June 5, 2023
Accumulating Cringe Theory (or, why It Sucks Growing Old)
If you think you’re about to read some grand existentialist revelation, let me stop you right there – or redirect you to Giacomo Leopardi. Accumulating Cringe Theory might sound fancy, but it’s just something I came up with in the middle of the night while trying to fall back asleep.
To be fair to my brain, the “what if” behind it was intriguing. The basic premise is: If we are embarrassed by our past behavior – think of the silly things you said as a teenager – doesn’t it follow that the older we get, the wider the expanse of this past?
In other words, as we get older and have more of a past to recall (often in a flawed manner), doesn’t it mean we have more embarrassing moments, too? I decided to call this accumulating cringe theory just to have a name for it. Is there anything valuable to discuss there? I’m finding out myself as I’m typing this very post.
Accumulating Cringe Theory: The Basics
Every theory – even if it’s not meant to be taken seriously – needs some fundamentals in place. This silly accumulating cringe theory of mine is no exception, so let’s try to define it:
The Accumulating Cringe Theory affirms that, the older a person gets, the greater the theoretical number of embarrassing (i.e. cringe-worthy) memories they have.
We should emphasize the fact that this number is theoretical. In other words, though a person who is e.g. 70 years old has 65-or-so years of possible memories – which, in absolute terms, is greater than the years available to e.g. a 40-year-old – practically speaking there are two limitations we need to acknowledge:
- A greater number of past years doesn’t necessarily mean a greater number of memories. Some of us are lucky enough to remember easily, but not all people do. It’s entirely possible that a random person in their 70s remembers about as much in total as another person in their 40s.
- A greater number of memories doesn’t necessarily mean a greater number of cringe-worthy memories.
This latter part in particular is intriguing, so let’s see it in more detail.
Cringe and Grumpy Old Men
Though the title of this post contains the phrase “it sucks growing old”, it’s not that bad. The best part about growing older is that – again, theoretically – you understand yourself and life better. The threshold is very subjective (some people reach it sooner, while some never do), but I’d say the average person at 35 or 40 should realize certain important things about life:
- No, you don’t exist to please others.
- Life is complex, there are no simple answers.
- There are no heroes.
- There’s a lot of ignorance and stupidity out there, and whereas you can help the ignorant, you can’t help the stupid.
The list could go on and on… The bottom line is, the older we get, the more we accept the realities of life. In this context, there should come a point where we no longer feel embarrassed about our actions or thoughts. More still, we understand that our past behavior was embarrassing at the time, but there’s no need to feel embarrassed about it now.
Of course, we all make mistakes; at any age. But accepting the reality of being human, there shouldn’t be anything embarrassing about, say, sending a message slaughtered by autocorrect to a friend. Similarly, recalling running naked around the neighborhood when you were 6 might have felt like a thousand deaths at 14, but it shouldn’t be a big deal at 50. To put it this way, if Gary Lineker survived this embarrassment, anything can be laughed at.
But people are complex…
Accumulating Cringe Theory Preys on Vulnerable Souls
As I mentioned above, realizing the realities of life is really subjective. Put simply, some people are fast learners, whereas others never learn the lesson – the world is full or jolly and smart 80-year-olds, but also of ignorant, bitter ones. Some tormented souls mature fast as a result of their experiences, while others never recover.
In this context, this tongue-in-cheek accumulating cringe theory of mine might have something to teach us, even if it was something I came up with during a sleepless night.
As I see it, the lesson is this: Learn to accept your shortcomings, particularly if they are harmless, because if you don’t, the weight of negativity will crush you.
So what if you ran naked around the block when you were 6? Heck, so what if you did it now, because you were accidentally locked outside your own house. So what if your first book was cringe-worthy? It offered you tons of experience, after all.
Knowledge without experience is impossible.
6 Comments
Comments are closed for posts older than 90 days
And, as one progresses in life, it is expected one understands oneself better. This expectancy is not unfounded, as understanding is bound to grow with time because it grows upon previous experiences enlightened by reflection. As time marches on, it stretches larger the interval for experience and reflection. But this is not materially probable, as we are flooded with distractions from ourselves: social media, mass media, etc.
There is no such thing as thinking for oneself about oneself. To think for oneself, on one’s own bases, is a blatant lie: we learn to think from others, and with others. But to think about oneself is perfectly possible, yet demands such strength of character, such moral impetus, such intellectual honesty, that it is far more challenging than many other tasks of thinking. To come to terms with what one truly desires, to admit it to oneself, to withstand the internalized shame, the self-beating…
Yet, to come alive and well on the other side of knowing, that is the purpose. A life not thought out (i.e. thought about) is not worth living, Socrates advised, and for good reason. To admit one is never alone, yet one has to make everything one’s own, what a marvellous challenge! Life. Life! Still, people are scared of death. Death is a nothing, not a thing, the very nothing that it will turn us into — life is the scary thing, to live, to go through.
I’m intrigued by your opening sentence, “as one progresses in life, it is expected one understands oneself better”, which reminded me – for some reason – John Wheeler: “We live on an island surrounded by a sea of ignorance. As our island of knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance”.
In other words, I wonder whether by growing older we only understand how little we understand – with obvious Socratic references there, of course.
It seems a comfortable — and quite mystic — position to just enlarge one’s unknowing beyond any knowledge. Except it is blatantly false: to know what one does not know is — surprise — a form of knowledge. Knowledge does, indeed, grow, even if negatively (by knowing it does not know).
But I do not say we do know more as time progresses. I just stated what is expected of time’s movement. We may come to know ourselves better, or we may not, time is not assurance, time is possibility, an opening for what is to come.
If one knows what one ignores, then one has given form, name, even boundaries to what is ignored, thus not ignoring it entirely.
Excellent points!
-grin- I did enjoy this one as I’ve finally reached a point in life where I’ve stopped caring. Not about the important things, just about the stupid ego related stuff. I still try very hard to please the people I love, but the rest of the world? Bah humbug! lol It’s one of the [few] nice things about getting old-ish. What a pity that by the time we finally fit inside our skins they become so wrinkly. 😉
It is very likely also a matter of confidence: When we’re young and insecure, we don’t want to be thought of as weak, and we want to be liked by everyone, to cover our perceived weakness and shortcomings. Only when we grow older and nurture some confidence do we say, screw it, good enough 😛