Other-esteem?

[Jill]

Ultimately, if others don't value you, you are in trouble. If you have nothing to offer, you have nothing to trade.

Self-esteem comes from knowing yourself competent to live, but that competence comes from feedback, from the result of creating value and attempting to trade it.

Thoughts?

[Zip]

Self-esteem comes from yourself. That self value drives you to accomplish, to produce and to live which in turn causes others to value you. Ever notice that people who do not value themselves are often overlooked as being of value to anyone else regardless of talents and value?

[Jill]

But you don't value yourself in a vaccum. You're only something if you are something in a world.

[Zip]

But you are not necessarily only something if you are something to someone else. Stranded on a desert Isle I would not value myself less because there was no one there to see what I had done.

[Eiuol]

If you have nothing to offer, you have nothing to trade.

I think that this is the problem. You don't -have to- trade value for value, sometimes it just feels good to create something that matters to you. I understand the "feedback" you mentioned, but there is also personal, self-caused feedback. You are always something in the world if you put yourself first. "The people around me don't care about me, but I care about me because I live my life as best I can." Yes, it is important to also be valued back, but you can't even feel valued by another person without valuing yourself in the first place. If people around you don't even value anything about you, that doesn't always mean you have nothing of value to yourself.

[Jill]

I'm not talking about being valued as being liked, but as competence to produce something others would offer value (money) for. All your self-esteem would mean nothing in a desert island if you have no skills to survive.

Edited June 7, 2009 by Jill

[DavidOdden]

Self-esteem comes from knowing yourself competent to live, but that competence comes from feedback, from the result of creating value and attempting to trade it.

My competence to do something, anything, is not caused by other people's estimation of what I do. Whether I am competent to play the violin, or dig a square hole, is a fact and it isn't defined by the attitude of others.

What you've done is substituted other people's judgment for actual fact. The problem with your equation is that people do not automatically respond based on objective facts and using the same values that I have. For example, if you dig objectively excellent square holes but nobody wants to hire you to dig such holes, either because they are idiots and can't see the craftsmanship of your holes, or because they don't share with you that value. Feedback (which is a kind of noise, in case you're curious) is useless. What you should seek is a rational critique of what you produce, checking first and foremost that your evaluators share essential values with you.

If you find that nobody shares your values e.g. your passion for square holes, then you should reconsider your career because it is not in fact a rational path to pursue in life. That speaks only to your competence to judge the market, not your competence at producing what you produce.

[Jackethan]

You do not necessarily have to produce anything that is of use to another person in order to gain self esteem from achieving your values. You can make yourself an amazing gourmet breakfast and enjoy eating it, this always helps my self esteem. Ultimately your pride must come from -your- recognition of value in -yourself- or something you have produced. Trading value for value is not necessary for man's psychological health, but necessary for man's moral existence in the modern age.

I add, if you lived in a cabin in the woods, completely self sustained, and never saw anyone else, you could still have a high self esteem, so long as you value that life, or something you gain from that life.

[Capitalism Forever]

All your self-esteem would mean nothing in a desert island if you have no skills to survive.

If you have no skills to survive, then you have no reason to hold yourself in esteem. On the other hand, if you do have the skills, then you also have a reason for self-esteem, and you can survive, regardless of whether there are others valuing your skills.

Being able to produce the values you need is the primary source of your survival; trade is only a secondary consequence of the need to be productive.

[Axiomatic]

No no, people, you don't understand. We should provide others with esteem according to our ability to give praise and receive esteem according to our need for it.

That way everyone wins!

[Jill]

If you find that nobody shares your values e.g. your passion for square holes, then you should reconsider your career because it is not in fact a rational path to pursue in life. That speaks only to your competence to judge the market, not your competence at producing what you produce.

In what is this different from being a Keating?

If you have no skills to survive, then you have no reason to hold yourself in esteem. On the other hand, if you do have the skills, then you also have a reason for self-esteem, and you can survive, regardless of whether there are others valuing your skills.

This is what I was asking, thanks. So the skills come first?

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

In what is this different from being a Keating?

This is what I was asking, thanks. So the skills come first?

I think Dr. Peikoff's 64th podcast will be beneficial to you.

One ought not to be so concerned with others from any perspective, but rather assess one's one abilities within the context of what you can do and accomplish. If others don't see it, then maybe you cannot earn a living from doing it, but that in and of itself does not mean that your abilities are worthless. As a personal example, I have written good many good poems and several good short stories, but given the responses to those on my website for about three years now, I may not be able to bring them all together into one book and earn a living from them. I still think they are good, but they are definitely not very popular. Also, I recognize that we live in an irrational society that does not recognize rational art; which leaves me out in the cold. Maybe eventually, I will find my audience, but I haven't yet. So I produce what I produce from the selfish pleasure of such production.

[Ifat Glassman]

Ultimately, if others don't value you, you are in trouble. If you have nothing to offer, you have nothing to trade.

Self-esteem comes from knowing yourself competent to live, but that competence comes from feedback, from the result of creating value and attempting to trade it.

Thoughts?

Your ability to live in society doing what you like to do does depend on others to some extent, as well as on other factors. It still doesn't make the standard for self esteem how others evaluate you. SELF-esteem is your evaluation of yourself. It is a mistake to let other dictate how you should judge yourself, or to try to substitute their judgment for your own.

In any profession if you wish to make money you need to provide something of value to other people. Still this does not mean that the industrialist who's producing pipes, for example, should take the opinion of every layman as to how to market or produce pipes. He needs to make himself the expert, to judge his pipes by his knowledge and standard and then to offer that product to others.

I'm not big on history, but I think if you look at all the men who succeeded big time, you'll see they always followed their own mind, what they thought was right. People like Walmart, Edison, Ford... Even when people told them it can't be done, it's foolish, etc' they stood by their own vision and their own knowledge and judgment, pulled through and ended up with a great product they could make money from. The key to their success was independent thinking.

The same is true for other professions.

For an artist (such as yourself) this is especially important because the fuel to create art comes from (a form of) self-expression. If an artist tries to substitute self-expression with creating whatever others want him to, he's finished right there. Not only will he/she lose motivation after a while, but also they would never, in my opinion, be able to create good art.

[Jill]

Thomas, aren't the skills that you can actually trade the ones that hold real value, though? Isn't what others value part of the reality you live in and doesn't an individual's identity depend on reality?

Ifat, attempting to live of one's personal art is very hard, because thousands of people are offering their images for free nowadays. It's like trying to sell a web browser. The pleasure of visual art is in seeing it and few people have a desire to own an image as a physical object after they saw it. The most marketable jobs in art are the less personal, such as concept art for film and games, for instance.

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

Thomas, aren't the skills that you can actually trade the ones that hold real value, though? Isn't what others value part of the reality you live in and doesn't an individual's identity depend on reality?

I don't think one ought to judge the value of one's art based upon if others will see it as valuable and want to pay you for it. You need to develop an independent assessment of the value of your art. That is, does it concretize what you seek to concretize in an objective manner; does it contain the facts necessary to convey what you think needs to be conveyed? Howard Roark had a very difficult struggle to become successful, but he was able to eventually make a living from his art. I work in the art business, and I have seen some wonderful art that was able to make a living for those artists, so it is not impossible.

I think you should also keep in mind that we live in a mostly irrational culture where the most god-awful art is the most popular. But it is possible to find a niche market. I haven't been able to do that yet, but I also haven't written books of poetry and short stories, so I don't know if they would sell or not; and I have to keep that in mind or I get discouraged. So, I think what you ought to do is to make your art for it's own sake in a sense; that is, make a portfolio and keep expanding it, and then one day put it all together into a book and sell it. There is no guarantee that others will see it as valuable, however. So, maybe you will have to keep "a day job" as you aim for success in the field you want to accomplish the most. And, no, it is not easy, but if doing good art makes your life worthwhile, then do it.

[Capitalism Forever]

So the skills come first?

It's more like a cycle. You successfully exercise your skills; the experience gives you self-esteem; the self-esteem allows you to develop further skills and continue exercising your existing ones.

Each of us learns some basic skills in the pre-conceptual stage of his life (such as sight, walking, and speech), so in this sense, the skills do come first--but of course anyone who stops there and doesn't develop any other skills won't have much self-esteem by the time he grows up.

[whYNOT]

Ultimately, if others don't value you, you are in trouble. If you have nothing to offer, you have nothing to trade.

Self-esteem comes from knowing yourself competent to live, but that competence comes from feedback, from the result of creating value and attempting to trade it.

Thoughts?

If others don't value you----- is exactly why you need to value yourself, to my mind.

In fact, I'd argue the converse; that you are in trouble if you pay too much attention to how much others value you.

I think that beyond the need to be productive [of course], to be effective [yes!], to be able to trade your skills in the market place [yes!], is a need to feel "right" in yourself.

Others and the market are fickle entities. You certainly can't allow them to be the final arbiter on who you are, and how high a price you set on You.

Can you, Jill?

[Grames]

Ultimately, if others don't value you, you are in trouble. If you have nothing to offer, you have nothing to trade.

Self-esteem comes from knowing yourself competent to live, but that competence comes from feedback, from the result of creating value and attempting to trade it.

Thoughts?

Just to explore this line of thought further:

You can't control what other people think. You can give them reasons, even excellent strong reasons, to think well of you but people can be and are irrational all the time so the influence of reasons is limited.

If others don't value you, you are in trouble.

We can't control, and have limited influence over, other people's values.

Therefore we can't control, and have limited influence over whether we are in trouble or not.

I don't like where this goes.

[whYNOT]

In the process of Mankind moving from the tribe towards the individual - which took forever to get going, and even now is faltering - a bunch of 'hang overs' have stayed with us.

Of themselves they are not wrong (as such) , in fact at one time they were life- affirming essentials to survive in a harsh (by Nature, and by man) unknowable world. Pragmatism was paramount, the good of the tribe was unquestionable.

Rand's " Civilisation is the process of setting man free from men. Civilisation is the progress toward a society of privacy", clearly, and forever, identifies what should never need to exist again - the group.

So these 'hang-overs' have in common the archaic need to be a part of the collective, and its survival. They are - 'belongingness,'approval, admiration, acceptance, appreciation, status. - And servitude, duty, and sacrifice,( in order to claim and earn that approval from others in the tribe.)

IMO, Ayn Rand's call to Individualism was a 'unilateral declaration of Independence', each person is faced with making. Not that she discounted the human need for approval from others, totally.

No, she just placed them further down the totem pole, where they belong, and replaced all those hang-overs with the true virtues of Productivity, trade, Pride, and Esteem.

[Jill]

I'm not talking about earning approval. If what a person really likes about life is not profitable, the person is in trouble. So the person has to change according to reality and reality also includes other people and what they value.

[whYNOT]

Right, I did veer off-topic there.

What I think is often the problem is the dual demands many of us in creative careers place on ourselves: to survive,to profit; and simultaneously, to stay true to ourselves. Why not?

There were several times in my free-lancing past that I had to take on extra, or part-time employment to earn a living. At the time I resented it, and saw this as a dilemma, interfering with the 'purity' of my 'art'.

This just isn't true, I see now. There was no 'duality', there's just me.

The market for what one is passionate about, and for one's particular style, ebbs and flows. I am in agreement with Ifatart, in that [my interpretation] one sticks to one's guns - if you believe your work has value, keep at it, with the proviso that you are constantly checking your premises.

One has to keep reminding oneself that it is precisely because of one's singular and unique vision that you have value. Your value to yourself is what people will buy.

Rather than try to adapt to the market, the way a businessman would, anyone in a creative field can do little more than produce, produce, produce, and -- wait. And use whatever outlets possible to gain attention.

If your'e as inept as I am at self-marketing, find someone to represent you.

Oh, and the beauty of this is that you don't have to convince the whole world of your worth; all it takes is a single person to recognise it.

[Grames]

[Guest ArenaMan]

I've given a little thought to this. What I think is important to keep in mind is the context in which we experience life. Most of us are social beings, and life would mean much less if not for our interactions with other people. Personally, I find much more fulfillment in producing something that has not only a recognizable value to someone, but actual utility-and usually, the more someone's the better. That's not to say that I couldn't produce something solely for the enjoyment of what I have produced, but that there's often more to get out of doing something in a social context.

For example, if I enjoyed being an artist and producing art, I could certainly live alone on a far-away island and produce paintings and sculptures for the rest of my life, with no one but me around to appreciate them. There's nothing wrong with that, and I could certainly find at least some happiness. But on the other hand, I could take those same paintings and sculptures and share them with other people, sell them to other people, etc, all without sacrificing my own pride in my work. I would personally probably find the latter scenario more rewarding.

The important thing is that you measure your work according to your own guidelines, that is where the self-esteem comes from. It's perfectly fine to incorporate other people's behavior into your measurement strategy. For example, if you are a hairdresser and you give your customer something completely opposite from what they want, when your guidelines for "good work" include making your customer look good and happy, then you have failed according to your own rules. In this way, the customer's opinion matters, but only to the extent that you have objectively defined why and how it matters. This also extends to personal relationships, for example listening (and I mean really listening) to a friend's advice, objectively considering it, and refactoring your original opinion to include things you might not have considered.

The truth is, the fact that we do not live in isolation from one-another makes life much more rewarding (for many of us). This necessitates including our interactions with other people in our self-esteem "accounting" processes.

[Scribulus]

What about "love languages"? Do you think there is any merit in that idea, or is it contrary to what really produces self-esteem? I have recently been wrestling with applying the ideas in this thread. As I learn to apply Objectivism to my life, I find that I have a tendency to want to replace my old friends, who validated my old, mystic, point of view, with new friends who validate my new, more objective, point of view. I have for many years thought of myself as someone whose love language is "words of affirmation." But if I want to be independent, I don't know how to deal with my own desire for affirmation.

My gut response has been to be more selective in who I seek and accept affirmations from. But I ask myself, can I ever be free from the desire to validate a given activity of mine with a word of affirmation from someone else? After all, if no one happens to be available to give the affirmation, then I am not in control of that aspect of my life. The result is I would feel anxious. And indeed, that is what I observe in myself when my usual friends are not available to give me that affirmation. It annoys me that I feel anxious! I want to be independent of that need. Is there some deep, evolutionarily based need by which people *need* to have social validation, in other words, is it a real part of human identity? Or is it possible to be emotionally free from the need to have validation from others?

Some of the other comments here have been about being able to market what one produces, but I am speaking of an emotional need for the independent development of self-esteem.

Maybe another way to say it would be, from a very nitty-gritty, let's-get-out-and-do-it point of view, how does one create self-esteem?

Another way to frame the question might be, if you were the last man on earth, would happiness be possible?

[Guest ArenaMan]

My gut response has been to be more selective in who I seek and accept affirmations from. But I ask myself, can I ever be free from the desire to validate a given activity of mine with a word of affirmation from someone else?

....

It annoys me that I feel anxious! I want to be independent of that need. Is there some deep, evolutionarily based need by which people *need* to have social validation, in other words, is it a real part of human identity? Or is it possible to be emotionally free from the need to have validation from others?

Again, I think context is important. Emotional "needs" are dictated by emotional goals. If you don't care to interact with other people, then validation doesn't matter because it has nothing to do with what you want out of life.

Personally, I know many people who have been able to give me a more objective picture of myself or my life during specific events or around specific behaviors or choices of mine than I had at the time. Sometimes when something dramatic is happening in my life just talking to someone is enough to realize I'm not seeing things 100% clearly. In cases like that, especially, it makes sense to trust the right person to say that I'm making a wrong choice or tell me something about myself I hadn't realized. That is just one type of scenario where it makes sense for other people to influence your self-esteem.

The truth, as I've experienced it, is that you can't expect to see yourself through a crystal-clear screen. You can try to be objective about yourself as you want, which you should, but often, someone you respect and trust can provide perspective you cannot get for yourself, even if it's relatively limited.

Maybe another way to say it would be, from a very nitty-gritty, let's-get-out-and-do-it point of view, how does one create self-esteem?

By deciding how to live and then doing it well. You may have specific standards that you expect yourself to live up to, but that doesn't mean you're the best judge of whether you're meeting them. The important thing is that it is you setting those standards and not someone else. Your choices in life should be determined by standards you have a good reason to accept, it is your life after all. When it comes down to it, trusting someone else's ideas could be the most rational way to judge yourself. That's when it is okay for your self-esteem to be influenced by other people.

Another way to frame the question might be, if you were the last man on earth, would happiness be possible?

Well, if you accept that happiness is a consequence of having positive self-esteem, then all you have to do is decide how you want to live, and then do it. If you can't find a reason to live, then you should kill yourself. But the reason that sounds ridiculous is because there is a lot to live for, even if it's only you.