The Danger of Self-Esteem by David McClister
Reprinted from the bulletin of the Palmetto church of Christ
(http://home1.gte.net/david1mc/feb4-99.htm)
I know I run the risk of agitating some folks for writing this piece, but it is something about which I have come to have strong convictions. We live in a culture of self-esteem. Never mind what others think of you, it is your own evaluation of yourself that counts. Fewer things are more highly prized among people today that this sense of self worth. Lack of self worth has been cited as the cause for all kinds of problems from poor educational achievement to failure in business, from unemployment to single parent homes, from drug abuse to violence. Self-esteem is even part of the curriculum in some public schools, with children getting a grade on their self-esteem (does something seem contradictory to you here?). The idea was that if we teach our children self-esteem, the drug abuse, violence, etc. would disappear.
The thing that concerns me most is that people have dragged the Bible into this. I suppose this was only inevitable. If a cause is deemed essential, people usually find a way to get the Bible to support it. It is a purely political use of the Bible, using the Bible’s authority to validate some human ideal. Anyway, I hear Matthew 22:39 thrown around as the supposed Biblical basis for healthy self-esteem. Jesus there said that the second greatest commandment in the law of God was "thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." According to self-esteem reasoning, this verse means that you cannot possibly love others correctly until you have first learned to love yourself. Learn to love yourself, and you will then be able to treat others with the proper respect. The key, they tell us, is in everyone learning to love themselves more.
No greater garbage in the name of religion has ever been foisted upon man (I speak figuratively). The problem is not that we do not love ourselves. The problem is that we love ourselves way too much!!! There is far too much selfishness and evil self-love, and it is the cause of many ills in our world today. Many problems in our culture do not stem from a lack of self-love, but from too much self-love and not nearly enough love for others. Also, Jesus was not promoting the idea of self-love in Matthew 22:39. In fact, He was teaching just the opposite. The fact is that we learn from an extremely early age to love ourselves and we get quite good at it. What Jesus is teaching us is to be as good at loving others as we are at loving ourselves. That does not mean we need to love ourselves more. It means instead that we need to concentrate on loving others more.
No greater illustration of my point could be imagined than some of the events we have heard reported on the news in the past several months. In October 1997 Luke Woodham, a young man and student in the public schools in Pearl, MS, murdered his mother and then went to school and killed two of his fellow students. There have been other school shootings (Paducah, KY and Springfield, OR to name a few), but the case of Luke Woodham makes an extremely important point about our subject here. Woodham had been so loaded up with self-esteem propaganda in his early years that he began to believe that he was the most important person in the world, that having his way was the only thing that mattered. When he was criticized or challenged, he turned violent.
In a piece in Newsweek magazine (July 13, 1998) by Sharon Begley, it is stated "Although psychologists have long believed that low self-esteem causes aggression and other pathologies, it’s not that simple. High self-esteem that is unjustified and unstable . . . also puts a kid at risk of turning violent." People drunk on self-esteem "are supersensitive to criticism or slights, because deep down they suspect that their feeling of superiority is built upon quicksand. Even though they say ‘the world would be a better place if I ruled it,’ if that grandiosity is challenged they may lash out." A researcher at Case Western Reserve University said, "unjustified self-esteem needs constant propping up. When the real world fails to deliver . . . he may explode."
Even more telling is a statement by the president of the American Psychological Association, who said that schools contribute to the problem by emphasizing self-esteem to students. The problem is that self-esteem is taught as a cause of success, not as the result of achievement. He accused that schools that implement these courses "ladle on the praise indiscriminately, rather than focusing on helping the child achieve something to deserve it." James Gilligan of Harvard Medical school says that using this kind of approach "could be building up the wrong kind of self-esteem, the kind likely to deflate. At best you get a disillusioned kid; at worst you get a shooting spree." Another Harvard professor added that "There are well-meaning parents who have seen self-esteem as ‘every little thing your kid does, praise them to the sky.’ But if it is done wrong, you can raise a generation of kids who cannot tolerate frustration." The Newsweek article goes on to say that "Even proponents of teaching self-esteem worry that it has gone astray."
Now I am certainly not arguing that we go to the opposite extreme and instill in children a negative self-esteem. That would be just as harmful as the inflated self-esteem we are here criticizing. However, the idea that people are just great and need to be congratulated for everything is just not true, and it certainly sets a child on the wrong path. Self-esteem should be the product of having worked hard and done something well. But even then I think it can be spiritually dangerous. Just because I work hard and do something well does not make me right, it does not make me an authority on something. The problem with self-esteem is that it always becomes proud (in the bad sense) and arrogant.
The Bible teaches us another way, the way of humility. "Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will exalt you" (Jam 4:6). Humility is not self-destructive. A humble person can achieve great things and have those accomplishments recognized by others without becoming arrogant, narcissistic, or self-aggrandizing. A person can have a realistic view of the significance of what he has done and still be humble. The key word here is realistic. Self-esteem fails because it becomes unrealistic; it tends to blow things out of proportion. Humility, however, is even-keeled.
What is needed is not more self-esteem, but to view ourselves and our accomplishments with humility. Then we will be able to view and treat others properly.
[Editor's Note: Bro. McClister will have more to say about this in next week’s article.]
Sometimes God Says No - Author Unknown
(contributed by K. Brown)
PARTING THOUGHT
Talk doesn't cook rice. ---Chinese proverb
Have you fed the hungry and given the thirsty drink? Have you taken in a stranger and clothed the naked? Have you visited the sick and those in prison?
We all better get about our Savior's business! (Mt. 25:31-46)