How much better could things be for us all if we believed the world is conspiring to do us good and we rejoiced in the joy of others?
These are the thoughts I had on a drive home from visiting my mom not long ago while listening to Robert Greene’s The Laws of Human Nature.
Mitfreude
In a chapter in which he talks about the toxicity of envy and how to avoid those people, he mentions an idea from Nietzsche that I hadn’t heard of before that hit me harder than I expected, something called Mitfreude:
“But it would be wise to practice instead the opposite, what the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche called Mitfreude—“joying with.” As he wrote, “The serpent that stings us means to hurt us and rejoices as it does so; the lowest animal can imagine the pain of others. But to imagine the joy of others and to rejoice at it is the highest privilege of the highest animals.” ― Robert Greene
Like, isn’t that just the most amazing concept? Experiencing joy with others, for others, is a much better feeling than sitting in the corner sulking over the comparisons that don’t matter.
Swapping Paranoia for a Better Conspiracy
The idea of Inverse Paranoid (a trait I now deeply embrace) came from Brian Tracy, and I first read about it in Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life:
“A paranoid is someone who believes that people are conspiring against him or her. An inverse paranoid, in contrast, is a person who is convinced that the world is conspiring to make him or her successful. An inverse paranoid insists upon interpreting everything that happens as part of a great plan leading to success.” - Brian Tracy
Flipping the Script (Like Jack Bauer with a Table)
By embracing both of these principles, we shift from a defensive crouch to an open sprint.
We stop viewing a friend’s promotion as a personal robbery and start seeing every red light or missed flight as a secret setup for a future win.
It’s a radical mental rebrand. A new, improved way for the Growth Mindset to present itself to the world through your thoughts and actions.
Instead of looking for enemies in the shadows, we look for the "joying with" in the sunshine.
“If all you did was look for things to appreciate, you would live a joyously spectacular life.” - Esther Hicks
Ponder This
- When was the last time you felt a genuine Ric Flair WOOOOOO!! in your heart for someone else’s win?
- If today’s biggest annoyance was actually a secret gift, what would the payoff be?
Books/Newsletters
- The Laws of Human Nature - Robert Greene
- Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life - Brian Tracy
- Mindset - Carol Dweck
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