Give Up Your Need To Always Be Right

Do you always have a strong desire to always be right? Well, most of us actually do and quite often, it can make our lives miserable. If you take a moment and reflect on your relationships and daily interactions perhaps you will realize that the strong need to always be right plays out practically every day.

For most of us, if indeed we are honest with ourselves, we will agree that our strong desire to be right can only be achieved if we prove the other person wrong.

The way I see it, the desire to always be right can mean a number of things. To start with, being right all the time is a form is self gratification, one that tries to stroke our ego and even in some cases mask our hidden insecurities.

But being right all the time is not important, it is a hindrance towards happiness and more often than not, it affects our relationships. Besides, no one loves a know it all.

Always Being Right Is Nothing But Perception

Life as we know it is not black and white. It’s never a question of who is right or who is wrong, but what is right and what is wrong. Believing that your own way is the right way is just a perception that enslaves your mind, it limits your ability to take constructive criticism, and it gets you angry and threatened every time your actions are questioned.

Soon enough, you start to distance yourself from people, your way of thinking becomes rigid and a path to a happy life is blocked forever.

Andre’ Maurois “Everything that is in agreement with our personal desires seems true. Everything that is not puts us in a rage.”

The Need To Be Right Can Be A Defense Mechanism

People who always feel the need to be right always have some underlying fears and insecurities.

Being right to them is a defense mechanism that elevates them to a place of superiority over those they interact with, or so it would seem to them but in most cases, the strong desire to be right leaves nothing but a short lived feeling of victory.

And the worst thing is that it presents some distorted reality of superiority that does not exist.

Albert J. Bernstein “Life offers a cruel choice: you can be right or happy. Not both. This is true regardless of whom you may be involved with, but it is especially true if there is an emotional vampire in your life.”

Being Right All the Time Means Being Miserable All The Time

People who feel the need to defend their correctness are often swamped by perceived or imagined shortcomings of the people they interact with. They feel that the people around them are not good enough and they try to justify their self righteousness by blaming and criticizing those around them.

They try to hold on to power and keep others into submission, they use anger to intimidate and control. And people start to distance themselves from them.

They become alone and miserable with only a bloated ego to show for themselves.

Virginia Satir “Whether you point your finger in blame or extend the hand in partnership is only a matter of perception”

A Strong Desire To Be Right Enslaves Your Mind

Maintaining a mentality of always being right makes you inflexible in the way you think. You are no longer open to new ideas, you feel threatened by people if they try to assert themselves, and your persistent insistence of having your way closes any opportunity to be open-minded and learn from others. This makes your brain enslaved to your own way of doing things.

You can no longer think outside the box, you are never learning new things, and most of the time you spend a big portion of your energy trying to justify your own way and belittling others who may challenge you.

This simply gets you stuck in your life and you can never move on towards success and happiness.

Ronald Reagan “There are no constraints on the human mind, no walls around the human spirit, no barriers to our progress except those we ourselves erect.”

How Do You Know You Have A Mr. Right Mentality?

Most of us may have the need to always be right and we may unconsciously assert this mentality to the people we interact with without even knowing it. However, there are some factors that can easily point out to the fact that you have the Mr. Right Mentality.

Here are some of the things to note:

• You have a strong belief that you are superior to others
• You do not always welcome opportunities to learn from other people
• You always feel important every time you are right
• You are not open-minded, your thinking is always one dimensional
• You feel angry when people question your way of doing things
• You always feel threatened when your way of doing things is challenged
• You don’t feel secure when people around you start to assert themselves
• You have an inherent fear of being wrong

Its Time Get Rid Of The Mr. Right Mentality

Being right all the time is not important. Overcoming your fear of being wrong is the first step in dealing with the Mr. Right mentality. Do not make everything in your life a competition. Sometimes you can be right sometimes you can be wrong, so what of it? As H. L. Mencken so clearly puts it, “For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong “.

– Conclusion

Being right all the time destroys your relationships, it keeps you always on the defense, and it makes your life miserable.

It is time to let go of this bad habit, do not reduce your life to a mere question of who is right and who is wrong, try and embrace the idea that for us to be right, we have to be wrong sometimes and soon you will start to make peace with yourself.