Who?
You! Really, sincerely, absolutely you! It sounds a bit ludicrous, but perhaps the most significant thing any human ever needs to think about is you. Start with yourself and the rest of the world may make more sense. There are two broad ways to think about the world. You can have an internal locus of control (you control what happens around you) and an external locus of control (the world controls what happens around you). Both are true of course because a gigantic volcano plume could swallow up Earth and we’d be toast just like the dinosaurs. That, however, is supremely gloomy, so ignore it. We shall pursue an internal locus of control! HUZZAH!
Denigrate or celebrate?
An internal locus of control is powerful, but also fraught with terror! If you are in control of your world, you have nobody to blame except yourself. That’s a recipe to denigrate yourself into oblivion. Got a question wrong on a test? “Why are you such a fool, YOU?”. Stop right there. Life's too short to career through life DISPARAGING yourself. You’ll feel worse and we need to turn that frown upside down. You need to extol yourself a bit more. Celebrate yourself and enjoy yourself. You’re gifted, you’re talented, you’re brilliant, and you’re YOU. Now, you’re thinking, but what about my FLAWS? Enjoy those, too. Imagine being perfect? Life would be oh so boring and you’d have nothing to improve and enjoy knowing you HAVE improved it.
What I do is what I do
You are an individual. You have flaws. So do I. Accept that and then we can start to understand ourselves a lot more. If you’re always angry or irate with those around you, consider this. Do I really have no control over my anger? No, you do have control. You can’t control others, but you can control how you react, respond, and play things out. The odd teacher who wrote this book was the WORST person to play sports with when young and would denigrate himself and everybody else on the team! Were they to blame? NOoooooooooo. The blame lies squarely on the shoulders of the person who gets irate. Nobody makes you angry - you just lose control of your emotion. Try this - when you feel like you are about to become furious and shout or scream, say in your head in an adorable voice, “I can control how I react!”. Now, you won’t get angry.
Playing up to the crowd
Understanding your psychology requires a lot of introspection. You need to spend time thinking about yourself and your thoughts. Make time for yourself. However, let’s be real. Humans are slaves to a crowd. When we are with other human beings, it’s sooooo difficult to control ourselves, especially when young. We play up to the crowd automatically. People fight because their friends say they should. We laugh at horrendously unfunny jokes because others are laughing. We say things we know to be wrong or false because our peers are doing the same. This, simply, is called growing up, and some of us NEVER overcome it. We want to please people around us and make them like us. Your teacher is doing it RIGHT NOW! People like to be liked. That’s not your fault.