Every person has their own viewpoint on how to live life.

We got the monks, the hedonists, the people who want to play it safe, the mavericks, the people who want to change the world, the list goes on and on and on.

Put two people with differing viewpoints in a room and what do you find?

That each will listen to the other and then subtly try to pick apart each other’s viewpoints and in the process, point out how their viewpoint is superior. Why? Because each person feels their own view is “right” so they feel the need to justify it.

But underneath all that is the strong desire NOT to find out that what they’ve been doing all along was “wrong”.

There’s a lot at stake here because a lot has been invested emotionally, intellectually, financially, socially, etc.

It’s easy to begin to feel defensive and insecure when we hear other people poke holes at our viewpoints on how to live life.

So how can we be the person who actively listens and accepts another person’s viewpoint without feeling insecure about their own?

This is the person we would all like to be.

The first thing to realize? Nobody has it EXACTLY right. That includes you and it definitely includes me. It’s a bitter pill to swallow because we’d like to think that we have it all figured out. That we are right. That everybody else is doing it wrong.

But it’s all relative.

When you realize that, you don’t stress out too much on whether or not you have the ultimate viewpoint or not because there is none. Think of each viewpoint as a color. There’s no “right” color is there? Can you say one color is better than another? That will fall to relative preference. There’s no absolute.

Once you accept that, you’ll come to realize the next logical idea which is that your viewpoint will evolve over time. I guarantee it’s happened to you. Just think back a couple years and you’ll see. You’re shaking your head right now and mentally hitting yourself for all the stupid things you used to believe.

Over time, you become a different person. You experience different things. You learn from other people. All that contributes to shaping your ever changing, molding viewpoint on how to live life.

The third thing to realize is just that. Everything, EVERYTHING, shapes a person’s viewpoint on life. Understand and see what has helped shaped a person’s viewpoint on life. Understand what has shaped yours.

It will help you put the viewpoints not in hierarchy, but on a level playing field. Each just different from the other, not one better than the other.

All this will help you accept another person’s viewpoint on life without judgment.

Now how do you do that, without GENUINELY feeling insecure about your own?

The answer is simple.

LIVE YOUR VIEWPOINT.

If you’re living your current viewpoint, and what I mean by that is you’re practicing what you preach, and it’s turning out good for you, no need to feel insecure. It’s working for you.

You can hear another way to live and you can accept that. You don’t have to feel you need to change your own because things are fine.

That’s NOT to say you keep living the same way. You can take individual elements from another person’s viewpoint on life and incorporate them into your own and see how that works out.

If it does, keep it.

If not, toss it.

Which brings us again to our previous point on our evolving viewpoint on life.

It’s easy to not associate ourselves with people who share differing viewpoints from ours to shield ourselves from the feeling of insecurity that might come up when discussing viewpoints on how to live life, but once we are strong in who we are and how we want to live life, you can feel confident in learning about other viewpoints without having it make you feel insecure.

You know there’s no EXACT “RIGHT” way.

You know your viewpoint is always going to evolve, maybe not drastically, but incrementally.

And you know there’s always much to learn.

If you find something new, put it to the test.

Welcome the differing viewpoints.

Actively challenge your own.

As you do this over time, you’ll eventually sculpt the near perfect viewpoint for you and you’ll have no trouble accepting the viewpoint of others without feeling insecure about your own.