Yoga - Self-esteem: The Trojan Horse of psychology

Author

Self-esteem: The Trojan Horse of psychology

ilya_shambat2004@yahoo.com

2005-07-28, 10:54 pm

I find the concept of self-esteem to be a Trojan horse.

Once you've allowed yourself to see yourself as something to be
esteemed, you have essentially made yourself a commodity.

You have taken the center of thought out of where it belongs and placed
it into the marketing-based social construct. Which means that you've
already lost before you have started playing.

It is not acceptable to anyone with any true self-esteem to be a
commodity, whether one valued or not. Which means that it is not
acceptable to accept the concept.

A friend of mine asked a guy who was confident, athletic, musical,
etc., how he got his high self-esteem. His response: "I don't have
self-esteem. I know myself through God."

That, is a far more acceptable attitude than one of identifying one's
image with marketing orientation and becoming one of the many things
people buy and sell.

Ilya Shambat.

earthview

2005-07-31, 6:00 pm

Ilya~

Your posting would seem to assume that all "self-esteem" issues stem
from such influences as Madison Avenue on the societal consciousness...

While that influence is often an aspect of self-esteem issues, I believe
that the susceptibility to developing poor self-esteem probably lies
more in influences primarily from the members of one's family -- those
who never learned how to live from their own Center... or how to
utilize that Center to connect to Source. Many of those with poor
self-esteem have also been exposed to long term verbal / psychological
abuse, and have been so damaged by the people in their lives that they
have perhaps even forgotten how to connect -- if they ever had learned
in the first place. Core Being or Center remains undamaged... but if the
surrounding persona has been battered, the connection into Center can be
damaged... and the conduit to knowing oneself "through God" isn't
accessible without some healing.

So, while I agree with some of your posting -- especially the quote from
the athletic friend, or the statement that people with true self-esteem
do not fall prey to marketing orientations; please let us have some
compassion for others, rather than simply judging them as being somehow
deficient, or that it's a false issue... They have probably been exposed
to the "judgment" of others too much already in their lives.

This does not mean folks need to be coddled... but it wouldn't hurt to
help them learn how to live from a place where they can identify with
Center and Source... Also, there's a need to find ways to help our
children stay connected to and centered their own inner knowing, their
own truth; rather than constantly encouraging them to so completely
conform to society in the first place.

We need to stand together to help each other as we walk through life,
not become yet another manifestation of societal psychological abuse, by
just being critical of where others are stuck... or dis-ing their
stuggle by labling it a "Trojan horse". It's not a non-issue... it's how
too many of our brothers and sisters have been raised, and we need to
lift each other up out of the mass hypnotism of societal conformity to
the commodity mindset.

~earthview

--------------------------------

ilya_shambat2004@yahoo.com wrote:

>I find the concept of self-esteem to be a Trojan horse.
>
>Once you've allowed yourself to see yourself as something to be
>esteemed, you have essentially made yourself a commodity.
>
>You have taken the center of thought out of where it belongs and placed
>it into the marketing-based social construct. Which means that you've
>already lost before you have started playing.
>
>It is not acceptable to anyone with any true self-esteem to be a
>commodity, whether one valued or not. Which means that it is not
>acceptable to accept the concept.
>
>A friend of mine asked a guy who was confident, athletic, musical,
>etc., how he got his high self-esteem. His response: "I don't have
>self-esteem. I know myself through God."
>
>That, is a far more acceptable attitude than one of identifying one's
>image with marketing orientation and becoming one of the many things
>people buy and sell.
>
>Ilya Shambat.
>
>
>

ibshambat2004@hotmail.com

2005-08-01, 6:00 pm

earthview wrote:
> Ilya~
>
> Your posting would seem to assume that all "self-esteem" issues stem
> from such influences as Madison Avenue on the societal consciousness...

Actually I found it to be the dark side of psychology. I write what I
write because I see constant shrill abrasive hideousness thrown the way
of people who have been judged as supposedly having bad self-esteem,
telling them that they can't have relationships or existence worth
having and denying them love and all good things when they most need
it.

I don't know how the concept originated, but the way it's been used has
been unconscionable. It's been made essentially to perpetuate atrocity
and injustice, adding insult to injury and basically robbing people of
a future because they have had something wrong take place in their
past.

> While that influence is often an aspect of self-esteem issues, I believe
> that the susceptibility to developing poor self-esteem probably lies
> more in influences primarily from the members of one's family -- those
> who never learned how to live from their own Center... or how to
> utilize that Center to connect to Source. Many of those with poor
> self-esteem have also been exposed to long term verbal / psychological
> abuse, and have been so damaged by the people in their lives that they
> have perhaps even forgotten how to connect -- if they ever had learned
> in the first place. Core Being or Center remains undamaged... but if the
> surrounding persona has been battered, the connection into Center can be
> damaged... and the conduit to knowing oneself "through God" isn't
> accessible without some healing.

God gives healing as part of the process.

Even in cases he does not, you've got someone great on your side.

> So, while I agree with some of your posting -- especially the quote from
> the athletic friend, or the statement that people with true self-esteem
> do not fall prey to marketing orientations; please let us have some
> compassion for others, rather than simply judging them as being somehow
> deficient, or that it's a false issue... They have probably been exposed
> to the "judgment" of others too much already in their lives.

I am not attacking the people who have been judged as having low
self-esteem. I am attaking the people who judge them that way.

> We need to stand together to help each other as we walk through life,
> not become yet another manifestation of societal psychological abuse, by
> just being critical of where others are stuck... or dis-ing their
> stuggle by labling it a "Trojan horse". It's not a non-issue... it's how
> too many of our brothers and sisters have been raised, and we need to
> lift each other up out of the mass hypnotism of societal conformity to
> the commodity mindset.

Once again, I'm not attacking the people who get labeled as having low
self-esteem. I am attacking the people who do the labeling, and who in
pursuit of it deny people future because they have had a bad past.

Ilya Shambat.