Be careful out there: it’s boasting season. Maybe you’ve already been cornered at a party, received your first round-robin email, opened a card to find a typed insert of “family news”, or stumbled on a social media post where someone lists their 2023 accomplishments with the baffling hashtag #humbled (you’re not, are you? Quite the opposite).
If not, stay alert. It’s sometimes straightforward – proud announcements of prizes and promotions – but more often, it’s subtler. “We must be mad, taking on this ramshackle Georgian pile by the sea, renovations are a nightmare because it’s in Pevsner.” “Oh, Harriet never has time to speak to us now she’s a Fulbright scholar, ha ha!”
I struggle with “success bombing” as I saw it described recently; everyone’s accomplishments all up in your face. Saying that makes me sound like I’m self-effacingly modest, a paragon of self-deprecation, which would be a brag of sorts, too – but I’m not modest. I’m insecure, in thrall to comparison, inclined to see others’ successes as a reproach for all I haven’t achieved. Isn’t there a bit of that in both extremes of this dance-off between compulsive self-deprecation and the desire to scream success from the rooftops? We’re all insecure and hungry for validation, aren’t we?
Well, not all of us. I’ve realised it’s possible not to feel threatened by other people’s expressions of pride at their and their family’s successes, whether or not it tips into bragging. I know, because there are people in my life who are comfortable and secure on their own path, able to feel simply happy for others, or if someone’s really overegging it, gently, indulgently amused. I wish I was like them, the weirdos.
So maybe those of us who feel a twinge of recognition at that Gore Vidal quote about dying inside at others’ success need to find a coping strategy other than grinding our teeth to dust? This year, I’ve adopted a blandly beatific: “That’s wonderful!” Because actually, I suppose it is? Anything that adds a drop to the leaky pot of human happiness is worth embracing.
• Emma Beddington is a Guardian columnist
