Cutting Off My Nose

I'm getting acupuncture.  (I feel like a voodoo doll.)  I don't really believe in it but it was suggested to me by someone I respect, and I decided to give it a try. So far it hasn't done anything, and I don't really expect it to. I'm a skeptic. All that I read about it is that it has no scientific basis and positive results seem to be the result of the placebo effect.

My greatest fear is that it may work. Yes, I know I'll feel better, but I'll have to admit I was wrong, and that could be more troublesome than my symptoms.

I suspect it's a common feeling – I know it is for me – to want to be right, even if there is a cost. It's especially true when my outlook is pessimistic. I may, for example, want candidate A to win an election, but he's an underdog and I predict that candidate B will win. If candidate A wins I'll get the policies I want, but I'll be wrong. In my eyes and the eyes of others. Which is worse? Unfortunately being wrong is often worse than getting what I really want.

Another situation in which I'm ambivalent – one which has repercussions for others as well – is that in which I feel that I'm not properly appreciated by someone else; usually,though not always, someone important to me. And the thought that goes with that is “He'd (or she'd) really feel bad if something terrible were to happen to me. That'll serve him right.

I don't really want anything bad to happen, but I do want to punish someone else – to show him how empty his life would be without me. And how guilty he'd feel if he believed himself to be responsible somehow. Especially if he felt responsible for my absence or not being concerned for me when I was around.

The most common example of the phenomenon relates to insurance. We sink a lot of money into it, initially with the hope that it will serve as protection against a problem that might arise. Later, when everything has gone well, someone will begin resenting the cost of protection against problems that have never occurred. Some will look for ways to collect even if nothing goes wrong. Or he may look for what may be considered wrong so as to collect some of what he's already paid. Or even more. We don't want things to be wrong, but if we've paid for protection we want some return – even if it means that we suffer some harm.

In certain ways it's a competition. We “bet” against our own wishes and don't know whether we want to win or lose. We bet against our friends and family and sometimes consider losing face to be worse than experiencing a negative turn of fate. We look for ways to punish others, despite our knowledge that we're really punishing ourselves. But that's the way to win, and that's more important than anything else.

There's no doubt that insurance falls into this pattern. The insurance company has deep pockets and we don't. Our original intent was to protect ourselves, but it's not fair that because everything has gone well for us the insurance company is getting all our money. Ideally we can find a way to get our money back without suffering any harm in order to do so, but sometimes we think about other scenarios in which we my suffer harm but we recover what we've put in – or more.

The worst situation, however, is the one in which we feel that it's necessary to lose in order to win. We're usually looking for sympathy. And it's often from someone in particular. But in order to get sympathy, something has to be wrong. And it has to worse than whatever your “target” will describe. (He's competing too.) That's the down side. The sympathy, itself, is the up side. Is it worth it? That really depends on your competitive spirit and your endurance of whatever problem you have. Some glory in the sympathy but others would forgo the sympathy if they were problem-free.

And that's the way it is for all of these questions. Is the competition worth the discomfort? I guess that depends on you. As for me, sometimes yes and sometimes no.

June 5, 2017