“The Plague of the Importance of Being Important”
by Kelvin Chin
Life After Life Expert
We often hear in these times of the COVID-19 pandemic the use of the word “plague.”
What does the word “plague” mean?
Webster’s Dictionary says: “a disastrous affliction, an epidemic disease causing a high rate of mortality.”
I want to take this idea a bit further, outside of the COVID-19 context. Perhaps shine a light on a bigger problem, an underlying problem, maybe even a cause of the “psychological plague” that has infected the human race for millennia and continues to wreak havoc among us today.
The “Importance of Being Important”
First let’s start by briefly addressing some commonly discussed psycho-social ills that we all have seen that afflict our species.
I think most of us would agree that bias exists in our world 🌎. “Bias” means preference. Plain and simple. It comes in many forms.
Height. Weight. Economic. Health. Race. Ethnicity. Age. Gender. Sexual preference. Nationality. City. Sports team. University. Company. Diet. Eye color. Hair color. Baldness. Vocal. Quiet. The list could go on.
You get the idea. We are all biased about something.
And it is not inherently a bad thing. I would argue it is necessary to make assessments. To discriminate in life. That’s what “discrimination” used to mean before the U.S. culture labeled that word negatively in the 1960’s when it became almost exclusively associated with racial prejudice.
So bias is real. Necessary. And not bad by itself.
What is bad is when we ignore our biases. When we become unconscious to them. And we act indiscriminately without forethought. And when those biases become hurtful to others.
When I was in elementary school, the “mentally challenged” kids were intermingled with all of us in gym class and during recess, i.e., play time before school and after lunch. Some kids would tease them and make fun of them. I would intervene. Tell those kids to stop ✋ 🛑 To leave them alone. And I would talk with the challenged kids sometimes — publicly and privately — so they knew they were also “like us” and not just different due to their mental abilities.
It is not that I didn’t see those kids as different mentally. Of course I did. And it’s not that I didn’t prefer to play with my other friends. Of course I did. But I drew the line when I saw hurtful behavior directed at them. I did not allow that in my presence.
We cannot control the thinking and actions of others. But when in the presence of bad behavior, we can act. Or not. That is a choice we each have.
So bias is real. But how we handle our biases is up to each of us.
Another example from my youth… When I lived and worked teaching meditation in Asia in my 20’s, I many times observed racial bias. I had previously personally experienced it growing up in a Caucasian dominated Boston suburb. But in Asia it was different.
I observed Caucasians being treated negatively by the dominant Asian culture. This was a brand new experience for me. And it was very apparent — not hidden at all — that it was because the Caucasians were racially not Asian.
It was apparent both in the disdain, the sometimes outright visible look of contempt on the face of the Chinese or Koreans I lived among when they interacted with some American, British or Australian Caucasians. And it was verbally apparent in what they called them — translation from Chinese — “white foreign devils.”
Now, please understand I’m not here to get into a political colonialism discussion. That’s not my point. Because I have also witnessed many instances of justified anger by the colonized cultures.
So what’s my point?
The tribalism that exists worldwide.
The separation that humans do when they are in groups.
And why do we do it in a way that is sometimes hurtful to others?
I think we are all — yes ALL of us — without exception — sometimes afflicted with the “Importance of Being Important.”
And we use it — usually unconsciously — when we feel tired, disempowered or insecure.
Why?
Because it makes us feel good.
Why did some kids bully the mentally challenged kids at the Cleveland Elementary School in Norwood, Massachusetts in 1960? Because it made them feel powerful, “better than someone else.”
Why did the Chinese shop owners snicker behind the backs of the much wealthier (arguably more powerful) Caucasian women and men, and talk about them negatively in Cantonese so they wouldn’t understand? Because it made them feel more powerful, “better than someone else.”
At least temporarily.
And so we go on. And on. And on. We repeat that behavior for generations and generations. We teach our children by our behavior and they in turn teach theirs.
And these scenarios are repeated worldwide hundreds of millions of times a day.
Every day. Every year.
In every culture.
We as a human race need to stop 🛑 and think about this tribal mentality — the “group think” of manipulating various biases towards others to make us feel good. Think and reflect on this behavioral pattern we have created for ourselves worldwide 🌎 for the past 400,000 years.
And especially when that tribalism leads to cruelty.
“Cruelty” is when someone gets pleasure out of hurting another person.
And why do they act cruelly? For the same reason we discussed above. Because they feel weaker, more insecure, less powerful at that moment. And by demeaning someone else, we make them feel worse so we feel better.
It could be caused simply by fatigue or low blood sugar — I have had moments like that when I snapped at my kids unnecessarily when I was exhausted or too hungry from driving too long without a break. We have all had moments like that.
Or in a more complicated psychological profile, the insecurity could be deeper and less transient, perhaps caused by the powerlessness and lack of love ❤️ shown a child by a father especially in the child’s formative years. Even maybe resulting in such a lack of sensibility for the needs of others that the “Importance of Being Important” and its cruelty component causes sociopathic behavior in the child later as an adult.
These general principles of the “Importance of Being Important” and “Transcending Cruelty” were introduced in the 30thNovember talk I organized in 2014. And they are topics that the spiritual group, the Movement, that some of you may have heard me discuss in my classes, has encouraged us to discuss further.
In conclusion — and to be continued — because this is a long term discussion that I hope will continue among us for millennia 🌎 worldwide — bias or preference is real. I would argue it is neutral, neither positive nor negative. But when our biases become exercised in a hurtful way — perhaps instigated by our need for the “Importance of Being Important” to satiate our insecurities — then that cruel behavior needs to be curbed by providing the means to develop more inner security.
While the list of experts to provide more security in the economic, political, educational, gender equality, and other arenas is long, I am not one of them. So instead, I focus on my work helping people in my areas of expertise — how to “turn within” and strengthen ourselves from the inside out, and Overcoming the Fear of Death.
I ask you to look at your areas of expertise — whether professionally or avocationally — and apply your energies as you see fit to helping others develop greater inner security. In that way, you will be a contributor and solution provider to what I would argue is the most debilitating plague of the human race — the Importance of Being Important.
Kelvin H. Chin is a Meditation Teacher, Life After Life Expert, and Author of “Overcoming the Fear of Death,” “Marcus Aurelius Updated: 21st Century Meditations On Living Life” and “After the Afterlife: Memories of My Past Lives.” He learned to meditate at age 19, and has been teaching Turning Within Meditation and coaching others in their self-growth for 40 years. He helps people understand their life challenges through their individual belief systems, and helps them find their own solutions. His past life memories reach back many centuries, and he accesses those memories in his teaching and his coaching in the same way all coaches draw on their own available experiences for perspective and effective analogies. He can be reached at www.TurningWithin.org.