‘The Inner Idiot’ is a bracing term used to describe a substantial, hugely influential
and strenuously concealed part of everyone. An Idiot is what we deeply fear being, it
is what we suspect in our darkest hours that we might be – and it is what we should simply
accept, with humour and good grace, that we often truly are. A decent life isn’t one
in which we foolishly believe we can slay or evade The Inner Idiot; it’s one in which
we practice the only art available to us: sensible cohabitation. The Inner Idiot makes
itself felt at moments small and large. The Idiot is clumsy: it forgets names, loses important
documents, spills food down its front and gets air kisses wrong. It speaks out of turn,
thrusts itself forward at inopportune moments, both babbles and blushes. The Idiot is prickly,
it gets into a rage because it was momentarily ignored, it sees plots against it where there
was only accident, it shouts when a drawer won’t open properly and it is immediately
self-righteous when faced with the most minor criticism. It is, for the Idiot, always someone
else’s fault. The Inner Idiot is a child on a bad day. We know our own Inner Idiot
from the inside and might suppose it is unique to us. In fact, it represents what might be
called the ‘lower’ self of all of humanity. It is only residual good manners that has
made the Inner Idiot of others less obvious to us – and hence made our own seem like
a freakish exception. Much of wisdom consists in accepting that the Inner Idiot isn’t
ever going to go away and realising that we must therefore endeavour to form a good working
relationship with it. Trying to prevent the emergence of the Inner Idiot otherwise inspires
a range of unfortunate traits. For example, we may lose confidence and grow unnecessarily
meek and cautious in a bid always to appear dignified in front of others. We may refuse
ever to ask someone for a date or for a pay rise, we might never go travelling on our
own or give a speech in public, all of these moves that require a calculated risk of being
hijacked by the Idiot. Or else, by denying our Idiot, we may grow unfeasibly pompous
and stiff. Nothing makes us seem absurd faster than to insist on our own seriousness. We
are always better off confessing to Idiocy in good time, rather than letting it emerge
from behind our carefully-constructed pretensions. In relationships, there can be no greater
generosity than to tell a partner, early on, what our Inner Idiot is like, to give them
a road map to its antics – and always to apologise promptly and warmly when it has
overwhelmed us. None of us should try to find a partner who lacks an Inner Idiot (it’s
impossible); we should just find out more about the particular kind of Idiot they have.
In a wiser world, an entirely standard and wholly inoffensive question on an early dinner
date would be: ‘And what is your Inner Idiot like?’
The best school for learning about the Inner Idiot is comedy. The essence
of comedy is to expose the workings of the Idiot in way that invites sympathetic laughter
rather than harsh criticism. The stand-up artist is a sage who knows how to redescribe
their Idiot with benevolence – and teaches us to do the same. Love is another solution
to the problems of the Inner Idiot. In its most mature and desired sense, love means
encountering and eventually, embracing the Idiot of another and regarding it not with
horror or as an affront – but with all the imagination and generosity with which a parent
might look upon their beloved red-faced two year old in a tantrum. It’s not very nice
that we have an Inner Idiot. In fact, it’s an immense inconvenience. But we cannot wish
the issue away. A wise society would be very ambitious about understanding, accommodating
and forgiving the Inner Idiot in everyone – and would be devoted to finding ways to
soothe it and limit its influence.
It is one of the greatest of all human achievement when we can finally
move from seeing someone as an ‘Idiot’
to being able to consider them as that far less offensive and far more morally-hybrid
creature: a ‘Loveable Idiot.’
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