Processing good news

Philosophy Forums Psychology and Mind
1

Why is it that good news is almost as stressful as bad news?

Like, you find out that you got a promotion, or a girl says yes, or you’re getting money, etc.

And instead of feeling great, you start feeling sick. Butterflies, edginess, flat out anxiety. Physically ill.

I got a new piece of business the other day. It was a big victory. But instead of feeling good, I just feel ill.

My dreams last night were like a loop of horror, a blend of amityville horror, saw 1-5, rosemary’s baby, the shining, and 2001 space odyssey. just looping over and over. I’ve had nightmares, but this is like a night terror I think, as if i was so sleepy that i was flashing in and out of this mortal coil, like my brain dipped its toe in the hell that’s waiting for me just beyond. so the dreams felt endless and really scary. but being a grown man, when i wake up i just shrug and take a leak and have some coffee. i don’t react at all. just glad i was even sleeping, since when you have kids you don’t get too sleep much. but i digress, i suppose

i’m anxious again today but i can’t figure why. why does good news make us so uneasy?

2

Stop being a pussy.

3

I think it’s because you’re left pondering the implications. Something good happens and you start to realize what, specifically, it means for you. You now have one, or more, new things to worry about.

4

YES! vintage.

fact is i long stopped being a pussy. getting the howling fantods doesn’t make you a pussy. it’s whining about it that makes you a pussy.

i don’t whine about it. i just wonder about it. it’s interesting to me.

i think statiktech is right. good news means you now have to go about the tricky business of feeling like you deserve whatever goodness the universe gave you. that’s kind of a burden. too much work. and also, the ongoing business of justifying the good fortune.

now, rationally, consciously, i know that we might as well just enjoy the good luck when it comes, because “deserve” often has little to do with the shit that happens to us. we will all get fucked in the end, so if something good happens, how about not getting your pigtails all tangled up. but this isn’t about taking off my dress and taking my finger out of my pussy.

this is just the odd awareness that i hate it when good shit happens to me. not whining, just noticing, and wondering.

and talking about it, hell, that ain’t being a bitch, that’s being the opposite of one.

and enjoying good news or saying “yippee” is sort of the inverse of whining over bad news. both are annoying

the question maybe is really about fear of success. fear of doing anything good. fear of power, fear of glory, fear of winning. fear. pussy. yep

i can’t be the only one who has this particular form of pussiness. so it’s useful to discuss. what holds YOU back?

5

I’ve thought about it, and I’ve decided that I do not believe in such a thing as “fear of success”. But, I believe in the fear of failure.

For example:
If I get a promotion, I may fear failing to handle the new and increased responsibilities. But not the money. When I get more money, (if I fear anything), then I fear not using the money in the right way—because I believe there are right and wrong ways to use money. IOW, I may fear failing to handle money as I ought. That’s still a fear of failure, right?

If a girl says ‘yes’ to me, then any fear I might have would only be a fear of failing to live up to expectations. It’s not a fear of having a great relationship, or great sex… it’s a fear of failing to do so—and of her telling all her friends never to talk to me. Fear of failure, again.

In all of these cases, there is no fear of success----just a fear of a new kind of failure. Obviously, it’s perfectly rational to fear failure. That’s why they call it “failure”. That reminds me of a line by Danny DeVito in the movie where Arnold Schwartzenegger gets pregnant. He says, “Everybody needs money… that’s why they call it money”.

But anyways, if you reflect and honestly say that you’re scared of success----and not just a new kind of failure—then I’ll have to reexamine this, but we probably won’t understand each other.

Success brings some kind of power. Power brings some kind of responsibility. Responsibility brings the chance of failure. And it’s natural to fear failure. If this relation is transitive, then you have reason to fear success.
Shit.

But it sounds odd. ‘To fear success’. It’s like a category mistake, or a definitional error.

Fuck, I’m tired. Life. Liiiiiiiiiiffeeee.

6

we’re just animals. don’t be so conscious (lol). all we do is exploit the conditions in which we find ourselves or we die. or life is lame. don’t make too much of a moral tale out of it or else the ridiculous will happen: you’ll begin to feel guilty over a bit of good fortune. “just do you.”

7

“just do you” is good but deceptive advice.

nothing just about it, Fuse.

argumentum ad think less-um. ILP is not exactly the place to be employing it, but noted.

the way my host organism exploits conditions is via a grid of existential values, justice being a big part of said grid. without which said animal would be failing to exploit his lot in life to the best of his ability, or, exploiting conditions when you have a human brain is not as easy as pissing on a fencepost.

Ridiculous or profound. There’s something beautiful about considering your good fortune and consciously deciding the best way to receive it. I always hate it when lottery winners grin like fools and are all happy about being able to buy a corvette and quit their job.

make up your mind.

8

Reference your Motivation thread.

9

You are taking the good fortune too personal. The business you received is (likely) not because some people or The Universe wanted to give you a reward for being such a wonderful person, but because they trust that you will be able to deliver, that your work will be of value to them. This would indeed result in some fear of failure, but you seem to confuse that fear with fear of being unworthy in some Human way. That’s a kind of cognitive dissonance, and your subconscious mind may have tried to resolve that it your sleep.

I’d resolve this by acting as if you understand that this is not about your person but about business, about the real world, and plan to do something generally constructive with (part of) the profit. Success gets frightening when you’re the only one benefitting from it. That’s why criminals often cause their own downfall - they want to push the premise that they “deserve it” (which is what I’ve seen criminals use as a mantra) to the limit, because they know somehow that they are living in a fantasy.

Maybe your dream was just telling you to wake up.

10

Honestly, Gamer, there have been plenty of times when “good news” has made me more anxious. It’s not usually the case – normally I just get an A on a test and give my self mental congratulations – but it happens. If good news makes me more stressful, it’s probably because I feel some kind of pressure to follow up the success with equal or higher caliber performance. If it’s a business success, then I definitely understand the anxiety. In business, everyone always wants to see the performance trend move indefinitely upward, or at least to see the best ever performance maintained. However, this obsession with bigger bottom lines, more contracts, higher stakes, etc. can be too rushed for its own good and quality of work starts to suffer or company culture turns ruthless, or employee morale declines. I don’t know what the case is with your business, but that’s what comes to mind.

Of course, but being born into riches isn’t any more a fault of a person than being born into rags. What could make you feel guilty is how you choose to make use of your riches.

When I said “don’t be so conscious,” I wasn’t recommending that you never think about things like this. I mean: if you don’t blend consciousness with action, if all you do is think about possibilities without trying any of them in practice, you will feel mired in your own thought and it can kill whatever bit motivation you had in the first place. Consciousness is great, but without action it can lead to anxiety and feeling overwhelmed.

But I doubt you think it would be preferable if people always broke down in guilt over good fortune. The concept of being deserving or undeserving doesn’t make any sense regarding processes governed mostly by chance, like a lottery. Good fortune is neither morally deserved or undeserved. It’s simply something that benefits you. Definitely, some will be seen as making “better” use of their fortune, so you might be anxious about whether you’ll make the most of this success that has come your way. Then it’s really a case of figuring out what you really want and what you value. What would you do if you won the lottery?

11

Generally I agree with your assessment. The potential for failure arises if one is sucessful. My quibble comes in around failure, which I Think should be a broader noun. I have feared success at times nto because I might then mess up, but because others might hate me or try to bring me trouble, take me down, focus negative attention on me. This need not even go so far as to have some scenario involving other people - there can merely be this feeling of being a target or somehow exhibiting hubris (that gods or fate will notice) that will be leveled. This can sometimes manifest as I am in fact successful but I try my best not to view it that way. (just to be clear: I am not advocating these concerns as rational, though sometimes they can be, just pointing out I have found them actually affecting in a negative way choices I make: hiding my work, not going for something, undermining my own performance, taking a back seat and so on). This feels closer to fear of success to me. That state seems precarious and not in all cases because I will mess up or not be right. Certainly in some work Environments this can actually have some solid reasoning and empirical evidence behind it. And if you toss in fame as one kind of success or a facet of success, I am scared of that. Not because of failure, but because of how famous people are treated. Be humans as joe shmoe and few notice and few care. Be human when the press are likely to notice, look out. Toss in any religious or long ago rooted in religious unconscious patterns where it may be sinful or a sign of hubris and the mere state of being successful can be really quite agitating. And the state of failure or not yet being successful can feel better. Perhaps the best is not yet being successful. Here you skip the precariousness of being successful, but to some degree you can imagine you have what it takes and any day now…

12

Well first:

Rivers I forgot to see that post. Good points of course, by you and Moreno, but even if fear of success eventually means fear of failure, it’s still “fear of failure by way of success.” a particular route toward failure, if we agree for sec, and this is a particular kind of situation, kind of fear, deserves its own look.

For me I suspect the failure is in not wanting to change. (because i’m not really afraid of failure, i rather like it, nor have i ever been afraid of failing at something I tried in earnest to do. knowing you tried your hardest is a wonderful thing even if you fail. the problem is when I don’t try my hardest and still succeed – THAT’S the big bad thing.)*

Like I said, when we succeed at something, change is part of it, and change, any change, is sort of a chore at this point, what with all the work Ive done mastering just being me. I’ll take change when it comes, but I’m not so keen on causing it, even if that change means “success.”

I don’t like the word success and successful, never have. It’s always bundled with money. I hate that, when people say so-in-so is very successful, when what they really mean is rich, and they’re equating rich with success. It’s nauseating when they do that. Flies in the face of everything we learned from sesame street on down, all the loving assurances that money does not equal success. it’s all a lie. becuz next thing you know your mother/friend/wife/kid is equating success w/money. As if it’s a given. Again, see motivation and the CAN/DO distinction.

*And FUSE in terms of guilt, it’s not that I think I’m special, I KNOW I’m special. When the universe hurls something good at me I absolutely DO take it personally. I don’t buy this idea that it’s all just random. Nature is very picky and does play favorites and it always has to be personal. Sometimes, like in lottery, it’s random. but when you set out to do something and succeed, it’s not random. So in terms of GUILT being part of the sickness unto success that I’m dealing with, it’s not guilt. Not in the way you’d think. It’s not an “I’m not worthy” guilt. It’s more a crashing realization that the thing I achieved is NOT something I actually want, earning it did NOT require any of my best efforts, best traits, or involve my truest aims. SUCCESS is the quickest route to coming face to face with your own fraudulence. “Great, you got what you supposedly wanted. Happy?”

No. So what do I/we really want? Know what I mean? I know you do, fuckers. I don’t want to run around looking for ways to slap the SUCCESS STORY label onto myself. Once I do that I feel like the jerks won. Part of me wants to not want. I mean, why the fuck did they have us read Siddharta in the first place…teach it in such a knowing, beatific way…and then tell us to go be “successful?” I think they made us read Hesse so we would be in this very predicament I’m writing about.

We all have to think hard to really know what we define as success. It might take awhile. I’m 42 and I’m still not sure.

And w/r/t lottery winnings i feel I already won just being born. we all have a limited time to spend our winnings. that’s the anxiety.

how to live.

try to wiggle out of that question, laugh at it, dismiss it, or answer it in a hokey soundbite. it doesn’t go away, our only true angel, we answer to it every day. and on days we succeed, it asks loudly.

13

Sure, I get it. There’s reasons to fear fame or fortune. But if you’re thinking of success more vaguely, as just living as you ought to—whatever that is—then it seems like an analytical truth that there’s no reason to fear it. And the fact that you fear fame or fortune is a reason to think they’re not success.

Socrates was guilty of corrupting the youth, because that question causes anxiety and sleepless nights. He was also guilty of disbelief in the gods, or anyone else, if any given instruction manual isn’t good enough just because someone else said so. Alone in the dark.

14

That’s a very smart Point and I pretty much have decided that fame - in the celebrity sense - is not success, even though it can be a Product of it. To the Point where I Think at the very least most people are making a mistake when they allow themselves to get famous, let alone strive for it.
To go back to the general issue, however: that makes sense, one should not consider a state that is negative successful, even if outwardly or culturally it might be seen as a moment or new state of success. But to me what people are trying to say is more complicated than that when they say they fear success. They may still want that success or facets of it, but also fear other facets of it. And they may not know a way to satisfy both their desires and their fears. They may find failure frustrating for example, but are also afraid of publishing that first novel - for the kinds of reasons I mentioned earlier. One could describe all this in very Concrete, specific terms, but I Think the concept of fear of success is useful. One could qualify it with one fears what is considered to be solely success, I suppose.

Your ‘thinking of success more vaguely’ seems to imply we have a choice of a pure state. I Think most people who have a fear of success would say that both failure and success feel like mixed states. They may even choose to have the success, since the mix leans towards the pro side, at least with this or that success, nevertheless, they feel precarious there, and they know that sometimes this fear has undermined the success - one that had facets they continue to desire but find not form of it unprecarious enough.

Socrates was guilty of corrupting the youth, because that question causes anxiety and sleepless nights. He was also guilty of disbelief in the gods, or anyone else, if any given instruction manual isn’t good enough just because someone else said so. Alone in the dark.
[/quote]
He was indicted for teaching new Gods, then at some Point in the trial accused of believing in none. I remember trying to get a sense of exactly what his view of gods were, or Plato’s view of his view and I could not come to any hard and fast conclusion.

15

Yesss, squid pro row.

I take Socrates at his word when he said he believed in the gods that everyone else did. I just don’t think he thought they mattered as a grounding for ethics or knowledge, in the way that everyone else did.

16

The gods were the anthropomorphic ideal man. He wanted to get away from the literally aesthetic ideal. He felt the pain of the singularity of the loneliness of the hypocracy. We owe him romantic visualization which christ became.