Most likely, just like you, everyone wants a long, happy, healthy life with an abundance of energy and vitality, free from any disorders with the ability to perform optimally at work and at leisure, while being emotionally balanced, successful in all types of relationships, and without any financial constraints.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At its core, feelings of wellbeing starts with a healthy self-concept, the \u2018self-ideal\u2019 when taking an ethical stance and view of the wider world in which to reflect who you really are. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
It further indicates your interests, opinions, attitudes, way of life, behaviours, and behavioural orientations, personal values and beliefs, preferences, and world views.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
How you think about yourself, has major implications for how you live your life, and what you assume is possible. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The philosopher Charles Taylor contends that there have been two main ways that Western philosophers have tried to understand the self – self-control and self-exploration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For Plato, self-control meant putting one\u2019s reason in control of one\u2019s desires – where reason meant the ability to grasp the inherent order of the universe. So self-control meant being in harmony with the ordered world outside of yourself, not a control originating within.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
By the time of Descartes, self-control morphed into you exerting will over your own thoughts, drives, and emotions. The self was seen as an instrument that you could use in whatever way you wanted. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In ancient Greece self-exploration was assumed that people knew what their own nature was and only needed to turn inward to discover themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Self-exploration today is the idea that each human being has their own particular way of being human, and so each one needs to become familiar with their own true inner self.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But as much as you might imagine you exist as yourself continuously and independently as one identity, as one true self that exists because you exert control over yourself, the truth is far more complicated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Much of how you understand yourself changes depending on the situations you\u2019re in and who you\u2019re with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
How you think, act, and feel typically changes from relationship to relationship with the people in your life, meaning you have a certain identity and act a certain way when you\u2019re with your partner or lover, and another way in business settings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, a one true self might not exist, and it’s wise to explore what you are like, your identity in all situations, according to how you feel the truest in that situation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This means to know and understand your own characteristics, emotions, feelings, motives, and desires in each scenario. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is the information you draw upon when trying to find an answer to the question: \u2018What am I like?\u2019 And the beliefs you hold about yourself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This also involves attributes that you uniquely pair with yourself, and theorise on whether these attributes are stable, dynamic, or consistent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Why is this even important?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n You have goals in life. But before you can achieve them, you need to get clear on where you are now, to see how big the gap is to where you want to go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These questions almost always lead you to seek, notice, and interpret information about yourself, on your quest for self-knowledge. <\/p>\n\n\n\n There are three primary motives that lead you in the search for self-knowledge:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Self-enhancement refers to the fact that you are motivated to feel good about yourself (think about yourself in highly favourable terms), in order to maximise your feelings of self-worth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Accurate self-knowledge is instrumental in maximising feelings of self-worth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are three considerations which underlie this need for self-worth:<\/p>\n\n\n\n To ensure consistency, you look for and welcome information that is consistent with what you believe to be true about yourself, and avoid or reject information that presents inconsistencies with your beliefs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This is also known as self-verification theory. This theory was put forward by William Swann of the University of Texas at Austin in 1983.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The theory states that once you develop an idea about what you are like, you will strive to verify the accompanying self-views.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Two considerations are thought to drive the search for self-verifying feedback:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Self-Concept<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n There are a number of forces that shape your self-concept and, therefore, impact your career, health and vitality over time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some of these forces come from internal sources, while others come from external sources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Internal sources include what you think about yourself and how you compare to others, what you pay attention to, how you interpret the events and circumstances of your life, and how you reframe both failure and success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n External sources include the environment you spend most of your time in, your interactions with others, and how other people tend to label you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Through rejection, judgment, ridicule, and criticism, other people often influence how you feel about yourself, the labels you give yourself, and fundamentally what you believe about yourself, about your own abilities, and the world around you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n All of these internal and external sources have a profound impact \u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n An unhealthy self-concept can drag you down, limit your opportunities, deny you access to essential resources and opportunities, and undermine your potential.<\/p>\n\n\n\n An unhealthy self-concept implies you have a low value of yourself. And when you have a low self-perceived value, you typically lack the confidence needed to act boldly when interacting with others, and to move steadily in the direction of your goals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Without self-confidence, you lack the resourcefulness needed to overcome uncertainty, to solve problems, to effectively manage change, and simply just be happy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The self-concept has three primary aspects:<\/p>\n\n\n\n The cognitive self motivates and guides your search to gain greater clarity and to ensure your own self-concept is an accurate representation of you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to Carl Rogers, the self-concept has three different components:<\/p>\n\n\n\n The concept you hold about yourself is brutally tested in the social domain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Humanity\u2019s comparative nature means that you compare your attributes with those of others and draw inferences about what you are like. <\/p>\n\n\n\n When you think they are like you, you tend to like them, and when you think they are not, you tend to dislike them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You tend to compare yourself with people who are slightly better off than you (known as an upward comparison), and with people who are slightly worse off or disadvantaged (known as a downward comparison).<\/p>\n\n\n\n The need to feel good about yourself affects the social comparison process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When you observe how others respond to you, your feelings towards yourself are socially determined via a three-step process as explained by the sociologist Charles H. Cooley in 1902 as part of his discussion of the looking-glass self:<\/p>\n\n\n\n The thing that moves you to pride or shame is not the mere mechanical reflection of yourself, but an imputed sentiment, the imagined effect of this reflection upon another’s mind.” (Cooley, 1902, p. 153)<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1963, John W. Kinch adapted Cooley’s model to explain how a person’s thoughts about themselves develop rather than their feelings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Kinch’s three stages were:<\/p>\n\n\n\n However:<\/p>\n\n\n\n People are not generally good at knowing what others think about them – due to communication barriers and imposed social norms of manners, etiquette and diplomacy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This is true for in-person collaborations, the situation on social media is starkly different where people behind the protection of digital avatars constantly say negative things about others without even knowing them personally, which again, gives a totally wrong impression of what others really would think had they had chance of meeting them face to face.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Despite being largely unaware of how exactly one person is evaluating another, you would be better off knowing what other people truly think, if they had more complete information about you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A Self-concept, or how people usually think of themselves, is the most important personal factor that influences self-representation to stay strong in a world of constant onslaughts and derision. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Self-concept is also known as the self-schema, made of innumerable smaller self-schemas that are chronically accessible. You can deliberately activate several particular self-views. You select appropriate images of yourself depending on what role you wish to play in a given situation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The roles you play in life determine your identity and behavior<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s difficult to deny that the roles you play in your life dramatically impact who you are and how you act.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The famous Stanford Prison Experiment conducted by Philip Zimbardo revealed that the roles people are in, in large measure, determine their identity and behavior.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the experiment, individuals were assigned to one of two roles, prison guards or inmates. Disturbingly, the experiment was forced to end premature because the subjects played their roles too well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Those playing guards ridiculed and tortured the inmates, whereas those playing inmates became docile and even hopeless. The aftermath of the experiment left several of the study\u2019s subjects psychologically traumatised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This shows that people\u2019s personalities are not a fixed and intrinsic entity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Consider the experience of Heath Ledger, whose death many believe was due, at least in part, to his over-attachment to his role as the Joker in The Dark Knight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAll the world\u2019s a stage, And all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances. And one man in his time plays many parts.\u201d\u200a \u200aWilliam Shakespeare.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Your personality and character are fluid and ever-changing based on the roles you play on different stages in varied contexts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In one situation, you may play the role of a student, while in other roles you may play a parent, a friend, a lover, or a teacher. And each situation determines how you act, how you talk, how you behave.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Most people have not consciously designed their circumstances nor have they consciously determined the roles they will play. They fail to realise that they get to choose their stage, who they will be, and how they will act. <\/p>\n\n\n\n They did not yet write the story of their own lives. But have consigned the story-telling to someone or something outside of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Rather than seeing their identity as flexible and malleable, most people believe: \u201cthis is just the way I am,\u201d and see their identity as rigid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Your most authentic self is not who you currently are, but rather, who you desire to become. You are the author of your life\u2019s narrative. You have power to determine the stages of life you will be on and the characters you will play.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Because you get to shape the environment and decide the roles you will play, you can make quantum leaps in your personal and professional development as long as they are congruent to your values\u200a – \u200athe essence of authenticity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The process seems simple:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Repeat, but at higher levels with more stretching leaps<\/p>\n\n\n\n What is your goal?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis is a fundamental irony of most people\u2019s lives. They don\u2019t quite know what they want to do with their lives. Yet they are very active.\u201d Ryan Holiday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Most people wander through life like they wander on the internet, reactively scrolling their newsfeed and landing on the random pages that appear. <\/p>\n\n\n\n They haven\u2019t determined what they want, and thus they haven\u2019t consciously designed their environments. Rather, they adapt to and become the product of whatever environments they wander into.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When you decide what you want, the universe conspires to make it happen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n How?<\/p>\n\n\n\n When you decide what you want, you set the stage. You get to create the plot, the setting, and the characters that will be in your story. Most importantly, you get to decide which characters \u200ayou will play, and how your story will unfold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Until you decide what you want, you won\u2019t be able to consciously shape your environments. And as a human being, you adapt to and evolve overtime based on your environment. In order to consciously evolve, you must know who you want to become at your next stage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When taking big leaps, you will enter new universes of possibilities. At every next level, your perception of your potential and possibilities will radically expand. As Leonardo DiCaprio said, \u201cEvery next level of your life will demand a different you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n You have no clue what your potential is or who you can become. There is no cap. You are completely flexible and fluid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Social psychologists argue that who we are at any one time depends mostly on the context in which we find ourselves. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But who creates the context? <\/p>\n\n\n\n The more mindful you are, the more you can create the contexts you\u2019re in. When you create the context, you are more likely to be authentic. <\/p>\n\n\n\n You take leaps of faith by putting yourself in demanding situations that require you to be substantially more than you currently are. In those situations, you\u2019ll need to decide who you will need to be and then act as if you are already that person.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When you commit to an enormous goal that far exceeds your current capability, you\u2019ll need a new environment that organically generates your goals\u200a, \u200aa context that forces you to become more than you currently are to become what you envision. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Once you design the right conditions, your desired behavior naturally follows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After you\u2019ve decided your goal and created the context, you\u2019ll need to determine the roles or characters you will play to achieve your goals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Your behavior, and the roles you play influence other people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Overtime, you will adapt and play your role so naturally that you\u2019ll no longer be acting. You will become who you intended to be. And in so doing, the attainment of your goals will be natural and inevitable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe bigger the dream, the more important the team.\u201d\u200a Robin Sharma.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It will be impossible for you to grow into your roles without help from trusted friends and mentors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the book, Who\u2019s Got Your Back, Keith Ferrazzi dispels the myth of the lone professional \u201csuperman\u201d and the \u201cgo-it alone\u201d mentality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to Ferrazzi, the real path to success in work and life is through creating an inner circle of lifeline relationships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lifeline relationships are deep, close relationships with a few trusted individuals who will offer the encouragement, feedback, and generous mutual support you need to reach your full potential.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These are the people who make sure you don\u2019t give up and quit. Without these people, you will fail. The situations you\u2019ll put yourself in will be too much for you to handle alone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Concept of self Most likely, just like you, everyone wants a long, happy, healthy life with an abundance of energy and vitality, free from any…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_customify_content_layout":"","_customify_sidebar":"","_customify_page_header_display":"","_customify_disable_header":"","_customify_disable_header_top":"","_customify_disable_header_main":"","_customify_disable_header_bottom":"","_customify_disable_page_title":"","_customify_disable_content_vertical_padding":"","_customify_disable_footer_top":"","_customify_disable_footer_main":"","_customify_disable_footer_bottom":"","_customify_breadcrumb_display":"","_customify_header_transparent_display":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-identity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rizeldelano.com\/chronicles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rizeldelano.com\/chronicles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rizeldelano.com\/chronicles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rizeldelano.com\/chronicles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rizeldelano.com\/chronicles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2617"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/rizeldelano.com\/chronicles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2617\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2618,"href":"https:\/\/rizeldelano.com\/chronicles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2617\/revisions\/2618"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rizeldelano.com\/chronicles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rizeldelano.com\/chronicles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rizeldelano.com\/chronicles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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