Pod Insights The Psychology of your 20s 292. The power of humility About this episode Sometimes we just need to humble ourselves. We need to tell our ego to take a back seat and let ourselves fail, let ourselves be beginners, be bested, admit we were wrong and in today's episode I'm going to explain the exact psychological power of humility, including:
The 3 different definitions of ego Why your ego is sabotaging you and keeping you stagnant 5 subtle signs your ego is taking over Why humility makes us happier, more successful, and better connected How to refocus from self-centeredness to contribution and connection + so much more Listen now!
ORDER MY BOOK: https://www.psychologyofyour20s.com/general-clean https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/755841/person-in-progress-by-jemma-sbeg/
Follow Jemma on Instagram: @jemmasbeg https://www.instagram.com/jemmasbeg/?hl=en#
Follow the podcast on Instagram: @thatpsychologypodcast https://www.instagram.com/thatpsychologypodcast/?hl=en#
For business: [email protected] mailto:[email protected]
The Psychology of your 20s is not a substitute for professional mental health help. If you are struggling, distressed or require personalised advice, please reach out to your doctor or a licensed psychologist.
See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Transcript Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
0:00 Speaker 00 This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed Human.
0:04 Jemma Sbeg? If you've ever gone into a store for two things and walked out wondering how it cost forty seven dollars? Yeah, same. That's why some people like keeping things simple with Bank of America Advantage Safe Balance Banking. If you're under twenty five, there's no monthly maintenance fee. Plus, you can enroll in B of A Rewards and enjoy benefits like cash back on brands you love. Plus fraud and identity monitoring. And there's no fees to enroll. It's one less thing to stress about. Learn more at B of A dot com slash simple banking. Member FDIC. You know that feeling when your skin just needs a tall drink of water? That's what Clinique Moisture Surge One Hundred Hour Moisturizer is for.
0:47 Jemma Sbeg? Moisture Surge One Hundred Hour Moisturizer absorbs instantly and hydrates for a hundred hours for plump glowing skin. That's right, a hundred hours. It is a lightweight, oil-free gel cream, safe for sensitive skin. It's allergy-tested and fragrance-free. I use this all the time. It makes my skin feel so fresh and plump and glowy. Even under makeup, I still see an amazing difference. It never leaves my skin oily or tacky. Try Clinique Moisture Surge One Hundred Hour today at Clinique dot com. Feels like moisture surge.
1:27 Jemma Sbeg? I've been approaching my health really differently this year. I used to be really focused on maximizing and doing more. And now I'm just realizing that if I listen to what my body needs, I perform way better. And that's why I am obsessed with my Whoop. Truly, you guys, you know I'm such a data and information-driven person. And I love opening my Whoop app and seeing how my sleep, my stress, my strain is correlating with my mood, with my running performance, with how I'm just feeling day to day. I'm not an elite athlete by any means, but I do really benefit. And I also just really enjoy knowing more about my body. And Whoop also gives me these actionable, personalized insights.
2:10 Jemma Sbeg? Sites that have made me more intentional and meant that I make smarter decisions day to day about what I need rather than just putting my foot on the gas and just going, going, going, going. New members can try whoop with a thirty day free trial before committing to a membership. That's join dot whoop dot com slash psychology for your free month of whoop. Hey, question, are you an extra care member at CVS? Because there is literally no reason not to be. It's super easy to join and members instantly get extra big deals on things you buy most. I mean, this is stuff you're already buying, things like snacks, personal care products, all of it. And after you join, the savings just show up. Deals refresh every two weeks, but they don't last long.
2:56 Jemma Sbeg? Head to your local CVS or open the CVS app, look for extra big deals and start saving today. Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the show. Welcome back to the podcast. New listeners, old listeners, wherever you are in the world. It is so great to have you here back for another episode as we, of course, break down the psychology of our twenties. Before we begin, I want to just thank all of you who have ordered or pre-ordered my book. This last week has been off the charts. The support has been so overwhelming. If you don't already know, my first book, Person in Progress, A Roadmap to the Psychology of Your Twenties,
3:41 Jemma Sbeg? came out this week and I am just, I, I'm, well, obviously I'm speechless. I'm so grateful for this community and I'm so grateful for you guys and for the support you've shown me. Some of you have even finished the book already, which is insane because it came out three days ago. And I, it just means so much to me. I had so much imposter syndrome going into this. I was catastrophizing every moment of every day, the negative reviews I was gonna get.
4:16 Jemma Sbeg? You know, how many people would say, she's a terrible writer, she shouldn't have done this. I don't know, I just, I was my own worst enemy for a little bit there and yet I have been met with just a wall of positivity and love from you all. And gosh, it's made me feel really good about the world. It's made me feel really good about humanity and it's made me feel really good about myself. So, thank you so much for providing me with that gift. I hope that I've provided you with a gift and that my book will help you, has helped you, is fascinating, interesting, makes you feel less alone and that if you haven't already ordered it, you check it out. You can buy it anywhere you buy books, preferably your local bookstore.
5:00 Jemma Sbeg? Um, I don't make any more money from where you buy it. I just feel like at this time in this day and age, big corporations, um, maybe need a little bit less of our money and shop local, shop your independent bookstore, who will really appreciate that twenty dollar sale and who you can have a nice chat with the person behind the counter and you can peruse and feel homely and cosy, um, that's kind of my preference. But again, thank you so much even for just, you know, listening to the podcast, for talking about the podcast with friends, talking about my book with your friends, checking it out on Goodreads, any of those things. It really means the world. But without further ado, let's stop babbling on about person in progress
5:45 Jemma Sbeg? and let's get into the episode. Now, I'm not proud to admit that this episode is inspired by a moment that happened to me the other day and it involves a bicycle. So I was walking to my ceramics class, which you guys know I go to every single Wednesday and I had my headphones on, I was playing the new Lord song, of course, and I was tuned in, my fourteen year old self was having a great time. And as I went to turn this corner, this cyclist rides past me and like brushes me, like brushes against my arm. And as she passes, she turns around and makes this gesture to me like, look where you're going and she shakes her head and she rides off.
6:29 Jemma Sbeg? But as she rides off, like she keeps looking back at me and keeps shaking her head, like looking very disapproving. And it kind of shocked me, but my second reaction was just. Rage, like, how dare she be mad at me? I'm just listening to my music. She doesn't own the road, blah, blah, blah. And I was really mad, I was really upset. And immediately after that, I felt so gross. I felt this deep anger, evil meanness in my bones. I was so mad at her, I kept thinking about it over and over again. And it just was weighing me down.
7:10 Jemma Sbeg? And as I kept walking and I calmed down, I was like, wait a second. What the heck was that? Where did that come from? Like, why am I feeling so entitled? And angry at this poor woman who I probably cut off, like I wasn't paying attention. And it kind of scared me. My ego was so reactive that it clouded my judgment. It made me think ill of this total stranger. And honestly, it put me in such a terrible mood for the rest of the day. And for what? It was just after this that I was like, hmm, I need to humble myself right now.
7:54 Jemma Sbeg? It is time to sit back and reflect on what's going on here. Because that right there, that was ugly behaviour. And it was really that, that instance that triggered me to start noticing some changes in myself recently and changes that I didn't like. It feels icky and hard to look at, but you know, I've been more jealous recently. I've been more critical, I've been more defensive, I've been more argumentative. And because of how conscious I am of it, it really got me thinking about humility. And why does the case that I had perhaps incidentally allowed my ego to kind of go off the rails? That's a hard thing to talk about. And even saying that I'm wondering. Who out there is judging me, who out there is thinking differently of me.
8:39 Jemma Sbeg? But something I always believe is that if you're experiencing something, someone else out there is also experiencing it. And hopefully my candor is is beneficial to someone else who is noticing this weird entitlement in themselves that is causing them a lot of shame and that they want to change. Sometimes we do have to practice humility. Sometimes when our ego takes over, we do have to rein her in. So how exactly, and this is the question I've been asking myself. How exactly do we strike that healthy balance between being proud of ourselves, knowing what we deserve, but not being prideful? How do we strike the balance of being confident but not arrogant?
9:25 Jemma Sbeg? That's really what I want to lay out for all of us today, including the real definition of ego, what ego looks like, where it comes from, what pride looks like, the consequences of an inflated ego, and the six steps that I personally have been taking to bring me back to a humble, honest equilibrium and to make me a more pro-social, better human. Because whatever has been happening in my brain, in my body, that has caused me to respond this way to certain situations, I don't like it. But I also think that when you acknowledge parts of yourself that you don't particularly enjoy, you're also capable and you must
10:05 Jemma Sbeg? change them or kind of submit, voluntarily submit yourself to suffering under the impression of your own thoughts and feelings that you don't take accountability for. So it's a bit more of a philosophical episode today, but I promise we also touch on some very important psychology. Without further ado, no judgment zone, let's talk about humility.
10:33 Jemma Sbeg? So before we get into it, we firstly need to talk about the various definitions of ego, because surprisingly, there is more than one. Most of us tend to think of ego as just our sense of self-confidence or our sense of self-worth. When our ego is inflated, we believe we possess more worth than others, which is not true. When our ego is deflated, we believe we possess less worth than others. It's also not true. All humans contain equal worth. Ego is about our perception of ourselves in comparison to others. Therefore, it's a subjective acknowledgement, it's a subjective opinion, rather than an objective fact of who we are.
11:16 Jemma Sbeg? So the first definition of ego that you are probably familiar with is pride, self-worth, self-confidence. It is often associated with entitlement, feeling like you deserve more than you have or than what others have. From a more psychological perspective, though, we want to turn to Freud's definition. He is really the one that first interrogated this idea of ego, Freud, of course, being the very famous Austrian psychoanalyst. And his idea of ego differed slightly to the definition that we currently uphold. Freud saw the ego as the part of the mind that mediates between
12:01 Jemma Sbeg? our primal urges, our moral values, and reality. All of us, you and me, we have this impulsive desire to take, to do what we want to do, to be quite animal. We have these natural instincts of possession and desire. But we are also ruled by this very real moral system that is taught to us at a young age and which, yes, doesn't always get it right, but is what allows us to be civilized and respectful to each other. It's things like, don't steal, don't make people feel bad about themselves, don't murder, don't be unkind. So when the part of us that is quite unruly gets too big,
12:44 Jemma Sbeg? our ego becomes unbalanced and we behave in a way that makes us feel gross or uncaring or arrogant. Therefore, this part of us, it's called the id, needs taming, it needs humbling, so that the moral side and the id can sit in harmony. So that's the definition given by Freud. Ego is an unbalanced system within us where pride is allowed to take over. Let me give you another definition of ego that's not psychological, it's philosophical, and it comes from Buddhism. So in Buddhism, ego is basically the source of suffering.
13:26 Jemma Sbeg? Ego has us forget that we exist in a very vast flowing ecosystem with other living souls who all have their own intricacies, stories and worth. And our ego is the thing that puts us above everyone else in a very unnatural and harmful way. So there is an incredible article written by The Mindful Stoic that I was reading when I was exploring this topic that talks about the the idea of anata or the no self, which is quite popular in Buddhism. Basically, this idea of the no self suggests that we are a combination of everything around us. We are constantly changing. Nothing makes us more special than anyone else. There is nothing that we do that we can ever take full credit for.
14:11 Jemma Sbeg? We are basically just the world, it's experiencing itself. And when we respect that principle, our attachment to ideas like success, fairness, pride, they're quite healthy. We tend to live a happier existence. I think that this idea is really, really profound. It's very freeing to just exist and watch yourself evolve and detach from all the heavy stuff that we opt into and just understand that you and everyone around you is is equal, is hopefully in harmony and and are connected. What happens when ego rules? Well, that becomes a problem. Ego is wanting to separate you from this humility and this understanding of connectedness
14:55 Jemma Sbeg? with other human beings. Ego is also always going to be a part of you. Now, that's something that I probably should have stated before. The idea and the existence of ego was not the problem. It's when it's allowed to rule and when essentially we are off balance. Here are some signs that that is occurring. Here are some signs that, you know, you kind of need to humble yourself. The first red flag is that, quite simply, you always need to be right. And you struggle with any form of criticism, even when it's valid. Specifically, I'm talking about instances or individuals who feel quite threatened when someone disagrees with them. And has a very hard time admitting that they're wrong.
15:40 Jemma Sbeg? This often has quite a physical element to it. Someone disagrees with you, someone argues back and you feel that hot flush. Maybe even that rage or that anger that you are being disrespected. When, if you dug a little bit deeper, you would see that you have more to learn in this moment than to be hurt by. And you are actually hurting yourself more by being defensive. Because these experiences of criticism, of feedback, of disagreement, they're actually learning moments. They're teaching moments. They are opportunities, they're a doorway to more knowledge about the world and to seeing things differently. But when your ego is in control, you never are able to see them that way.
16:23 Jemma Sbeg? This also links to the second observation or sign that your ego was out of control. Which is that you take everything personally, including others' reactions and others' bad days. I'm gonna call myself out there. That woman who got upset at me for, I guess, walking in her way. She was, she was entitled to have that reaction. But my reaction to her reaction, that was ego. Because I was interpreting what could have been a neutral comment or action as an attack, as a sly. And I was allowing it to infiltrate deeper than it was intended to or that it needed to. Therefore, kind of ruining my day. The thing is, is that we are of course the centre of our own universe.
17:08 Jemma Sbeg? We can only see through our own mind's eye. We can only experience the world through our senses from our perspective. That makes it difficult sometimes to empathize with others, but empathy is also an incredibly unique and important human quality. And if you are devoid of that, or if you are detached from it, it makes you hard to be around and it makes you, it makes it harder for you to be happy. The third red flag, if your ego is unruly, you are craving validation and recognition, and you are constantly in what I call a more, more, more mindset. So the more, more, more mindset is basically a mindset where we are never entirely content or happy with what we have.
17:50 Jemma Sbeg? Now, humans by nature, we actually exist according to something called the hedonistic treadmill. Essentially, what this term describes is this thought or theory that you cannot be happy all the time, and that no matter what good things happen in your life, what amazing successes you achieve, you are always going to return to quite a neutral point. Now, that is healthy. It's very healthy. You cannot be at either extreme end of our emotion spectrum, either extreme surprise, joy, excitement, or extreme misery for too long. It's a healthy thing to be somewhere in the middle.
18:28 Jemma Sbeg? But if you, if your ego is, if you haven't humbled yourself, you just cannot, you cannot make peace with the fact that at times you will not receive recognition, you will not receive validation, people will not be thinking about you, people will not be praising you. That means that not only are you never happy with what you have, but you constantly feel this pressure to push and strive harder and to bring the spotlight back on to you, which is unnatural. You also may compare yourself constantly, whether it's status, looks, success, popularity, you're always measuring your worth by someone else's.
19:10 Jemma Sbeg? I always give this analogy, and I think I gave it in a, in a recent rerun episode, but we have to remember comparison, it's a circle, not a ladder. There is not someone who is objectively the happiest person, or the best person, or the most successful person in this world, and there is probably not a person who wants for nothing. Even if they are someone who is trying very hard for that. Even if they are someone who is very spiritually disciplined. All of us feel jealous and envious at times. But you might be looking at someone thinking, why don't I have what they have? Whilst they're looking at someone else who is looking at you, and what you don't appreciate is that this is a circle, this is a cycle.
19:54 Jemma Sbeg? And if you continue to constantly compare and ruminate and feel miserable about what you don't have, you miss out on a lot of what you do. I think we're up to the sixth sign now that your ego is out of control. And that is that you need to always be in control. Letting others lead or not having the final say. It can make you feel very uncomfortable and anxious and uncertain. Whether that is, you know, the need to control the itinerary for the group trip, not being able to work in a team, craving alone time because it's easier to not think about others. That has a real consequence for our relationships. We cannot let our grip up over our life and over our interactions with others.
20:37 Jemma Sbeg? I will say, some people are what we call type A individuals. Some people are just like that, they're older children, they're naturally leaders. But the distinction is the ability to compromise without emotional distress and discomfort. It's not, you know, some individuals will naturally take charge because they're just very good at it. But if they were invited to not take charge, they wouldn't have this visceral sense or need to reinstate themselves at the centre of everything. They are able to say, yes, someone else might not do this the way that I will do it. Doesn't mean it's not a worthwhile, valid way. Doesn't mean I can't be happy with whatever they produce. Couple more signs, you feel threatened by others' success.
21:23 Jemma Sbeg? And you also struggle to apologize. Two big ones that I've actually, I've seen in people's behaviour before, and they're not that pleasant. All of this turns us into, you may have guessed it, a deeply unhappy person, but also a self-conscious person and someone who was not a good friend, not a good partner, not a good child, not a good sibling or colleague. That last point is very important because being in community requires people to de-center themselves. I read a similar quote recently that being in community requires inconvenience. A lot of people talk about loneliness these days. They talk about how it's difficult to make friends, difficult to be seen. But if you think you are the most important person in the world,
22:05 Jemma Sbeg? you are not going to be able to tolerate the inconvenience and sometimes the difficulty of having to compromise and be around other people. Think about it, you know, being a good partner means being able to admit you're wrong, means compromise, means losing control sometimes, means doing things that aren't always what you want to do, but that are what's best for the team. If you are not tuned into that fact that your preferences and lifestyle don't matter more than anyone else's, that is going to be a hard dynamic. Any relationship is going to be difficult to sustain. Now, we know relationships are one of our main predictors of happiness. Studies have proved this again and again and again.
22:47 Jemma Sbeg? Actually, one of the longest longitudinal studies on happiness in the world found that positive relationships make you live longer, make you more pleasant, make you happier, make you more satisfied with your life. So if ego is costing you those relationships, it's also costing you your happiness. If you are lonely, if you don't have those meaningful connections, what do you have? Success, accomplishment, knowing you're right. Like, none of that really means anything. And it reminds me of now a very famous interview between, I think it was Benny Blanco and Selena Gomez, where he basically says, like, what do I have to achieve by being right? Like, an angry girlfriend and not much else. For what?
23:28 Jemma Sbeg? And that's a mature man right there. He has understood the cost of his ego and it's something that a lot of us are yet to recognize. It may not come as a surprise as well that ego and narcissism go hand in hand. Narcissism as a term is often misused a lot. What we are talking about today is narcissism as a trait, not narcissistic personality disorder, not narcissism in a medical setting, narcissism as a trait that we all have some of. Like any trait in this world, any personality trait, like all of us have a little inch of it. When you are high in narcissism as a trait, as some people naturally are,
24:13 Jemma Sbeg? basically you cannot see anyone else's point of view because you see everything as a mirror of yourself or something to take advantage of. You must find yourself competent, successful, attractive, desirable, intelligent, or else. What does that also sound like? It also sounds like a dysregulated ego. Now, this means that we can basically understand ego and pride and a lack of humility by examining narcissism as well and examining the origins of it. And a study published by NYU in twenty twenty one has found that narcissism is driven primarily by a deep rooted sense of self hatred. In this study, individuals who are higher on traits associated with narcissism,
24:54 Jemma Sbeg? they were typically quite emotionally vulnerable and felt quite emotionally, I don't like the term weak, uh, out in the open. Maybe that's also where our inflated ego comes from. It comes from a desire to protect ourselves because perhaps we don't feel great or feel good enough deep down. So we counteract that by puffing out our chest. We counteract that by turning up the entitlement. So we don't have to uncover unfortunate truths about how we really feel about ourselves. There is a great article that was published by the Society of Personality and Social Psychology, and it's titled Are Narcissistic People Happy?
25:35 Jemma Sbeg? And it looked at the mood of over two thousand individuals who had narcissistic personality disorder. And it found that a lot of them were quite miserable. Especially when they felt that they were constantly in competition with others or had some rivalry, they were less happy than the average person. In fact, they they reported greater life dissatisfaction, greater relationship dissatisfaction, greater sense of accomplishment when it came to when it came to their achievements. Now, perhaps I've gone too far here because, you know, this isn't to suggest that we are all narcissists if we can relate to our ego taking over. But maybe when that happens, this gives us a clue as to what our ego thinks it's protecting us from.
26:18 Jemma Sbeg? The expected unhappiness, the insecurity, the jealousy, the poor self-esteem that may come to the surface if we don't keep trying to inflate ourselves and prove ourselves. Maybe unlike narcissism, ego is is quite protective. An ego is the result of something quite squishy and soft and delicate inside of us that feels a bit bruised. So this brings me to my next question. Why do we sometimes feel so entitled for seemingly no reason? What spikes ego? We're going to take a short break here and then I'm going to return with a few explanations.
27:02 Jemma Sbeg? There's this moment in your twenties where you realise, oh, no one is double checking my finances for me anymore. It's just me, my bank account and a growing list of, wait, I forgot I subscribed to that. And honestly, that can feel overwhelming. So you could look into Bank of America Advantage Safe Balance Banking. It's perfect for this stage of life where you're figuring things out as you go. There are no overdraft item fees, and if you are under twenty five, there's no monthly maintenance fee, which just makes it easier to stay on track. What stands out is that it doesn't try to overcomplicate things. It's not about being perfect with money. It's about having a system that helps you feel a little more in control. What's more with Safe Balance Banking?
27:47 Jemma Sbeg? You could enroll in B of A Rewards and enjoy cash back deals plus fraud and identity monitoring. If you are in that phase of I'm trying to get my life together financially, Bank of America Advantage Safe Balance Banking is a really solid place to start. Learn more at B of A dot com slash simple banking, member FDIC.
28:09 Jemma Sbeg? I've been really trying to prioritize my health in a realistic way this year. And something that has kept me really motivated is my Whoop. I am such a data person, which is why I love Whoop. Because I can genuinely see why my body feels differently depending on the day. Why I'm running differently, why I'm maybe less focused. Whoop effortlessly tracks my sleep, it tracks my strain, my recovery, my stress. And most importantly, my overall health. And it just gives me all that data and all those patterns. So I can make better decisions, which includes knowing when to go easy and knowing when to go hard. New members can try Whoop with a 30 day free trial before committing to a membership. That's join dot whoop dot com slash psychology for your free month of Whoop.
28:54 Jemma Sbeg? This episode is sponsored by Gymshark. Gymshark has spent over 14 years obsessing over gym clothing and the people who wear it. And let me just say, I think we all know they are very, very good at what they do. No, seriously, their stuff is so good. Their everyday seamless collection is light, it's soft, it's stretchy. All of their stuff just looks good on and it's made for people who love to exercise. Whatever exercise that is, lifting cardio, Pilates, running around campus, maybe just doing errands. Discover Gymshark and find your new favorite gym clothing at gymshark.com.
29:31 Jemma Sbeg? So you've snapped, you feel like a terrible, horrible, no good person. Why is that the case? Why was humility not on your side in that moment? Firstly, and this one is probably the most likely case for those of us in our twenties. You've just got a lot on your plate right now. You're irritated, you're overworked, you're overstretched. And your capacity to monitor and mediate your emotions and rein in your ego, it just isn't there right now. When we are in that survival overextending mode, we are naturally more tense and more defensive. And that defensiveness extends to our sense of self and self-worth. This really does come down to emotional regulation. And the fact that this becomes harder at these points in our lives,
30:16 Jemma Sbeg? these tension points, lots of deadlines, moving house, relationship problems that bleed into work, bleed into friendships. It's somewhat of a cruel cycle. You know, we need emotional regulation to manage stress. But when we're stressed, it becomes harder to regulate any form of rational thinking, meaning we can't navigate our emotions or our ego properly. The solution here is to find a tiebreaker or reroute, which means simply stop doing what you've been doing all along that obviously isn't working, thinking that it's gonna work. Stop pushing yourself even further. Stop being cruel to yourself to rein in your ego. Try something new here. Specifically, I think if you want to control your ego, you need to slow down and be more intentional about your thoughts,
31:01 Jemma Sbeg? but also your actions. What can you do to calm down your nervous system and fill that emotional cup back up so that it can restore a healthy level of ego? Rest, it's physically important. It's also mentally important and it's emotionally important. If you are finding that you are at the end of your tether and that you feel abrasive, entitled, prideful, I really sometimes think it's just a matter of exhaustion. The other reason that our ego can become unruly is unmet needs or insecurities. When we feel inadequate, as we said, overlooked, insecure, our ego steps in to compensate and it builds a false sense of superiority
31:44 Jemma Sbeg? to kind of protect and guard our self-worth. Validation addiction is another term that we should be across here as well. It refers to essentially an unnatural dependency on praise, attention and success. The ego begins to expect reward, expect applause or admiration as a baseline, not as a bonus.
32:10 Jemma Sbeg? That validation addiction is very common amongst not just high achievers, but what they call ultra high achievers, a whole new level. And what they tended to find was that these individuals were generally not satisfied by any accomplishment that didn't come with praise. They could produce their best work yet. They could run a sub two hour marathon. I don't even think that's humanly possible. But you know, they could paint the next Sistine Chapel. But if there was no praise, it wouldn't be worth it to them. Everything is based on external recognition. And when investigating this, they did a little bit more deep, a little bit more digging, a little bit more searching. They found that it typically begins around the age of between twelve to seventeen, so prime
32:55 Jemma Sbeg? teen years around puberty, when our sense of identity is in a real growth formative period. But also when we are quite young, we're learning what our worth is, we're learning essentially the guidebook by, you know, by which we're going to judge ourselves. And if during that time, what you are absorbing from your environment, from your caregivers, from your community, from your environment is you are only worth something if you can produce good output and if you are being praised for that output. And based on something that we can see physically, that's going to really fuck with your sense of self-concept.
33:38 Jemma Sbeg? And it's going to ensure that the older you get, the higher that baseline for validation becomes until it's unruly, unmanageable and cannot be met. Now, those are some very high level reasons why we may be called to humble ourselves and why we need to embrace the power of humility. Let's now talk about exactly how to get there. Now, let's just say it one more time. You're never going to eliminate ego. We've talked about ego a lot this episode, and perhaps I've done a bad job at painting it as this very villainous evil thing. It's not a bad thing. It's not harmful. Having a healthy level of ego allows you to set boundaries,
34:22 Jemma Sbeg? allows you to recognize what you do and don't deserve, allows you to work hard, have ambitions, maintain a stable sense of self. We don't want to give any of that up. And I also don't want you to feel shame at being envious or jealous or accidentally rude or mean. And I don't want you to think that just because you have acted that way in the past, that that is always who you are going to be and how you are going to feel. I say this a lot. You simply cannot hate yourself into being a better person. It doesn't work that way because if you truly think you are awful and cursed and whatever else is running through your mind, you have no incentive to improve because this all feels very set in stone.
35:06 Jemma Sbeg? Your shame and self-awareness, it's gotten you to this very important point. You have recognized that perhaps something is off. That's a good thing. Now it's time to focus on the mindset shifts that are available to you to get you out of this downward ego spiral. Humility is also just such a great asset to have. Humility makes you more attractive. It makes you more desirable as a romantic partner. Humility is a strong predictor of relationship satisfaction, but also relationship length and sustainability. It makes you a more desirable employee and it also means that people feel more comfortable around you because you're less defensive and judgmental. I know that confidence and arrogance and thinking that you're the shit, like that's,
35:51 Jemma Sbeg? some people are going to confuse that with having a strong sense of self and knowing your worth. I don't necessarily think that when it gets to the level where you are instinctually judging or thinking cruelly of other people. I don't think that that is what we're talking about. We're talking about the balance. So in order to get back to that balance point, the first thing I need you to do is call yourself out. Call yourself out for those moments like the one I experienced the other day where you just behaved in a bad manner. Your instinct was ugly, no matter.
36:26 Jemma Sbeg? How much control you had over it or not, it was coming from a place that was not being taken care of. People aren't always going to call you out for your bad behaviour. In fact, you know, it could get to a point where even if they did, you would still not believe them. And and that would result in reputational and interpersonal damages or consequences. It would result in relationship failure and breakdown because you have gotten to a point where you just think they're a hater, or you think that they're, um, you know, criticizing you. So when you notice that your behaviour is not what you want it to be, I want you to say it out loud, that's not okay. I want you to ask yourself, why did I say that? I want
37:10 Jemma Sbeg? you to pull your head in. Remember, bad, mean, cruel thoughts, they come from you. That also means that a better thought can come from you as well. You are capable and able and allowed to have mean thoughts that you don't particularly like, or prideful thoughts, and then take that thought, examine it, give it a kiss and replace it with something even better. Secondly, if you are ready to embrace the power of humility, don't do a gratitude list. Commit to a contribution list, a list of things that you have done for others. I will say gratitude and humility are a very healthy match and studies do find they're mutually reinforcing. That means the more you feel
37:55 Jemma Sbeg? one, the more you feel the other. But I think we can take it a step a step further and really start to reflect and make our priority what we are doing for other people in our community. And if you have a contribution list, I think this makes this more of a focus for you to be putting things on that list as regularly as possible. D, centre yourself by doing something selfless. As selfless as as any act can really be, but something that is not primarily for you. I think our issue as a society, specifically in a highly individualistic society, is that we are taught, again, that we're at the centre of our own universe and that we should always look out for ourselves first. We focus on what makes us special, what we need. When we have more than plenty.
38:40 Jemma Sbeg? We have so much more than we need. And because of our obsession with just gaining more, gaining more praise, wealth, whatever it is, we've lost this sense of interconnectedness. You are going to do better if your neighbor is doing better, if your friends are doing better, if the people around you feel supported. So if you are feeling gross about yourself, if you are engaging in too much self pity, if your ego is dominating, it is time to do something for someone else. And speaking of others, my third tip is to start noticing the most beautiful things about other people. My humility always goes down the drain when I start feeling bad about the world,
39:23 Jemma Sbeg? when I start believing that everyone is cruel and mean and cold hearted and therefore I have to only look after my, after myself. That's especially hard these days with the news, with everything going on. I need to remind myself that humanity and other people are beautiful and that life is valuable and that we are all the same, like I am no better than anyone else. There is good in everyone. And so I've started doing this walk slash run practice. In particular, I started doing it on my long run. So like every weekend, me and my friends go to Centennial Park in Sydney and we do like a couple of laps, ends up being like 10 kilometres. And one day I forgot my headphones and I was just in a bad mood.
40:07 Jemma Sbeg? And I don't know, something had happened that week and I was feeling like quite angry, like, I don't know, people would like kind of get in my way and I'd be like, I was getting frustrated. And so what I started doing is every single person that walked past me, I forced myself to notice something really beautiful about them. Something spectacular, something wonderful, something about their outfit that I liked, the colour of their eyes, um, how beautiful they were walking, how kind they were to their dog, how they were noticing nature. Every single person got this hidden compliment from me. And it immediately made me feel that interconnectedness, that, that those Buddhist philosophies and Buddhist principles want us to feel with other people.
40:51 Jemma Sbeg? It de-centred me from the narrative. It allowed me to reconnect and, and remember that, you know, humanity is gorgeous and beautiful and that people are kind and that that is enough. I think we're going to talk a little bit more about the role of others here just for one second, which is, yes, we want to do things for others. We want to notice things about others. We also want to give credit publicly and thank others. You can celebrate yourself and you should. We're not saying not to do that. When it's your moment and good things are happening and you've worked hard for them, go off. You did that. Celebrate yourself. Buy yourself a freaking cake. Put some candles in it. Tell people, self-promote. But you also have to notice when it's someone else's moment as well.
41:33 Jemma Sbeg? We are not letting a scarcity mindset trick us into envy and into not raising others up because we think there is less room for us. There is room for everyone. Believe me, I know in a success obsessed society, we don't think there is. But you are going to get further ahead and you are going to have a happier life. If you are getting ahead with others beside you, who you care about and whose careers and ambitions and goals are meaningful to you and who you can celebrate. Like, none of this. Life is worth nothing without community. Community is so valuable. Every single person that you feel envious towards or jealous of because they have more than you
42:15 Jemma Sbeg? or are doing something better than you, that means that there is something you can learn from them. That means that they have cracked a code that you are still working on. And a kindness towards them is a kindness towards yourself. But it also just makes your life better. It makes everyone's life better to give credit publicly, to thank people, to praise people, to speak their names in crowded rooms where there are opportunities. Here's my little challenge for you. This week, I really want you to hype someone up that you envy, even when it feels unnatural. Now, that could be someone that you know, someone you, one of your coworkers, colleagues, classmates, whatever it is.
42:59 Jemma Sbeg? I want you to speak their praises. It could literally be a celebrity, could literally be a social media influencer. Speak kindly about them. I mainly, what all these exercises are doing is, is basically pursuing humility by...
43:14 Jemma Sbeg? Allowing you to see how wonderful other people are and that there is no world where anyone is worth more than someone else, where your needs, your desires, your goals are more important. We are really, truly all equal and yes, your ego will sometimes get in the way of that humility. That is when you need to deliberately humble yourself and that is where you need to understand that if you approach things with humility, if you remove yourself from the centre of your own universe and you focus outwards, you are going to get more done because you aren't always trying to prove yourself. You are going to have more fun because you take life less seriously, you take yourself less seriously.
43:58 Jemma Sbeg? You are going to appreciate your mistakes more, you are going to be a better person to be around and you are actually going to gain more momentum towards your goals. Because this huge factor has been taken out of the equation. This huge factor being how you think your story looks to others. This huge factor being trying to impress others, trying to protect your sense of self, trying to avoid any hint of rejection or unfairness or dissatisfaction. When you take that as part of your life and you humble yourself and you say, I'm just going to accept what comes and I'm going to work hard and be kind. Like, I know it sounds simple, but that is truly, every single major religion, every single major philosophy
44:44 Jemma Sbeg? will tell you that that is the equation for a satisfied life. So I hope that this episode has been persuasive for you. I understand that it's more philosophical than what we normally talk about, but I promise we have a jam packed, science packed psychology episode coming to you next week. If you made it this far, hello, my loyal listeners. I want you to leave, hmm, what emoji should I choose today? I want you to leave a little banana emoji down below. I would also love it if you shared your thoughts about this episode. Further questions, thoughts, queries, qualms, maybe you disagreed with something that I said. Maybe there was a point I didn't make, please leave it below. This is, obviously, I feel like every episode I make, I want it to be an ongoing discussion and. We can learn so much from each other. So um yeah, don't feel afraid to share.
45:30 Jemma Sbeg? Make sure you share this episode as well with someone who you think needs to hear it. Although I feel like that's kind of a read if you're like the power of humility and you send that to someone, but you never know, maybe you and your friends or your family or your partner have that kind of relationship. Maybe it can be a subtle hint that they need to to rein it in. But until next time, stay safe, be kind, be gentle to yourself, make sure that you check out person in progress and make sure that you're following me on Instagram at that psychology podcast and we will talk very, very soon.
46:06 Jemma Sbeg? Your twenties are full of firsts. First job, first rent payment, first time checking your balance. Wow, that's a lot. Having the right setup helps. Bank of America Advantage Safe Balance Banking has no monthly maintenance fee if you are under 25. It's simple, which is honestly exactly what most people need right now. Plus, when you open a new Safe Balance Banking account, you can explore what B of A Rewards has to offer, like cash back deals plus fraud and identity monitoring. Learn more at B of A dot com slash simple banking. Member FDIC. I've been really trying to prioritize my health in a realistic way this year and something
46:47 Jemma Sbeg? that has kept me really motivated is my Whoop. I am such a data person, which is why I love Whoop, because I can genuinely see why my body feels differently depending on the day, why I'm running differently, why I'm maybe less focused. Whoop effortlessly tracks my sleep, it tracks my strain, my recovery, my stress, and most importantly, my overall health. And it just gives me all that data and all those patterns so I can make better decisions, which includes knowing when to go easy and knowing when to go hard. New members can try Whoop with a 30 day free trial before committing to a membership. That's join dot whoop dot com slash psychology for your free month of Whoop.
47:28 Jemma Sbeg? This episode is sponsored by Jim Shark. Jim Shark has spent over 14 years obsessing over gym clothes. And the people who wear it. And let me just say, I think we all know they are very, very good at what they do. No, seriously, their stuff is so good. Their everyday seamless collection is light, it's soft, it's stretchy. All of their stuff just looks good on and it's made for people who love to exercise, whatever exercise that is, lifting, cardio, Pilates, running around campus, maybe just doing errands. Discover Gymshark and find your new favourite gym clothing at gymshark.com.
48:05 Jemma Sbeg? Hi, this is Jemma Sbeg. Taking care of yourself doesn't have to mean completely changing your routine. Naturewise Vitamin D3 is an easy way to support immune, bone, and muscle health every single day. And because quality matters, Naturewise has one of the first NSF certified Vitamin D3 currently on the market. Plus, it's non-GMO, gluten-free, and third-party tested. Visit naturewise.com to explore their Vitamin D3 options and find the one that's right for you. naturewise.com.
48:41 Speaker 00 This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed Human.
Previous 291. How I wrote a book Next 293. Why are we never happy with what we have? Page updated November 3, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated