Why do Catholics make such a big deal about confidence and self esteem

[EasterJoy]

Sadly this makes me worried i’m screwed up now. I get what you mean though. I don’t see myself as a fraud though. Its more that I feel like the stuff i’m good at doesn’t matter or isn’t that big of a deal. For example I am an intelligent man but I feel that intelligence doesn’t mean much. Honestly unless you are intellectually disabled you can have average or even lower than average intelligence and make it through life just fine.

This especially affects me in regards to women. I feel like sometimes it doesn’t matter how smart or holy or moral of a person i am since i have a weird personality below average looks and probably am mentally ill based on what people say here. Like I said last year it especially hit me because i had a huge crush on one of my fellow teachers but felt I couldn’t do anything about it because she was out of my league since she was a super smart super attractive super devout woman who was just amazing and I was just ole negative me. Turns out i found out from someone else that she found it hard to work for me. I feel like now i shouldn’t have even had those feelings since she didn’t like me in the first place. Whats tough is though that i’d still love to be with her but don’t want to be some creepy stalker guy.

You know how to tell if a person has some dysfunction in their personality? They’re still breathing. It is also not uncommon to be attracted to someone who does not find you attractive in return. It happens all of the time. It is frustrating and discouraging, but it is not unusual.

You might consider, however, that not recognizing talents in yourself or others could possibly imply a sort of ingratitude. Ask yourself: What does it take to impress you? What does it take to please you? If you send out messages, verbal or not, that let others know that you are not easily impressed, it is very likely that those who would very much like to impress you will feel too timid to try.

No, you don’t need to be impressed with what people have to offer you. You do have to give praise to God for making them human beings and for finding them worthy of His love. You have to appreciate that they have worth and their presence is worth being thankful for, just for that. That alone is all it takes to make a person “impressive.” If you are impressed with the worth of others simply on the grounds that they are beloved of God, if you remind yourself to take delight in that and let others know their presence is something to be grateful for, then that is good enough. Get that right, and you don’t have to worry yourself with giving out points for anything else.

 

[Xantippe]

Sadly this makes me worried i’m screwed up now. I get what you mean though. I don’t see myself as a fraud though. Its more that I feel like the stuff i’m good at doesn’t matter or isn’t that big of a deal. For example I am an intelligent man but I feel that intelligence doesn’t mean much. Honestly unless you are intellectually disabled you can have average or even lower than average intelligence and make it through life just fine.

This especially affects me in regards to women. I feel like sometimes it doesn’t matter how smart or holy or moral of a person i am since i have a weird personality below average looks and probably am mentally ill based on what people say here. Like I said last year it especially hit me because i had a huge crush on one of my fellow teachers but felt I couldn’t do anything about it because she was out of my league since she was a super smart super attractive super devout woman who was just amazing and I was just ole negative me. Turns out i found out from someone else that she found it hard to work for me. I feel like now i shouldn’t have even had those feelings since she didn’t like me in the first place. Whats tough is though that i’d still love to be with her but don’t want to be some creepy stalker guy.

As a matter of fact, being smart is very helpful in your situation.

The smarter you are, the better job you can do remediating yourself into being more or less normal-acting.

With regard to your colleague, you were probably giving out weird crush vibes that made her feel uncomfortable. Obviously, if you were working together, you probably couldn’t ask her out, but in future, if you ever find yourself with a crush on somebody you can easily ask out, ask her out as soon as possible before you start giving off that weird crush vibe.

And yes to what Easter Joy said about putting yourself down being uncomfortable for bystanders. If they don’t agree, they’re questioning your judgment. If they do agree, they’re agreeing that you’re a terrible person. Don’t be pulling the guy equivalent of “I think I look fat.” It’s exhausting to be expected to prop up another human being’s frail self-esteem.

 

[JorduSpeaks]

It seems opposed to Catholicism.

Honestly, I think what we’re talking about here is self-compassion, rather than self-confidence, and self-compassion is ABSOLUTELY aligned with Catholicism.

One of the key virtues of Catholicism is humility, meaning subordinating yourself before God. However, there is nothing humble about subjecting oneself to a constant barrage of verbal abuse and never treating oneself with love. If you profess that God loves you, but then privately assert that you are unworthy of love, you are essentially placing yourself above God, claiming to know better than He who is worthy of love. That is far from humble.

Full disclosure: self-compassion has always been a struggle for me. I derive little joy from life and don’t understand why others are kind to me or how God could possibly love me. However, I have faith that he does, and that my own thinking is severely disordered. Loving God means trusting that God loves us. Not everyone has an easy time with that, but part of living a Christian life is struggling against what is contrary to God’s love.

 

[EasterJoy]

…With regard to your colleague, you were probably giving out weird crush vibes that made her feel uncomfortable. Obviously, if you were working together, you probably couldn’t ask her out, but in future, if you ever find yourself with a crush on somebody you can easily ask out, ask her out as soon as possible before you start giving off that weird crush vibe…

This is good advice and the vibe thing is worth considering, but I wouldn’t assume the “weird crush vibe” was necessarily in place. Most people do not see themselves as dating most of the opposite-sex friends they know. Those are people they know and like! Many couples who have been married fifty years report that there were no sparks when they first met, at least not on one side.

Having someone you fall for also fall for you right off the bat is like an extra-base hit in baseball. Everyone wants it, but it is rarely what happens. It is almost never what happens the first time up. For the proficient, two-thirds of the time you don’t get on base at all, and that is if you are really good at it. Once in five times is more typical. That’s baseball. The odds in romance are even worse. It takes foolish optimism to succeed, because the pessimists have an even worse batting average yet! You’re better off looking at each “at bat” as a learning experience, expecting that most of the time you’ll do more learning than succeeding.

The good thing about that extra base hit? Unlike in baseball, you only have to get that hit once. That can be enough. If you look at it that way, then the pessimism isn’t so appropriate. As the old lady once said, “There isn’t a scraggly horse out there but that you can find a scraggly bush to tie it to.” Most of us have felt like the scraggly horse or the scraggly bush at one time or another, and that includes those of us who are very happily married. (Maybe that is how we feel gratitude for that wonderful person who finally did see what we’re like and was happy to sign on for us, anyway! )

 

[white_sheep]

Honestly, I think what we’re talking about here is self-compassion, rather than self-confidence, and self-compassion is ABSOLUTELY aligned with Catholicism.

One of the key virtues of Catholicism is humility, meaning subordinating yourself before God. However, there is nothing humble about subjecting oneself to a constant barrage of verbal abuse and never treating oneself with love. If you profess that God loves you, but then privately assert that you are unworthy of love, you are essentially placing yourself above God, claiming to know better than He who is worthy of love. That is far from humble.

Full disclosure: self-compassion has always been a struggle for me. I derive little joy from life and don’t understand why others are kind to me or how God could possibly love me. However, I have faith that he does, and that my own thinking is severely disordered. Loving God means trusting that God loves us. Not everyone has an easy time with that, but part of living a Christian life is struggling against what is contrary to God’s love.

No one said anything about subjecting oneself to a constant barrage of verbal abuse.

He said if someone says something bad about themselves they have to say three positive things about themselves afterward. This seems to gloss over their faults, build an unhealthy self-esteem, remove good old-fashioned Catholic guilt, and infer that they don’t need to change.

Example: I am a drunkard. But I don’t beat my wife and kids, do drugs, or sleep around. Yay, God loves me just the way I am!

 

[Xantippe]

No one said anything about subjecting oneself to a constant barrage of verbal abuse.

He said if someone says something bad about themselves they have to say three positive things about themselves afterward. This seems to gloss over their faults, build an unhealthy self-esteem, remove good old-fashioned Catholic guilt, and infer that they don’t need to change.

Example: I am a drunkard. But I don’t beat my wife and kids, do drugs, or sleep around. Yay, God loves me just the way I am!

In normal life, there’s no need for self-criticism sessions with one’s peers.

It’s one think to apologize for wrong-doing to the person wronged or to confess sins through the sacrament of confession, but there’s generally no need to go around saying “I eat too much,” or “I masturbate a lot” or “I have huge library fines for being late” or I take too many packets of ketchup at Chik-fil-a." What would be the point of sharing that sort of thing with a person who is not your therapist or spiritual director or confessor? Maybe a spouse or a serious girlfriend or boyfriend might need that kind of openness, but a colleague or an acquaintance doesn’t need that. If one doesn’t have a close relationship, I think that qualifies as “too much information.”

 

[JorduSpeaks]

No one said anything about subjecting oneself to a constant barrage of verbal abuse.

He said if someone says something bad about themselves they have to say three positive things about themselves afterward. This seems to gloss over their faults, build an unhealthy self-esteem, remove good old-fashioned Catholic guilt, and infer that they don’t need to change.

Example: I am a drunkard. But I don’t beat my wife and kids, do drugs, or sleep around. Yay, God loves me just the way I am!

Acknowledging that there are good things about yourself =/= ignoring your own faults. If you’re self-deprecating to the point that other people notice, I think we can safely assume that you’re aware of your faults. It is reasonable, however, to think you may be less aware of your virtues. Also, the three positives you listed in the example would not be sufficient, in my mind. Negative virtues (“I’m not as bad as I could be”) are always trivial. Acknowledging that a person could be worse does not improve your opinion of them.

As a blanked policy, scrupulously enforced, I agree that the “three complements” thing is a little silly. Some people have perfectly healthy self-concepts and don’t need this sort of thing. However, some people are absolutely horrid to themselves and need a reality check for their own sake and the sake of those around them.

 

[Xantippe]

Acknowledging that there are good things about yourself =/= ignoring your own faults. If you’re self-deprecating to the point that other people notice, I think we can safely assume that you’re aware of your faults. It is reasonable, however, to think you may be less aware of your virtues. Also, the three positives you listed in the example would not be sufficient, in my mind. Negative virtues (“I’m not as bad as I could be”) are always trivial. Acknowledging that a person could be worse does not improve your opinion of them.

As a blanked policy, scrupulously enforced, I agree that the “three complements” thing is a little silly. Some people have perfectly healthy self-concepts and don’t need this sort of thing. However, some people are absolutely horrid to themselves and need a reality check for their own sake and the sake of those around them.

The OP does seem to be beating up on himself. He sees his flaws but his virtues (which I’m pretty sure are fairly substantial) are invisible to him.

Hence, I don’t think the drunkard example is applicable.

 

[EasterJoy]

No one said anything about subjecting oneself to a constant barrage of verbal abuse.

He said if someone says something bad about themselves they have to say three positive things about themselves afterward. This seems to gloss over their faults, build an unhealthy self-esteem, remove good old-fashioned Catholic guilt, and infer that they don’t need to change.

Example: I am a drunkard. But I don’t beat my wife and kids, do drugs, or sleep around. Yay, God loves me just the way I am!

What good does it do, though, for you to tell me you are an alcoholic during vacation Bible school? There are times when these self-admissions of fault are a good way to let others who have had their faults exposed know that you also have your own faults and failings. There are times when self-examination and confession is the topic at hand. Otherwise, most of the time you have no more need to tear yourself down for the consumption of others than to puff yourself up. It is just as possible to be a self-immolating boor as to be a self-congratulating boor.

Old-fashioned Catholics did not go around talking about themselves. If the consequences of trying to put yourself down is that you get to compliment yourself thrice (instead of someone else compensating and saying something nice to reassure you that they like you), that might break you of that habit. Humble people don’t call so much notice to their own opinion of themselves, but instead give the pleasant impression that they spend far more time thinking about others. Maybe that was not the teacher’s exact intention, but certainly the idea was to get the negative self-talk to stop.