Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy

by Burns, David D.

  Here’s a second method. If you insist your worth is determined by your achievement, you are creating a self-esteem equation: worth = achievement. What is the basis for making this equation? What objective proof do you have that it is valid? Could you experimentally measure people’s worth as well as their achievement so as to find out if they were in fact equal? What units would you use to measure it? The whole idea is nonsense.

  You can’t prove the equation because it is just a stipulation, a value system. You’re defining worth as achievement and achievement as worth. Why define them as each other? Why not say worth is worth and achievement is achievement? Worth and achievement are different words with different meanings.

  In spite of the above arguments, you may still be convinced that people who achieve more are better in some way. If so, I’m going to hit you now with a most powerful method which, like dynamite, can shatter this attitude even when it appears to be etched in granite.

  First, I would like you to play the role of Sonia (or Bob), an old friend from high-school days. You have a family and teach school. I have pursued a more ambitious career. In the dialogue you will assume that human worth is determined by achievement, and I will push the implications of this to their obvious, logical, and obnoxious conclusion. Are you ready? I hope so because you’re about to be assaulted in a most unpleasant way by a belief you apparently still cherish.

  DAVID:

  Sonia (or Bob), how are you doing?

  YOU

  (playing the role of my old friend): Just fine, David. How are you?

  DAVID:

  Oh, great. I haven’t seen you since high school. What’s been happening?

  YOU:

  Oh, well, I got married, and I’m teaching at Parks High School and I have a little family at home. Things are great.

  DAVID:

  Well, gee. I’m sorry to hear that. I turned out a lot better than you.

  YOU:

  How’s that? Come again?

  DAVID:

  I went to graduate school and I got my Ph.D. and I have become quite successful in business. I’m earning a lot of money. In fact, I’m one of the wealthier people in town now. I’ve achieved a great deal. More than you by a long shot. I don’t mean to insult you or anything, but I guess that means I’m a lot better person than you, huh?

  YOU:

  Well, gee, Dave, I’m not sure what to say. I thought I was a rather happy person before I started to talk to you.

  DAVID:

  I can understand that. You’re at a loss for words, but you might as well face facts. I’ve got what it takes, and you don’t. I’m glad you’re happy, though. Mediocre, average people are entitled to a little happiness too. After all, I certainly don’t begrudge you a few crumbs from the banquet table. But it’s just too bad you couldn’t have done more with your life.

  YOU:

  Dave, you seem to have changed. You were such a nice person in high school. I get the feeling you don’t like me anymore.

  DAVID:

  Oh, no! we can still be friends as long as you admit you’re an inferior, second-rate person. I just want to remind you to look up to me from now on, and I want you to realize that I’ll look down on you because I’m more worthwhile. This follows from the assumption that we have—worth equals achievement. Remember that attitude you cherish? I’ve achieved more, so I’m worth more.

  YOU:

  Well, I sure hope I don’t run into you soon again, Dave. It’s not been such a pleasure talking to you.

  That dialogue cools most people off very quickly because it illustrates how the inferior-superior system follows logically from equating your worth with your achievement. Actually, many people do feel inferior. The role-playing can help you see how ludicrous the assumption is. In the above dialogue, who was acting jerky? The happy housewife/schoolteacher or the arrogant businessman trying to make a case that he was better than other people? I hope this imaginary conversation will help you see clearly how screwball the whole system is.

  If you like, we can do a role-reversal to put the icing on the cake. This time you play the role of the very successful person, and I want you to try to put me down as sadistically as you can. You can pretend to be the editor of Cosmopolitan magazine, Helen Gurley Brown.* I went to high school with you; I’m just an average high-school teacher now, and it’s your job to argue that you’re better than I am.

  YOU

  (playing the role of Helen Gurley Brown): Dave, how have you been? It’s been a long time.

  DAVID:

  (playing the role of a high-school teacher): Well, fine. I have a little family, and I’m teaching high school here. I’m a physical education teacher and really enjoying life. I understand you’ve made it big.

  YOU:

  Yeah. Well, I really have been kind of lucky. I’m editor of Cosmopolitan now. Perhaps you heard.

  DAVID:

  Of course I have. I’ve seen you on TV on the talk shows plenty of times. I hear you make a huge income, and you even have your own agent.

  YOU:

  Life’s been good. Yeah. It’s really been terrific.

  DAVID:

  Now there’s just one thing I heard about you that I really didn’t understand. You were talking to a friend of ours, and you were saying how you’re so much better than I am now that you’ve made it big, whereas my career is just average. What did you mean by that?

  YOU:

  Well, Dave, I mean, just think about all the things I’ve accomplished in my life. Here I am influencing millions, and whoever heard of Dave Burns in Philadelphia? I’m hobnobbing with the stars, and you’re bouncing a basketball around in the court with a bunch of kids. Don’t get me wrong. You’re certainly a fine, sincere, average person. It’s just that you never made it, so you might as well face facts!

  DAVID:

  You’ve made a great impact, and you’re a woman of influence and fame. I respect that a lot, and it sounds quite rewarding and exciting. But please forgive me if I’m dense. I just don’t understand how that makes you a better person. How does that make me inferior to you or make you more worthwhile? With my little local mind, I must be missing something obvious.

  YOU:

  Face it, you just sit around and interact with no particular purpose or destiny. I have charisma. I’m a mover and shaker. That gives me a bit of an edge, wouldn’t you say?

  DAVID:

  Well, I don’t interact to no purpose, but my purposes may seem modest in comparison with yours. I teach phys ed, and I coach the local football games and that kind of thing. Your orbit is certainly big and fancy in comparison with mine. But I don’t understand how that makes you a better person than I am, or how it follows that I’m inferior to you.

  YOU:

  I’m just more highly developed and more elaborate. I think about more important things. I go on the lecture circuit, and people flock to hear me by the thousands. Famous authors work for me. Who do you lecture to? The local PTA?

  DAVID:

  Certainly in achievement, money, and influence you’re way ahead of me. You’ve done very well. You were very bright to begin with, and you’ve worked very hard. You’re a big success now. But how does that make you more worthwhile than I am? You must forgive me, but I still don’t grasp your logic.

  YOU:

  I’m more interesting. It’s like an amoeba versus a highly developed biological structure. Amoebas are kind of boring after a while. I mean your life must be like an amoeba’s. You’re just bumbling around aimlessly. I’m a more interesting, dynamic, desirable person; you’re second-rate. You’re the burnt toast; I’m the caviar. Your life is a bore. I don’t see how I can say it more clearly.

  DAVID:

  My life isn’t as boring as you might think. Take a close look at it. I’d be surprised to hear what you have to say here because I can’t find anything boring about my life. What I do is exciting and vital to me. The people I teach are every bit as important to me as the glamorous movie stars you interac
t with. But even if it were true that my life was more tedious and routine and less interesting than yours, how would that make you a better person or more worthwhile?

  YOU:

  Well, I suppose it just really boils down to the fact that if you have an amoeba existence, then you can only judge it on the basis of your amoeba mentality. I can judge your situation, but you can’t judge mine.

  DAVID:

  What is the basis for your judgment? You can call me an amoeba, but I don’t know what that means. You seem to be reduced to name-calling. All it means is that apparently my life is not especially interesting to you. Certainly I’m not nearly as successful or glamorous, but how does that make you a better or more worthwhile person?

  YOU:

  I’m almost starting to give up.

  DAVID:

  Don’t give up here. Press on. Perhaps you are a better person!

  YOU:

  Well, certainly society values me more. That’s what makes me better.

  DAVID:

  It makes you more highly valued by society. That’s undoubtedly the case. I mean Johnny Carson hasn’t contacted me for any appearances recently.

  YOU:

  I’ve noticed that.

  DAVID:

  But how does being more highly valued by society make you a more worthwhile person?

  YOU:

  I’m earning a huge salary. I’m worth millions. Just how much are you worth, Mr. School-teacher?

  DAVID:

  You clearly have more financial worth. But how does that make you a more worthwhile human being? How does commercial success make you a better person?

  YOU:

  Dave, if you’re not going to worship me, I’m not going to talk to you.

  DAVID:

  Well, I don’t see how that would make me less worthwhile either. Unless you have the idea that you’re going to go around deciding who’s worth-while based on who worships you!

  YOU:

  Of course I do!

  DAVID:

  Does that go along with being editor of Cosmopolitan? If so, please tell me how you make these decisions. If I’m not worthwhile, I’d definitely like to know why so that I can give up feeling good and considering myself equal to other people.

  YOU:

  Well, it must be that your orbit is rather small and dreary. While I’m on my Lear jet to Paris, you’re in a crowded school bus going to She-boygan.

  DAVID:

  My orbit may be small, but it’s very gratifying. I enjoy the teaching. I enjoy the kids. I like to see them develop. I like to see them learn. At times they make mistakes, and I have to let them know. There’s a lot of real love and humanity that goes on there. A lot of drama. What about that seems dreary to you?

  YOU:

  Well, there’s not as much to learn. No real challenge. It seems to me that in a world as small as yours you learn just about everything there is to learn, and then you just repeat things over and over.

  DAVID:

  Your work presents quite a challenge as it turns out. How could I know everything there is to know about even one student? They all seem complex and exciting to me. I don’t think I have anybody figured out completely. Do you? Working with even one student is a complex challenge to all my abilities. Having so many young people to work with is a challenge beyond what I could ask for. I don’t understand what you mean when you say my world is small and boring and everything is figured out.

  YOU:

  Well, it just seems to me that you are unlikely to run into many people in your world who are going to develop as highly as I have.

  DAVID:

  I don’t know. Some of my students have high IQ’s and may develop the same way you did, and some of them are mentally subnormal and will only develop to a modest level. Most are average and each one is fascinating to me. What did you mean when you said they were boring? Why is it that only the great achievers are interesting to you?

  YOU:

  I give in! Uncle!

  I hope you did in fact “give in” when you played the role of the successful snob. The method I used to thwart your claim you were better than I was quite simple. When-ever you claimed you were a better or more worthy person because of some specific quality such as intelligence, influence, status, or whatever, I immediately agreed with you that you are better in that particular quality (or set of qualities) and then I asked you—“But how does that make you a better (or more worthwhile) person?” This question can-not be answered. It will take the wind out of the sails of any system of values that sets some people up as being superior to others.

  The technical name for this method is “operationalization.” In it you must spell out just what quality makes anyone more or less worthwhile than anyone else. You can’t do it!

  Of course, other people would rarely think or say such insulting things to you as were said in the dialogues. The real put-down goes on in your head. You are the one who’s telling yourself your lack of status, or achievement, or popularity, or love, etc., makes you less worthwhile and desirable; so you’re the one who’s going to have to put an end to the persecution. You can do this in the following way: Carry on a similar dialogue with yourself. Your imaginary opponent, who we’ll name the Persecutor, will try to argue that you are inherently inferior or less worthwhile because of some imperfection or lack You simply assertively agree with the grain of truth in his criticism, but raise the question of how it follows that you are less worthwhile. Here are several examples:

  1. Persecutor: You’re not a very good lover. Sometimes you don’t even get a firm erection. This means you’re less of a man and an inferior person.

  You: It certainly shows that I’m nervous about sex and not a particularly skilled or confident lover. But how does this make me less of a man or less of a person? Since only a man can feel nervous about an erection, this would seem to be an especially “manly” experience; doing it well makes you more of a man! Furthermore, there’s a great deal more to being a man than just having sex.

  2. Persecutor: You’re not as hardworking or as successful as most of your friends. You’re lazy and no good. You: This means I’m less ambitious and hardworking. I may even be less talented, but how does it follow that I’m “lazy and no good”?

  3. Persecutor: You’re not worth much because you’re not outstanding in anything.

  You: I agree that I don’t hold a single world championship. I’m not even second best at anything. In fact, at most things I’m pretty much average. How does it follow that I’m not worth much?

  4. Persecutor: You’re not popular, you don’t even have many close friends, and no one cares about you much. You have no family and not even any casual lovers. So you’re a loser. You’re an inadequate person. There’s obviously something wrong with you. You’re worthless.

  You: It’s true I have no lover at this time, and there are just a few friends I feel close to. How many do I need to be an “adequate person”? Four? Eleven? If I’m not popular, it may be that I’m relatively un-skilled socially, and I may have to work harder at this. But how does it follow that I’m a “loser”? Why am I worthless?

  I suggest you try out the method illustrated above. Write down the worst persecutory insults you can level at yourself and then answer them. It may be hard at first, but eventually the truth will dawn on you—you can be imperfect or unsuccessful or unloved by others, but not one iota less worth-while.

  Four Paths to Self-Esteem

  You might ask, “How can I attain self-esteem if my worth doesn’t come from my success or from love or approval? If you peel all these criteria away one by one and expose them as invalid bases for personal worth, it seems there will be nothing left. Just what is it that I have to do?” Here are four valid paths to self-esteem. Choose the one that seems most useful to you.

  The first path is both pragmatic and philosophical. Essentially, you must acknowledge that human “worth” is just an abstraction; it doesn’t exist. Hence, there is actually no such thing a
s human worth. Therefore, you cannot have it or fail to have it, and it cannot be measured. Worth is not a “thing,” it is just a global concept. It is so generalized it has no concrete practical meaning. Nor is it a useful and enhancing concept. It is simply self-defeating. It doesn’t do you any good. It only causes suffering and misery. So rid yourself immediately of any claim to being “worthy,” and you’ll never have to measure up again or fear being “worthless.”

  Realize that “worthy” and “worthless” are just empty concepts when applied to a human being. Like the concept of your “true self,” your “personal worth” is just meaningless hot air. Dump your “worth” in the garbage can!(You can put your “true self” in there too, if you like.) You’ll find you’ve got nothing to lose! Then you can focus on living in the here and now instead. What problems do you face in life? How will you deal with them? That’s where the action is, not in the elusive mirage of “worth.”

  You may be afraid to give up your “self” or your “worth.” What are you afraid of? What terrible thing will happen? Nothing! The following imaginary dialogue may make this clearer. Let’s assume that I am worthless. I want you to rub it in and try to make me feel upset.

  YOU:

  Burns, you’re worthless!