How to be happy though human / by W. Béran Wolfe.

to mobilize the individual’s complete powers to escape from or to surmount danger. Nervousness, anxiety, worry, timidity, or actual fear where no real danger exists are therefore the manifestations which accompany an unconscious realization of danger and isolation. An individual who has effectively isolated himself feels himself in constant danger in situations where normally social men and women feel secure. A third expression of the inferiority complex is egoism and all its associated concomitants. The egoist lives not by common sense but by a sort of “ private logic ” which he seeks to superimpose upon the laws of communal living. At a certain stage of human development, during infancy and early childhood, egoism is a natural phe¬ nomenon, as desirable as isolation is in sleep, for during these periods the individual must really look to his personal growth in order to survive. Society demands little more of a child. But when a man or a woman has grown to maturity and persists in remaining an egoist, it is evidence of the fact that he still feels as dependent and inferior as a child and has gained neither the courage to contribute to society nor the proper social feeling towards his fellows. In a later chapter, we shall be able to trace more in detail the life history of egoism as a technique of living. But here it must suffice to indicate that egoism, the cult of personal superiority, the desire for great personal power as expressed in an overweening ambition for riches, knowledge, and prestige, together with a feeling of uniqueness and individuality which may range from personal eccentricity in dress or manners to the cult of personal saintliness, are common manifesta¬ tions of the lack of social adjustment, and certain signs of the presence of an inferiority complex. Similarly those states which are commonly called “ the blues ”, melancholia, disinterestedness, apathy, and boredom, chronic hesitation, vacillation, indecision, and doubt are evidences of the inferiority complex. The well- adjusted person finds the world a very interesting place to live in. He finds that each day presents an opportunity