The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem

by Branden, Nathaniel

  Here are examples from the personal realm, where sentence completion is used to illuminate:

  “If I were to give up blaming my parents for my unhappiness,” said a “child” of forty-six, “I’d have to take responsibility for my actions; I’d have to face the fact that I’ve always felt sorry for myself, and enjoyed it; I’d have to recognize that I still dream of being rescued by my father; I’d admit I like seeing myself as a victim; I’d have to act in new ways; I’d get out of my apartment and look for a job; I couldn’t just suffer.”

  “If I were to accept that I am responsible for my happiness,” said an older man who drank too much, “I’d stop complaining that my wife drives me to drink; I’d keep out of bars; I wouldn’t spend hours in front of the TV, blaming ‘the system’; I’d go to the gym and start getting in shape; I’d give my boss more for his money; I’d probably have to stop feeling sorry for myself; I don’t think I could go on abusing my body as I do now; I’d be a different person; I’d respect myself more; I could get my life moving again.”

  “If I take responsibility for my emotions,” said a woman who exhausted her family and friends with her complaining, “I wouldn’t be so depressed; I’d see how I often make myself miserable; I’d see how much rage I’m denying; I’d admit how much of my unhappiness is spite; I’d focus more often on the good things in my life; I’d realize I’m trying to make people feel sorry for me; I’d see I can be happy more often.”

  A Personal Example

  In the overall conduct of my life, I would say that I have always operated at a fairly high level of self-responsibility. I did not look to others to provide for my needs or wants. But I can think of a time when I failed my own principles rather badly, with painful results.

  In my twenties I formed an intense relationship with novelist-philosopher Ayn Rand. Over the course of eighteen years, our relationship passed through almost every form imaginable: from student and teacher to friends and colleagues to lovers and partners—and, ultimately, to adversaries. The story of this relationship is the dramatic centerpiece of Judgment Day. In the beginning and for some years, the relationship was nurturing, inspiring, valuable in many ways; I learned and grew enormously. But eventually it became constricting, toxic, destructive—a barrier to my further intellectual and psychological development.

  I did not take the initiative and propose that our relationship be redefined and reconstituted on a different basis. I told myself I did not want to cause pain. I waited for her to see what I saw. I looked to her rationality and wisdom to reach the decision that would be right for both of us. In effect, I was relating to an abstraction, the author of The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, rather than to the concrete woman in front of me. I did not confront the fact that her agenda was very different from mine and that she was totally absorbed in her own needs. I delayed facing the fact that nothing would change unless I made it change. And because I delayed, I caused suffering and humiliation to us both. I avoided a responsibility that was mine to take. No matter what explanations I gave myself, there was no way for my self-esteem to remain unaffected. Only when I began to take the initiative did I begin the process of regaining what I had lost.

  We often see this pattern in marriages. One partner sees before the other that the relationship is finished. But he or she does not want to be “the bad guy,” the one to end things. So instead manipulation begins, to lead the other to make the first move. It is cruel, degrading, lacking in dignity, and hurtful to both people. It is self-demeaning and self-diminishing.

  To the extent that I evade responsibility, I inflict wounds on my self-esteem. In accepting responsibility, I build self-esteem.

  Productiveness

  No one can be said to be living self-responsibly who has no productive purposes. Through work we support our existence. Through the exercise of our intelligence toward some useful ends, we become more fully human. Without productive goals and productive effort, we remain forever children.

  True, we are limited by the opportunities that exist for us at a given place and time. But in any given context, the mark of independence and self-responsibility is the orientation that asks, “What actions are possible to me?” “What needs to be done?” “How can I improve my condition?” “How can I move beyond this impasse?” “What will be the best use of my energies in this situation?”

  Self-responsibility is expressed through an active orientation to life. It is expressed through the understanding that no one is here on earth to spare us the necessity of independence, and through the understanding that without work, independence is impossible.

  Thinking for Oneself

  Living actively entails independent thinking in contrast to passive conformity to the beliefs of others.

  Independent thinking is a corollary both of living consciously and of self-responsibility. To live consciously is to live by the exercise of one’s own mind. To practice self-responsibility is to think for oneself.

  A person cannot think through the mind of another. We learn from one another, to be sure, but knowledge implies understanding, not mere imitation or repetition. We can either exercise our own mind or else pass on to others the responsibility of knowledge and evaluation and accept their verdicts more or less uncritically. The choice we make is crucial for the way we experience ourselves as well as for the kind of life we create.

  * * *

  Often what people call “thinking” is merely recycling the opinions of others.

  * * *

  That we are sometimes influenced by others in ways we do not recognize does not alter the fact that there is a distinction between the psychology of those who try to understand things, think for themselves, and judge for themselves, and those to whom such a possibility rarely occurs. What’s important here is intention, the nature of an individual’s goal.

  To speak of “thinking independently” is useful because the redundancy has value in terms of emphasis. Often what people call “thinking” is merely recycling the opinions of others. So we can say that thinking independently—about our work, our relationships, the values that guide our life, the goals we set for ourselves—strengthens self-esteem. And healthy self-esteem results in a natural inclination to think independently.

  The Moral Principle

  Embracing self-responsibility not merely as a personal preference but as a philosophical principle entails one’s acceptance of a profoundly important moral idea. In taking responsibility for our own existence we implicitly recognize that other human beings are not our servants and do not exist for the satisfaction of our needs. We are not morally entitled to treat other human beings as means to our ends, just as we are not a means to theirs. As I have suggested above, a consistent application of the principle of self-responsibility implies the following rule of human relationships: Never ask a person to act against his or her self-interest as he or she understands it. If we wish people to take some action or provide some value, we are obliged to offer reasons that are meaningful and persuasive in terms of their interests and goals. This policy is the moral foundation of mutual respect, goodwill, and benevolence among human beings. It rejects the notion that some people may be treated as sacrificial fodder for the goals of others, which is the premise underlying all dictatorships and, for that matter, most political systems.

  Sentence Completions to Facilitate Self-Responsibility

  In my therapy practice and my self-esteem groups, I work with a great number of sentence stems that allow clients to explore the psychology of self-responsibility. I offer a representative sampling below. The homework assignment would be broken up into weekly installments, as follows:

  WEEK 1

  Self-responsibility to me means—

  At the thought of being responsible for my own existence—

  If I accepted responsibility for my own existence, that would mean—

  When I avoid responsibility for my own existence—

  WEEK 2

  If I accept 5 percent more responsibility
for the attainment of my own goals—

  When I avoid responsibility for the attainment of my goals—

  If I took more responsibility for the success of my relationships—

  Sometimes I keep myself passive by—

  WEEK 3

  If I take responsibility for what I do about the messages I received from my mother—

  If I take responsibility for what I do about the messages I received from my father—

  If I take responsibility for the ideas I accept or reject—

  If I bring greater awareness to the ideas that motivate me—

  WEEK 4

  If I accept 5 percent more responsibility for my personal happiness—

  If I avoid responsibility for my personal happiness—

  If I accept 5 percent more responsibility for my choice of companions—

  When I avoid responsibility for my choice of companions—

  WEEK 5

  If I accept 5 percent more responsibility for the words that come out of my mouth—

  When I avoid responsibility for the words that come out of my mouth—

  If I bring greater awareness to the things I tell myself—

  If I take responsibility for the things I tell myself—

  WEEK 6

  I make myself helpless when I—

  I make myself depressed when I—

  I make myself anxious when I—

  If I take responsibility for making myself helpless—

  WEEK 7

  If I take responsibility for making myself depressed—

  If I take responsibility for making myself anxious—

  When I am ready to understand what I have been writing—

  It is not easy for me to admit that—

  If I take responsibility for my present standard of living—

  WEEK 8

  I feel most self-responsible when I—

  I feel least self-responsible when I—

  If I am not here on earth to live up to anyone else’s expectations—

  If my life belongs to me—

  WEEK 9

  If I give up the lie of being unable to change—

  If I take responsibility for what I make of my life from this point on—

  If no one is coming to rescue me—

  I am becoming aware—

  The power of the method is that it generates shifts in the consciousness and orientation of the individual without lengthy “discussions” or “analyses.” The solution is largely generated from within.

  If you keep a journal and over time write six to ten endings for each of these incomplete sentences, not only will you learn a great deal but it will be almost impossible not to grow in the practice of self-responsibility. The best way of working is to do the week’s stems Monday through Friday, then do the weekend stem If any of what I have been writing is true, it might be helpful if I—and then move on to the next week’s stem on Monday.

  No One Is Coming

  Having worked with people for so many years with the aim of building self-esteem, I have always been on the lookout for decisive moments in psychotherapy, instances when a “click” seems to occur in the client’s mind and new forward motion begins.

  One of the most important of such moments is when the client grasps that no one is coming. No one is coming to save me; no one is coming to make life right for me; no one is coming to solve my problems. If I don’t do something, nothing is going to get better.

  The dream of a rescuer who will deliver us may offer a kind of comfort, but it leaves us passive and powerless. We may feel If only I suffer long enough, if only I yearn desperately enough, somehow a miracle will happen, but this is the kind of self-deception one pays for with one’s life as it drains away into the abyss of unredeemable possibilities and irretrievable days, months, decades.

  Some years ago, in my group therapy room, we hung on the wall a number of sayings that I often found useful in the course of my work. A client made me a gift of several of these sayings done in needlepoint, each with its own frame. One of these was “It isn’t what they think; it’s what you know.” Another was “No one is coming.”

  One day a group member with a sense of humor challenged me about “No one is coming.”

  “Nathaniel, it’s not true,” he said. “You came.”

  “Correct,” I admitted, “but I came to say that no one is coming.”

  The practice of self-responsibility is the third pillar of self-esteem.

  9

  The Practice of Self-Assertiveness

  Some years ago I was addressing a graduate class in psychology and I wanted them to understand at what subtle level the fear of self-assertion can show up.

  I asked if anyone present believed he or she had a right to exist. Everyone’s hand went up. Then I asked for a volunteer to assist me with a demonstration. A young man came to the front of the room, and I said to him, “Would you please just stand facing the class, and say aloud, several times, ‘I have a right to exist.’ Say it slowly and notice how you feel saying it. And while you are doing this, I want everyone in the class to consider: Do you believe him? Do you think he really feels what he is saying?”

  The young man put his hands on his hips and belligerently declared, “I have a right to exist.” He said it as if preparing for battle. With each repetition he sounded more pugnacious.

  “No one is arguing with you,” I pointed out. “No one is challenging you. Can you say it without defiance or defensiveness?”

  He could not. The anticipation of an attack was always in his voice. No one believed in his conviction about what he was saying.

  A young woman came up and said in a pleading voice and a smile begging to be forgiven, “I have a right to exist.” No one believed her, either.

  Someone else came up. He sounded arrogant, supercilious, affected, an actor playing a part with embarrassing ineptitude.

  A student protested, “But this isn’t a fair test. They’re shy, not used to speaking in front of people, so they sound strained.” I asked him to come to the front and say, simply, “Two and two make four.” He did so with complete ease and conviction. Then I asked him to say, “I have a right to exist.” He sounded tense, flippant, unconvincing.

  The class laughed. They understood. Standing in front of the class and saying two and two make four was not difficult. Asserting the right to exist was.

  “What does the statement ‘I have a right to exist’ mean to you?” I asked. “Obviously in this context we’re not taking it primarily as a political statement, as in the Declaration of Independence. Here, we mean something more psychological. But what?” “It means my life belongs to me,” said one student. “It means I can do my own thing,” said another. “It means I don’t have to fulfill my parents’ expectations for me, I can fulfill my own,” said another. “It means I can say no when I want to,” said another. “It means I have a right to respect my self-interest.” “It means what I want matters.” “It means I can say and do what I think is right.” “It means I can follow my own destiny.” “It means my father can’t tell me what to do with my life.” “It means I don’t have to build my whole life around not upsetting Mother.”

  These were some of the private meanings of the statement “I have a right to exist.” And this is what they were unable to assert with serenity and confidence to a roomful of their peers. The point made, I began to talk with them about self-assertiveness and self-esteem.

  What Is Self-Assertiveness?

  Self-assertiveness means honoring my wants, needs, and values and seeking appropriate forms of their expression in reality.

  Its opposite is that surrender to timidity that consists of consigning myself to a perpetual underground where everything that I am lies hidden or stillborn—to avoid confrontation with someone whose values differ from mine, or to please, placate, or manipulate someone, or simply to “belong.”

  Self-assertion does not mean belligerence or inappropriate aggressiveness; it does not
mean pushing to the front of the line or knocking other people over; it does not mean upholding my own rights while being blind or indifferent to everyone else’s. It simply means the willingness to stand up for myself, to be who I am openly, to treat myself with respect in all human encounters. It means the refusal to fake my person to be liked.

  * * *

  Self-assertiveness means the willingness to stand up for myself, to be who I am openly, to treat myself with respect in all human encounters.

  * * *

  To practice self-assertiveness is to live authentically, to speak and act from my innermost convictions and feelings—as a way of life, as a rule (allowing for the obvious fact that there may be particular circumstances in which I may justifiably choose not to do so—for example, when confronted by a holdup man).

  Appropriate self-assertiveness pays attention to context. The forms of self-expression appropriate when playing on the floor with a child are obviously different from those appropriate at a staff meeting. To respect the difference is not to “sacrifice one’s authenticity” but merely to stay reality focused. In every context there will be appropriate and inappropriate forms of self-expression. Sometimes self-assertiveness is manifested through volunteering an idea or paying a compliment; sometimes through a polite silence that signals nonagreement; sometimes by refusing to smile at a tasteless joke. In work situations one cannot necessarily voice all one’s thoughts, and it is not necessary to do so. What is necessary is to know what one thinks—and to remain real.