Self Worth for Dummies, Part I

This blog is going to be very long and very cathartic. So, if you don't want to read about my personal issues, then get up now and go play some Halo 2 ;) hehehe

We all learn things from our relationships. Sometimes, we learn them as we're going through them, and sometimes, we learn them after everything is all said and done and we've had a chance to reflect. The one major thing I learned from my most recent relationship is the importance of self-worth. In this blog, I'm going to go through my theories on how people get thrown into a vicious cycle of feeling inadequate and what I think it takes to get out.

For me, I was raised with the idea that it was okay to perform for recognition and praise. I was a national competitor on viola and I was also pitted against my sisters for the "best child" award. Wherever I went, I always had to prove something to other people - to prove that I was good enough: the best daughter, the best violist. I always was the best too, and that reinforced the idea that it was okay to do things solely for recognition. Looking back on it, there is a big difference between doing those things for myself or doing them because I wanted to please others.

Last Friday, I was working in the writing lab and this very overweight girl came in for an appointment with me. She was so overweight that I could hear her labored breathing from across the room as I was gathering my materials. When I sat down, I introduced myself and shook her hand, like I always do with clients. But she was very distant and stand-offish. I decided I needed to win her friendship in order for her to really get anything out of her tutoring session. Some people may disagree with my methods, but I make it a point to be extra nice to people who society may not be generally nice to. In about 8 minutes, she was smiling and enjoying how much she was learning. I'd like to think that, in some way, I made her day a little better.

But within this girl lies my cycle theory. It's a proven fact that better looking people are more likely to get a job versus less attractive people, even though they have the same qualifications. This points to some modicum of prejudice towards unattractive people just for their appearance. That easily transfers over to obese people, retarded people, and nerdy people. Whatever is not perceived as normal or kewl is automatically discriminated.

Now, these "abnormal" people may try to be nice to others, but with a level of prejudice going against them, they are going to have to work harder, and in some cases, they won't ever succeed. Take the baby elephant who is raised at the circus as an example. When the elephant is a baby, the trainer puts a chain on its left back ankle and attatches it to an 8-foot steel rod driven deep into the ground. The baby elephant doesn't have enough strength to get away even though it may try and try. Eventually, the baby elephant will give up and realize there is no way to get away and therefore, no reason for even trying. As an adult elephant, you will still notice that their left back ankle doesn't move during a circus performance. The elephant has learned "learned helplessness".

Let's take this example and apply it to the obese girl. The obese girl may have tried to be nice and friendly to people before. But it's possible that people discriminated against her because of her weight or appearance. If enough people ignored her friendly gestures, she would probably notice that there was no point in trying to be friendly - she would always be met with the same fate - just like the baby elephant not being able to move. The obese girl has also learned "learned helpelessness".

This becomes more complex when we add in the concept of self worth. Why did the girl become so discouraged when enough people had treated her badly? Why didn't she have the self-worth to not care. And herein lies our problem... We are all born thinking we are perfectly acceptable. After birth, we take our cues of "abnormality" from our parents and society. A person with a low IQ doesn't realize it's low until something else points it out. And from a very early age, we start to put a lot of emphasis on the opinions of others. We start to derive our world from the opinions of others.

It is my opinion that the obese girl did not know or realize that anything was wrong with her. Only after encountering people who discriminated against her on the basis of her weight and provided her with the idea that she was not "acceptable" did she realize that maybe how her body naturally was was, somehow, not okay. Once she realized this, she can either lose weight (thereby reinforcing the idea that she must change in order to be accepted), or she can decide not to change (necessarily believing that there is nothing she can do about it - learned helplessness). Either way, she necessarily believes that she is not adequate enough according to the opinions of others.

Looks like this is going to be longer than I thought... Time for lunch and we'll meet back here later! :D To be continued... hehehe :P