Women's Sports" line, I ask them to name 3 WNBA players.
That tends to short circuit their brain a little bit.
Yeah, I suppose not.
I'm reminded of a sentiment I've heard from various musicians over the years that I generally agree with: you want to be the worst player in any band you're in. Being surrounded by people you can learn a lot from will push you to improve, even if only just to keep up, and that pursuit of self-improvement is one of the things that makes playing music so addictive. You'll never be the best there is, so it's an endless journey; hard to imagine it being so rewarding if you are already as good as you'll ever be.
In the context of the film, I guess what Dash might have gotten out of that was a sense of belonging, hanging out with other kids with a similar interest.
In hindsight I think you got a point, in the film superheroes everywhere have to hide their superpowers in order to fit in society. If everyone got superpowers then no one have to hide.
I feel like it sorta worked for the Incredibles, but a lot of subsequent Brad Bird works feel more nakedly objectivist. I'm curious to see how his upcoming film pans out in that regard.
Agree with this sentiment, it's super healthy to think you're special, because it helps you understand that you're worth it.
//soapbox
I had a string of bad relationships in my teens and early 20s where they HATED that I thought I was special. They constantly tried to talk it out of me, called me entitled, etc etc, I ended up so depressed I almost died. I think the internet culture does the same thing to people, we're constantly posting images and videos of really ridiculous examples of people totally ignoring everything around them and calling those situations "entitled" "self absorbed" "main character energy" etc etc and I think that culture totally misrepresents what's happening in the images, and it's harming all of us.
I'm healthy now, because I am the main character in my story, but that doesn't mean that I ignore the people, animals, situations around me. That doesn't mean I'm an asshole.
Where does the line between self-worth and self-absorption get drawn for you? I have a tendency to undervalue myself because I'm not sure I always know where that line is, and I dread getting too close to it.
Seeing and accommodating people around me is separate from my self worth, in fact the more comfortable/confident I am in myself, the more brain space I have to give to others.
I find I end up stuck in my own head ruminating on things when I’m not feeling great, so focusing on my own health first always helps me be the person I want to be for my friends.
Edit: I realize the above comment might be cryptic if you’re lacking some self worth journey context, a simple way I learned self worth in my head is just, it is all about you. You are you. They are them. You interact from your perspective, and all you can do is be open to theirs. This makes you, by nature, self absorbed. It’s all you can experience. Lean into it, be the best you that you can be, and you will also be a good friend.
I can think of at least two interpretations of "special". I'm super-curious which motivates your post, since that could drive so many interesting followup thoughts.
Egotistically special: "I'm not like the others".
Enlightened special: "I'm amazing but so are others. It's not zero-sum. I can love my self and my unique qualities while equally loving all the other unique energies the world gives off".
Fantastic question! I guess both, because I think the 2 forms are related.
To start, specialness I think necessarily implies some sort of comparison. Maybe one rank higher than others when applying some metric (and thus "better"), maybe it's just a matter of being different when one has some features that the others don't. Someone may be special because they can run faster than most people, or be special because of their unique combination of life journey and decisions which provides them with a set of experiences not identical to anyone.
The egotistical version seems to suggest a more absolute attitude, maybe the person is the best at some metrics and extend to believing those metrics matter more than others, or maybe there's an aggregate metric than combines all the disparate ones such that at the end they'd still rank on top. The enlighten version suggests the person recognizes there are multiple metrics, that they're better at some and worse at others, but importantly, there's no ranking between the different metrics.
However, in either case, the person still come out knowing that they're special (and what makes them special). This distinction focuses on the person's attitude toward other people, but I think I was wondering more about the person's attitude about themselves. What does being special mean to you? What led you to adopt those metrics as what make you / someone special (or not)? Did your feeling of specialness ever change over time, if so how and why?
What prompted me to think about this question is getting randomly reminded that back when being a kid, I used to think of myself as intelligent and that made me special. At some point that feeling was lost to time, likely due to regular exposure to plenty of smarter people and work/life turned out as normal as any other people. If I were to sit down, I could list out stuffs that prove I'm smart and that I'm not, or areas where I'm better than some and worse than others. But the exercise did not provide any more clarity than before. Looking back, my believing in being special probably came from being told I was special by parents (but also maybe not, memory that far back is hazy). There's a sense that objective metrics are just red herrings and what makes something/someone feel special is based on something else.
So I think I'm trying to understand the feeling of specialness, and hoping that hearing other people's thoughts and experiences would help.
Edit: phrasing
Thanks for this amazing followup. You gave me a lot more to think about. I fear my response won't do justice to everything you're saying, but here goes...
Excellent insight. I agree you're probing something deeper than how I summarized it. I still think the deepest answers somehow involve our relationship with our ego, so somehow comparative elements have a place in the story. But maybe what you're identifying is that the ultimate feeling is sub-rational. As many of our strongest feelings are.
Your progression sounds so common. If we're born into good families we're rightfully given constant emotional support to help us develop into healthy human beings. As kids the whole world is ahead of us - it's a world of unbound potential and constant encouragement to explore our talents and consider what they might offer to the world. And we only have so much social exposure so we're not fully aware that our greatest talents aren't unique.
Even aside from that the world is just newer: we're still building knowledge and relationships, there's more new adventure to be had, our responsibilities are limited so we have the freedom to explore and connect. It's all a virtuous cycle of supportive development.
And then slowly over time we become more "adult". Less hand holding, less support for exploration for its own sake, more responsibility, higher expectations. We start to face more of the tough, merciless world head-on, without filter. And we're more expected to handle it with whatever coping mechanisms we developed from that earlier period. The game is real now. We're fully in it. And good luck.
I don't see how that wouldn't be taxing on someone, as they bear more and more weight, and need to rely more on their inner selves to keep balance just to keep their head above water.
So maybe what I'm saying is there's natural child to adult environmental changes as we age. With more weight put on us and more expectations we handle the weight on our own. Our environments are by definition immersive: they surround our thoughts and feelings constantly. So we're inevitably going to feel that shift, even if not consciously.
And in my opinion one of the greatest challenges of adulting is to somehow remember our inner worth, remember all the best feelings we felt as young people with all our potential in front of us, and find space to exercise that part of our mind and soul to internalize that again, even if just a little bit, as a reminder that the stresses of our current environments still aren't everything that's out there.
Thanks for your wonderful followup to my followup! I'll have to mull over this for a while (and everyone else's comments as well, y'all have so many varied perspectives!). It's a good point, when we were kids we felt as if we could do anything.
Weirdly enough reading your description of how the experience is common for many of us feels more comforting than how I imagine I'd feel now if being told as special (edit: the adult equivalent is maybe 'outstanding'). Maybe what made being special felt attractive at the time was actually the feeling of being well-supported.
Really interesting post. I'm going to riff on what you said a little bit.
You talked about how your own feelings of being special came from observing or being told that you were more intelligent than other people throughout early and middle school, and that you then lost that feeling because you kept running into people more intelligent than you. (To paraphrase poorly.)
I have a very similar start but a different end. Throughout the early and middle stages of my life, I kept being sorted into increasingly differentiated groups, frequently with a warning that this next time, I would be outclassed. That never happened. I have, of course, at this point in my life met multiple individuals who clearly had more g than I do -- typically but not always people from elite academia -- but the relative rarity of that means that rather than taking it as a sign that I'm not special, it's more like a sign that I belong in that club.
So I do feel special. Professionally administered IQ tests, standardized testing, etc., puts me in the top 99.xxx% of the population. At a certain point, to claim that I didn't feel special because of that would be much closer to self-denigration than to humility. However: yes, I am very bright, but that doesn't mean that I'm inherently good at everything, not even everything relying purely on intelligence. We often think in terms of raw processing power for everything when that's really not how the brain works at all. Studies have consistently shown that people vary enormously at discrete skills, even people within the same band of overall intelligence. So yes, I feel special -- and even superior, frankly -- but so what? There's more to life, and more to being a good person, than being smart.
This is not something I discuss very often because it's unnecessarily arrogant (whereas this way, it's only necessarily arrogant). I mention it now to provide a foil to your view.
I definitely believe that I'm special, and I believe everyone else is, and I believe Syndrome can eat a big one.
Growing up I, like many here, was told I was special. It was an explanation of my school performance, good and bad. It was an expectation of future performance, which was equal parts inspiring, incorrect, and hurtful. It was true.
It was also relative. When you're in a small town, a small school, a small world, it's easy to be not just special (unique in the universe, as we each are) but exceptional (above average, not falling into typical ranges), at least in some regard. There were things I could do that nobody around me could do so well. Few of them were socially valuable, like being good at sports would have been. Nobody "cool" cared that I could, before the age of 16, guess a grown man's pants size from 10 feet away to a high degree of accuracy. But it was something that made me exceptional. I was also academically gifted (for certain values of "gifted"), which didn't necessarily endear me to other kids, but impressed adults and could make life easier later. I was also exceptionally annoying to my teachers, but they tended to let that slide.
But then I went to college. I met other exceptionally academically gifted kids, and they were more exceptional than me. It hurt. They were driven by the competition; I was daunted by the work of keeping up with them and gave up. My mind was accustomed to being a big fish in a small pond, and the ocean in which I found myself (in reality, another tiny pond - a small, private, conservative college nobody has likely heard of) broke me for a bit. I have a need to be exceptional, healthy or not.
It took years to realize that the existence of people better than me at something did not negate my own exceptionality. People that score like me on standardized tests are a dime a dozen at universities. Not so at the hardware store I worked at after I dropped out of college. On the other hand, people who know how to change their own wall outlets, rekey a lock or properly use a glass cutter are common in hardware stores everywhere, but are exceptionally rare in the frat houses I've visited. Being exceptional doesn't mean being the best. It means being rare in context.
I'm monologuing (dang it, Syndrome). But my rambling has reminded me of a scene from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, wherein the main character (an extraordinarily average man) finds himself stranded on a planet where technology is somewhat primitive. He doesn't know how to turn any of their resources into food, or how to build his own hut, or anything useful in his new context. But he finds a niche - he knows how to make a mean sandwich. His adoptive people have never seen such a thing, and he has tons of practice, so he becomes the closest thing to a restauranteur in that society. It's played for laughs, and at the time I first read it (as a still-academically-exceptional high-schooler) I assumed it was making a point about how unexceptional modern society makes us, that we become useless. Maybe that was the author's point, he was awfully pessimistic on modern society. But now I'm coming to view it as a demonstration that exceptionality is all about context.
Sure, you may be a ho-hum coder at your big tech firm, but you'd be the best anyone's ever seen at thousands of small businesses. You might be so bad at your favorite video game that you can never get into competitive, but you dominate in your friend group. You might not be as funny as your friends, but you're the funniest dude at the office. It's all about context.
And sure, some people derive their drive from being surrounded by exceptional people - they tend to gather, after all - and use that drive to improve. But if you're burned out, if you've hit your own personal ceiling in the skill, and you miss being exceptional, then try to find a new context. It's tough to do, and often very luck-based, but if you nail it it's so rewarding.
But even if you don't find that niche, I think it's ok to believe you're special. We all are. You might just need to find the right people to recognize it.
This is a beautiful take that I agree with wholeheartedly. And for what it’s worth I did always read the optimistic view on Arthur Dent and his sandwich making, I saw it as a glimmer of hope even in Adams’ clearly deeply depressed writing in that last book.
So, with the hope that people will understand the context I’m coming from when I say this and the deeply mixed feelings I have about it: I was the “gifted kid” who never hit that wall, who people kept seeing that way well into my adulthood and career. And I am proud of that, it does drive me in a lot of ways, I do have some of the material rewards to show for it. I’d be colossally ungrateful to really complain about it.
But it’s deeply isolating in a lot of ways too, it creates a distance that my decidedly unexceptional and frankly somewhat below average social skills often aren’t up to bridging. It comes with a host of mental illnesses and related struggles that I have to believe are the other side of the coin on whatever parts of my brain and mind make certain technical skills feel more natural to me than talking, like all my capacity was dumped into the latter at the cost of the former. And even then, I’ve never once felt I’m really living up to my potential, however hard I try and whatever other people tell me.
I guess what I’m saying is I wish more people shared your understanding and looked for the whole diverse array of niches and contexts that people can excel in. Not only would it be much needed recognition for the people who fit within those niches, it’d take some of the laser focused pressure off the areas that people do already think of too.
Thanks for the kind words and perspective!
The isolation is real for sure, I remember feeling it a lot in my youth. I think there can be a flip-side to finding a niche for your own giftedness matrix at work, and that's finding a social/friendship niche. As before, it's highly luck-based and (depending on the niche available to you) potentially at a high risk of toxicity (see the incel community, which started innocently as a place for people with a certain type of perceived social deficit to gather and find friendship or commiseration, but turned into... well, yikes).
I've lucked out majorly in both places, and I'm so grateful. I fell into a career that is shaped around my interests and skills, which is fostering new skills I didn't even know were within my reach. I also, through fortunate happenstance, have been brought into proximity to a couple of people who took an interest in me and keep me from falling back to my social default (reading at home).
I hope you are doing well though the mental challenges, too! I'm still coming to grips with that part of things, I think.
And the "potential" thing... Well, I've been disappointing people who could see my potential for decades, so at least that part is fairly well scarred over for me. Disappointing myself sucks, though. I have to make an effort to affirm to myself that, even though I'm not a rocket surgeon or whatever I could have been if I were, fundamentally, a different person with none of my deficits, I am pretty badass at what I do sometimes and I occasionally make other people's day better, which is all that really matters anyway, I think. I try to focus less on how far I am from what I could be, and more on how far I am from where my worst traits would like to drag me. I'm improving, I'm trying.
I really appreciate this, all of it, and I wanted to say a big thank you in particular for ”I try to focus less on how far I am from what I could be, and more on how far I am from where my worst traits would like to drag me”. It’s such a succinct framing of a concept that’ll do me a lot of good to hold on to, and that’s very meaningful to have.
Not really, and frankly teaching people that they are has been a complete societal disaster.
Teach everyone that they are the main character, then do surprised pikachu face when they behave like one.
I often joke that Mr. Rogers was the worst thing that ever happend to me as a child. He convinced me that I was special and that I should behave morally and expect others around me to do the same. I've been struggling to cope with reality ever since.
I'm being tongue in cheek of course... Sort of.
I think Im special, but being special doesnt necessarily mean youre destined for anything special.
Im going to end up a very special person who lived a very unremarkable life.
Not sure if I’m special or just autistic
We used to soften the blow, so to speak, by calling neuro divergent people "special". With that in mind, perhaps both apply.
(This is a joke, no foul intended)
I’m special to me because I’m the main character of my own life. I’m special to my loved ones because I’m a part of their life. On aggregate, across all the people in the world, whether I’m special or not is just splitting hairs. We’re all just animals on computers.
Special? I'm not sure what that means.
Incredibly fortunate and lucky? Absolutely. Does that make me special? I'm not sure. I'm in a better position than a lot of my friends and cohorts, but I don't believe I've worked particularly hard or sacrificed much to be where I am.
I guess maybe I'm special in so far as I tend to get along with most people and am able to empathize and find common ground, which seems generally uncommon. I think that's helped me be lucky and fortunate.
I think I'm in the same boat as you. just a fortunate guy that is sociable and lucky enough not to have any mental struggles. I kind of think we're a slight majority in total, but a slight minority amongst most people that seem to talk about themselves online.
Each person is unique, including me. Sometimes I have struggled with understanding what makes me unique or valuable, understanding why others value me, and separating the two.
Special can be loaded, and I think in English it has come to have some negative connotations that are hard to ignore—disabled, "gifted", inherently superior, or even problematic ("well, isn't that special?").
I love the affirmations in The Help: "You is kind. You is smart. You is important." I think being diligent or determined might be more important than being smart, though.
Absolutely not. I don't really believe that I'm special in any sense of the word. Not really even unique.
I would say even that well-meaning family members trying that rhetoric with me has caused me a lot of distress.
No and I believe that thinking you are is harmful to the self and probably the wider world.
I'm the same as everyone else. Of course there are things that I'm better and worse at, relatively speaking, but I'm just a human, as is the prime minister and the heroin addict living in the park that steals bike wheels for a living. We are the same.
Accepting that has been beneficial to my sense of equilibrium and my happiness, having grown up on a diet of specialness from my parents that led to a sense of expectation and dissatisfaction.
Eventually I lived long enough to have better context for how big a number 8 billion is.
Realizing you're not particlarly important in the scheme of things is freeing, I highly recommend it. But that truth doesn't take away from the importance you have to the people who matter in your life. That's entirely real.
I feel that being able to trace a series of events from elementary school to now that allows me to be where I am and who I am grants me to the ability to think I am special, or at least lucky.
Here's the brief story of why I feel special or at least lucky:
Essentially I feel since divorce until today my life had a series of radical shifts that allowed me to be where I am today. Which I am very thankful for.
I also feel that I am smart in being able to get things done when the pressure is on but somewhat dumb otherwise. I feel quite special in getting most of what I want to achieve.
Going off on a tangent.
I find it hard to believe that most people who say they don't consider themselves special aren't simply paying lip service to the idea...
Every one is special to themselves, we're our own viewpoint.
We can compare how much people have trully accepted they are not special by how selfless they behave. On a scale from Epstein to caricatures-of-Saints type of personality.
(I'm not saying "noone is trully selfless so that excuses not being a saint", I'm saying "prove you're selfless with costly action, your words mean very little")
I'm going to make this a combined response to yours and @macleod's comment below, "Of course, and you don't then you're not human". I think both of them are anathemic to good discourse. If you don't believe in someone when they answer a question, or if you deny their humanity when they answer differently, then you aren't really open to learning or understanding anything about an opposing viewpoint to your own.
It is certainly possible to feel that one is not special and still be human, and not just paying lip service to some idea of what it means to be or not be special. It comes down to whatever definition one uses to define "special" and there's a lot of meat on the bone in that discussion.
"Self" and "Special" are very different things. I understand the concept of self, and I know that my "self" is different from every other "self" on the planet. I think that is what the two of you are talking about when you say "special". However, to me, that does not denote special. "Special" is comparative; there should be something not normal, something important, something extra to being thought of as special.
I am not special; I am one of eight billion. There are no physical, cognitive, psychological, social, behavioural, or biological measurements by which I could be thought of as special. The degree to which I excel at any measurable trait in the measurements I just listed is what makes me different from any other person, but that difference is not necessarily remarkable, and the understanding of my lack of remarkability is not lip service to an idea, or inhuman. It's just an understanding and acceptance of myself.
I'm struggling to make the link honestly. We are each our own viewpoint, of course, but it's not exactly a leap to realise that that applies to everyone. An awareness of the uniqueness of one's position doesn't imply that it's the only unique position. So it's hard to see how that makes anyone special and doubly hard to see where selflessness would necessarily come into things.
Special? Overall I don't like the entire idea around framing talking about oneself or others this way. I get that it's used in positive and negative ways both but I think it's a clunky and nebulous term that lends itself to ego or bumper stickers or other trite nonsense ways of talking about humanity.
Everyone will perceive this word in different ways too- ask each person what they mean by "special" and you'll get 1000 different answers and those answers will in part be informed by the actual reality of the uniqueness of every human's experience. So let's cut beneath the layer of terms like "special" and get down to the reality. Because asking the question without being explicit about the definition makes the question itself rather meaningless.
We need to use better terms, we need to talk about humanity, and each other, in down-to-earth ways, etc. We need to cut the trite bullshit, and I think the use of "special" to describe oneself or others almost always falls in this category.
We all have our uniqueness, we all have our ways in which we're similar to one another. We all have our own life experiences, upbringings, influences, and thousands of factors that have shaped us. I am fortunate to have had, even with all of it's flaws, good material conditions, upbringing, life experiences, and plenty of circumstances completely out of my control that shaped me into who I am today. There are plenty of unfortunate parts to that same story too, but many people have had far more struggles than I have had.
None of this necessitates throwing around the word special like a trite motivational poster or an ego-fueled feeling of superiority. If you have a great talent or are extremely knowledgeable about certain things or you fit "traditional" ideas of what's considered high intelligence or whatever- fine, that makes you unique in your particular way, and maybe that trait is rare- or whatever. Be grateful for whatever benefits life has bestowed upon you- but realize at the end of the day you are simply another human being- no matter how rare and good you feel about your position in life- use it to bring others up instead of feeling superior
That superiority will turn you into an isolating and destructive person and we have enough of those ruining the world at the moment and they are an anathema to what we really need
Sometimes knowing the right question is half the answer. Had I known a better word, I might not have felt the urge to ask :)
Though I take from your answer that we should do away with the aspects that make us feel superior, and hold onto what let us feel unique and fortunate, yeah?
Yeah and I don't intend my statement about the question to be a criticism of you asking it that way- and to be fair, the fact that people are answering it many different ways might give us more insight than if you had asked something narrower.
But yes, I feel like no matter which way I interpret special the word just carries a different baggage with it in each case, that just doesn't ever really get at what it's trying to describe. I think I get, in some interpretations, what it's trying to go for but it just never feels like the right way to describe it
But ultimately yeah, hold onto and be grateful for what you can, and even if you feel rather unfortunate, find the joys available, don't compare yourself to others, realize that a thousand different factors combined to bring you to whatever place in life you currently are- and just work with that the best you can. It's like- the ability to celebrate one's individuality reasonably without taking all the credit or all the blame for it, and without letting it go to the head, or sacrificing community and connections with others and realizations of what we have in common. Nothing wrong with being confident or appreciating ones own talents and skills and so on. Delicate balance and it's difficult for me to articulate well.
No worries, I also knew you didn't criticize me because the point you made were very well articulated :)
I wish I was special, but I'm a creep. /noise
Special can be taken as "a novelty of the universe", which everyone is, and special can also mean "privileged above others", which being an American white guy, I apply for as well.
Yeah. But also no.
I think I have a unique set of characteristics in specific that no one on earth has, has ever had, or ever will have. I think everyone else does too though.
Also, I think I'm more similar to everyone else than I am different. I don't think any of the thoughts I have are particularly unique, and my life is very similar to tons of other people around my age, gender, nationality and so on. It's very unlikely that anyone will think about me in even a fleeting way in 150 years. Way less if I end up not having any descendants.
I don't think that's a bad thing though. I'm not burdened by fretting about things like legacy or the afterlife or anything like that.
I just kinda focus on enjoying my life, making things a little better for the people around me, and that's about it.
I think a lot of the problems we have are caused by too many people thinking they're special, as in, wholely unique and more deserving of things than others, then people thinking they're not, as in, the same as everyone else and completely unimportant to anyone.
Both are problems though.
Everytime I think that I am, I learn that I'm not. Everytime I think that I'm not, I learn that I am.
Especially when moving around into the world though, I feel more like a background character. Feels like I'm constantly between the two states.
I've been writing those fleeting thoughts in my WisdomDump.
I'd call myself weird/different, not special. I do like that about myself though, normal is a terribly boring thing to be, far better to be abnormal. Thankfully people seem to be embracing being different, even if they still try to keep others contained to their new normal with far too many labels.
I used to think I was more special, butt after seeing the wide variety of people on the internet and finding others have what makes you special (even some without your flaws) and seeing how well your actions can be predicted or even manipulated due to data gained from other people linked to your data, the whole special thing goes out the window. There's so many humans, even the more unique people can find others just like them to an uncanny degree. A truly special person among billions would be an extremely rare find. Though a special person is far more likely to exist if you constrain the group of people being compared to that person. A special person in a village would be more likely than a special person in a city.
Of course that is using the special as in a real trait that makes you better than others. There's also special relation, most people have someone who considers them special (and not the sarcastic kind). Family, friends, fans, students, etc... it just takes someone who sees you as better than others, even if you have no actual special qualities.
You are special, just like everyone else.
I think one operable definition is to be in top/bottom X% of the population in some way or another, and to be able to demonstrate it to some degree. I think you really need something like that if you want to say anything of substance, otherwise it's just too vague and error-prone.
Personally I suspect I could be special in my music listening habits because I've often been in the tail end of the distribution for some metrics (e.g. diversity of genre listened to) on last.fm and Spotify, although I couldn't tell you which % that really corresponds to in the global population.
I probably did though I was more special when I was young, but it's just realizing there's more people like me that I thought when discovering more of the world than my little region that made it go down. So I went from "I'm the 1%!" to "ha, I'm actually 10%".
Believing that you lead a novel, charmed and special is a cheat code for exactly that.
With so many "fake it 'til you make it" style anecdotes in support of the notion, I'd argue that there's true power in positive thinking so long as you're honest about your achievements and actively savour them when they happen.
There is that of the Spirit in every one. Perhaps I have something unique to offer to my family, friends, and community, but I am no more immanently worthy or virtuous than anyone else, in whom the Spirit also lives.
I used to think I was individually special, or destined for great things, or deserving of certain privileges, because it was how we were raised. In hindsight, I think that sets people up for disappointment. It also instills feelings of entitlement and sometimes elitism that affect a lifetime of political decisions, which is unfair to others.
As a mortal, subjective creature with limited emotional capacity, it's not physically possible to care equally about every atom in the universe. The self is a fair, simple point of centrality for any consciousness, but it's unfair to use that to justify extreme inequality or cruelty. When I'm following my best habits, I center the Spirit. As an imperfect person, I am not always successful. We are always learning: this is continuing revelation.
Some people are able to accomplish special things, which is laudable, and I think earned entitlements are different than inferred ones. This need not be obsessively hierarchical. We could all do a better job of listening for and supporting each other's gifts. Comparison is narrowly useful but not when it leads to bitterness.
I'm special in the sense that I have a unique set of features, traits and history that together are unique to me as an individual. Doesn't make me superior or inferior to anyone else. I suspect that's the case for the vast majority of us.
Yes and no? I don’t think I deserve special treatment, or that I have some unique trait that makes me better than others. I feel special because I have more people that love and support me than I can count.
And out of me and my wife, I’m our dog’s favorite.
Of course, and if you don't then you're not human (and that makes you quite special).
Why?
I feel this is how we end up with manifest destiny and other harmful notions
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(-;
I think I am special in a few ways (mostly in the "ahead of my time" arena) but IMO it's just a factoid about me. I don't need or demand special treatment for being who I am.
Once upon a time, I was special. I was a principal dancer in my dance troupe and was basically "famous" in my cultural community because of it. I also had very undiagnosed ADHD and lived with a narcissistic emotional abuser and an "everyone else is an NPC" autistic (my parents), and they never did anything to dissuade me of that notion that I was special and mildly "famous." They liked it because it gave them clout as well. Even my parents' divorce was highly publicized/talked about in the community because they were my parents, and drama surrounding them was drama that could potentially hurt me (it did, but massively for the better).
Now, though, I know I'm not special, and I'm honestly ok with it. I have completely escaped that community, no longer talk to one of my parents, am low contact with the other, and am properly medicated. I don't feel the embarrassment I once did for my "downfall," and I am honestly so glad I am a nobody again like I was when I was a little kid. I lost a lot of people who I considered to be friends, but I have some of my best friends and a small, insular support group and am happy. I was not happy when I was someone. Now that I'm a nobody, I'm happy. Not healthy, because I could never be healthy after the things I put my body through for the love of dance, but mentally, I'm much better off.
Even though I still live in the same area, no one comes up to me and talks to me about my dance life or the drama in my family. They just pretend I'm some regular person like everyone else.
Do you still do anything related to dancing, and how do you feel about the activity now?
I miss dancing every day. I miss what I was once able to do and how my body felt and moved. I have a lot of limitations on my body now, especially heat and exercise intolerance.
I started taking a tap class since it's a different style than I was doing before so I wouldn't compete against my memory of what my body knew how to do. I would come away from other styles of dance crying because I couldn't keep up.
I also took the entire summer off from classes thanks to the heat intolerance. I basically can't exercise in the summer unless the AC is blasting directly at me and the dance studio I go to doesn't have AC. I'm looking forward to going back in the next few weeks!