Do You Have a Glass Jaw?

I was skipping through the TV channels during an ad break on Thursday night (as men do) when I came across a radio broadcaster (Alan Jones) being interviewed on a football show about a racial comment one coach had made about an opposition player three weeks previous.

While discussing the incident, Alan also commented how another player (from another code of football) was also in trouble with their league for calling an opposition player ‘a dribbler'. Alan said he wasn't sure what a dribbler was and it's not a term I have heard - although I can guess it's meaning.

In concluding, Alan commented how we are becoming a glass jaw society.

And I have to agree.

When someone says we have a ‘glass jaw', it means our jaw is so fragile (made of glass) it only has to be touched or hit and it smashes. In other words, we are so insecure, if someone says something about us we don't like or is not 100% politically correct, we emotionally fall to pieces.

We are fast becoming an emotionally insecure society.

There are more and more laws to protect us from physical and emotional harm.

And the more protecting we need, the more insecure we become. We then become dependent on others at all times to do the right things by us for us to feel happy and secure.

It's like putting a child in cotton wool, or, as someone once said (I think it was Friedrich Nietzsche) "That which does not kill us makes us stronger".


So, what's the Solution?

The key is to feel totally secure.

To do this, we have to be totally happy with who we are and what we believe.

When we achieve this, the negatives that others say are like water off a duck's back. We are able to simply let them go.

Let me give you an example.

I was speaking at a seminar on self worth. The attendees were all from one ethnic culture. During lunch, four of the attendees began telling anti-white jokes - obviously not worried as to whether I heard them or not.

clive, what would you have done?

Would you have felt hurt?

Would you have reacted?

Would you berate them?

Would you emotionally put them down - for example, by telling a joke about their culture?

I simply let it go.

I knew, what they were saying was not a reflection on me.

It was a reflection on them.

It was a reflection on what they thought about themselves and life.

Other people do not define you. You do.

The problem is, most people have no idea as to who they are, so they let others define them.

You define who you are.

Once you define yourself, you then have the power to agree or disagree with what others say about you, your race and your religion.

What does the emotionally secure person have to prove?

Nothing.

They already know what their truth is.

If someone calls me ‘lazy', I know they are not speaking about me as I know I am not lazy. People will defend ‘lazy' when they fear being that way or fear being seen that way and they do not like it.

The irony is, once you feel emotionally secure, you no longer have the need to degrade another. You are committed to respecting and helping others.

Then, when you are called a degrading name, you shrug it off and move on, knowing (i) the degrading name is not who you are, and (ii) they have just defined who they are.

Back to the coach. While he said the wrong thing once, the media (and those listening and watching) have talked about it every day for three weeks. That means, the coach said it once yet the listener/reader has had them do the wrong thing 21 times (once a day for 21 days).

This is the multiplier effect and it's easy to let your brain become filled with negative information - which, in turn, makes you feel negative.

Maybe we should be teaching people how to feel emotionally secure rather than spending weeks, months and years complaining about how others treat us.