Podcast - Episode 0273 - Root Causes Of Insecurity

11 comments

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  • Natasha
  • August 10, 2022 at 1:26 pm

  I am currently going through insecurity at work. I’ve been at this company for 13 years and I’ve been promoted and due to restructuring have changed departments and roles multiple times along the way. The constant is change so you’d think I would be used to my role changing, but the latest change had a crippling affect on me. I actually experienced so much anxiety around my inability to do the job that I took a 2 month leave to recalibrate. I got on anti depressants, anti anxiety meds and started meditating and doing yoga everyday. Important to note that everyone in our department felt stress too. I often wondered why I couldn’t push through the challenges but my team members who were going through the shit show too could handle it. I like what Brene Brown said about difference between stress and overwhelm in Atlas of the Heart. When youre stressed you can figure out how to push through the challenges whereas when youre overwhelmed, you are unable to push through it. I’m paraphrasing. That’s how I feel about what I was experiencing during that time. Ovewhelm. I remember my supervisor and work peers told me I doing a good job and they felt overwhelmed too but I didn’t feel agree that I was doing a good job because the fact is, we weren’t. Everyone was figuring it out though and i was frozen. Its a deep insecurity and lack of confidence and fear of failure and I know I’m the only person that can change that narrative but it’s hard to know where to begin. Anyway, I’m back at work now and that project is over, but I am worried if the meds, yoga and meditation will be enough to help me handle the project when it rolls around again next year. I’m told since this was the first time project, leadership learned alot and we’ll have systems in place and tools to do our jobs next year, but there’s apart of me that doesnt believe it and the other side wants to because i like my department and organizatio and have worked really hard over the years. Im hopeful that it will work out and that I’ll end up being great in this role. Or, maybe we can find a different project for me to work on if the project is unorganized next year. I’m not the project leader and do not want to be. I like working behind the scenes and doing my job but I do need systems and tools in place to feel equipped to do my job and that’s not in place currently. My strength is not in creating those systems and tools and i wish it was because that would feel amazing to be apart of fixing it and making it better for everyone. All of this is to say that i understand insecurity and how it can affect people differently.

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  • Michael (A.A)
  • December 13, 2019 at 9:52 pm

  List of Things I’m Insecure About (Because NFs keep telling me to express my emotions whenever I ask for advice).

  I’m used to Ti and Ne but the other functions. . . I’m not sure about.

  1. That being yourself, especially with your own unique logical views, obviously makes people more likely to hate you.
  2. I live in a world where people just argue things with insults rather than actual logical arguments, so I can’t expect people to listen to me when it’s impossible to logically predict that people will listen.
  3. It’s not that hard for me to eventually get bored of a friendship once I’ve learned enough from them and them from me, so I question whether I’m a good person due to this. Sometimes it just feels like I outgrew them.
  4. It’s so hard to be emotionally vulnerable when nearly everyone else keeps acting like they’re not. So don’t just be vulnerable to feel closeness just for yourself, but for others too.
  5. I feel so out of place with other online MBTI communities, because they just focus on being aware of personality traits rather than doing anything about it in personal development.
  6. I’ve researched about all kinds of social issues, and I feel guilty whenever an activist complains a topic is too uncomfortable to talk about. Because damn, I can be bad at doing that.
  7. I question my ability to maintain relationships with shared memories, because when people close to me make inside jokes of events that happened long before, I don’t really remember.
  8. I question being a good person when having a lack of sentimentality may come off as cold. The past? Been there. Done that. I could care less about mementos, and while I do have nostalgia pangs at times, especially for those close to me, it’s much less than most people.
  9. I am sometimes frustrated about my lack of ability to relate to people’s need for “the good ol days” because while I’ve heard of the psychology bias that people are biased to see the past as better, it’s the opposite to me. The past? It’s full of embarrassing memories and past regrets where everything was so much worse so I rather not remember it. The farther back I remember, the dumber and more immature I am, not to mention a lot of family and friends around me too, so why bother?
  10. I question my goodness and ability to be liked when unlike many people’s habits, I rarely ever reach the point of idealizing something too much. Most likely I get too cynical. So whenever people talk about idealizing a romantic partner, idealizing a dream career or idealizing society hopes, I can’t relate and believe talking about how I see things would just upset people. I do realize the difference between pessimism and realism, but it’s so annoying to constantly only hear advice for people who idealize and are overconfident in things when I am the complete opposite. Rationally, I know this does not make me a bad person, but man does my lack of sentimentality of things make me look more unsympathetic.

  I guess that’s enough venting for now.

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  • Cecile
  • June 3, 2019 at 6:02 pm

  oh man Antonia, you literally verbalized my insecurities. It’s not the capabilities within myself but within relationships that I have insecurities. I’ve had abandonment issues since I could remember my first dream, which was me losing my mom in a mall and not being able to find her. But it’s carried on into every failed relationship (which isn’t out of the norm by any standard and I’m also still great friends with many of them) or friendships that end, either due to a clear reason or inexplicably. I am confident with how I handle situations or work or things that require my cognitive skills. I have no clue what I’m doing that’s good or bad or works or doesn’t when it comes to interacting with other people and building relationships. Which is really ridiculous from outside in because I know that many of my more introverted friends think I’m an absolute social butterfly. Perhaps overcompensating? idk. What you said about well, after it’s happened several times (losing people), perhaps it’s not the world or other people, perhaps it’s me. I’m facing with the realization it’s becoming increasingly harder and harder to shake off this feeling. :/

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  • Liam Beck
  • May 24, 2019 at 6:19 pm

  First time I’ve posted here, but I have been listening to your podcasts for a couple of years now and have read your book. Love you stuff. I make it a point now to listen each week as it is a way for me to “sharpen the saw” and remind myself of things I need to work on.

  I wanted to reply as you asked about our types and our insecurities and I wanted to give a quick story on me (male ENFP) and the woman I love (female ISTJ) who is my direct opposite. So the insecurities I am going to list for us are more around relationships.

  My insecurity relates to me feeling like I am never enough for someone. That people will grow out of love with me, so I tend to skip my co-pilot of Authenticity and do what I think others want because I think that will ensure they keep loving me. I’ve been working on this one quite a bit as it made me lose who I really was in my first marriage and it makes me self-sabotage myself as I’m no longer me and the reason people loved me is gone as I’m trying to be what they want and not the person they fell in love with.

  My ISTJ girlfriend is the opposite in that she knows how deeply I love her, but her insecurity is that she feels she can’t show me that love back. It’s not comfortable for her and she tends to hold back and she’s told me before how she is concerned she doesn’t know how to show me how she feels.

  So we get into this loop where I don’t feel loved enough so I want her to show me more. And she doesn’t know how to always show me so she hides in that and puts her walls up further. We almost broke up once for this exact reason until we both realized what is going on. When I control my insecurity I can look through this and pick up on the every little thing she does show me. And she doesn’t need me to remind her everyday of how much I love her, but give her the security that I see and recognize what she is giving me.

  It’s a challenge for two people who are direct opposites in our cognitive stacks. But when I settle down and can recognize my insecurities, and she does the same, we pick up on the important things and quit self-sabotaging ourselves.

  Great podcast and I look forward to the next part of this one.

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  • Pracchi
  • May 22, 2019 at 3:49 pm

  Hello there….l resonated with almost everything you both said..I’m an lNFP..l am a chartered accountant by profession,l was not interested in studying the subject but as l was unclear about what l wanted to do and as per my family’s wishes l pushed forward with it…luck was with me and l got good grades Everytime (even though I wished l could fail,so l could leave the stream) with so much mental/emotional pain… l am perpetually in a state of panic/insecurity in my job…as l don’t like or understand the subject…almost everyone around me says that I’m lucky to have a good job…but I know what kind of torture the past 15 years have been and still continue to be…it creates a lot of self doubt…wishing to have a different life…but don’t know how to start…as l feel alone with my thoughts and ideas…and also not knowing my limits in any thing else because living a lie everyday is an effort in itself….l turned to spirituality and psychology to keep myself sane all these years…