At what point does pride become a bad thing?

Hi,LittleK. A sense of one's self worth is not necessarily synonymous with pride.

Mikey, Without "losers" we wouldn't have any winners, and without" have-not's"there wouldn't be any "haves" et cetera--et cetera-et cetera.

Dear li'l k,
I hope this helps. I am still very young and at times stupid. When I was younger I made allot of mistakes due to pride, or negative ego. I spent a long time only accepting the positive things I did for people, and always coming up with an excuse for my errors to do with me. It was always someone elses fault. I was stuck in a self centerdness vault.

To truly understand acceptance you need to look both at you're negatives and positives. Do not dilute yourself, when you look in the mirror what do you really see? If you can look at you're mistakes or faults and accept them on a level where you are trying to grow, move on, or change, than that is respect.
If you can accept you're positives or contributions without becoming self righteous or expecting something in return. Than that is love All of these ranting's I just put here have a very deep but simple meaning. all pride really is most of the time is a word that each person has their own definition for. Though I know you will find yourself a beautiful definition or enough insight to guide you.....

You have it right, Phoenix. The Japanese culture is definitely a "shame" culture. The first thing most children learn from their parents is "don't bring shame to the family name." In Japan, that shame culture was taken to its extreme. When they had children with any kind of disability, they hid them in the house, never to be exposed to the public. It's changing now, but it's still a slow process. Another extreme in Japan is how discriminatory they are. When their children begin to talk of marriage, the parents will do a family background check to see if the potential in-laws are of similar class and background. Because of the shame culture, suicides in Japan is now at a increase, because many have lost jobs, and they are unable keep up with 'appearances.' It's really a shame. c.i.

Thanks for expanding, c.i. Truly amazing.

Re: At what point does pride become a bad thing?

The author of your horoscope should be compelled to explain his/her interpretation of pride issues? As has been pointed out here in these enlightening posts, there are far too may definitions of pride to apply to any one particular individual. Ask your friend why he/she agreed with the horoscope. If your friend spoke in a sarcastic or demeaning way, request an explanation. Almost every horoscope I've read (I'm not a believer in horoscopes, btw),has been ambiguous. That is the author's intent.
I have avoided friends in the past because of hurtful words spoken in haste and even though they have apologized I have severed many a relationship because of what? Pride ,vanity or just plain sensitivity/hurt? That's something only we, as individuals, can decide and it isn't easy. Pride when it is described as arrogance, conceit or haughtiness is not a boon. But pride in one's accomlishments, achievements, family, children, etc. is . But that's only my opinion although it is food for thought. However, never lower your self esteem.

I'ts Ok new day SMILE

Mellow Gemini,

You are making no sense. Japan and China are vastly different from each other. I have lived in Japan for years and China for a short time (Macau, Taiwan and Hong Kong) as well.

I read your post 3 times trying to figure it out but I can't make head or tail of it.

ci,
The Japanese would probably call it a culture of honor instead of shame. lol

c.i.- Thanks for the clarification.

Craven- Whether we call it "shame" or "honor" (which is really the other side of the coin) the point is that the culture is outer rather than inner directed.

Yes. I think Craven understands that.

Swings and roundabouts. I wonder what the advantages and disadvantages of both are? I referred to this ages ago on this thread. Different topic, though. Fascinating.

Craven, For the Japanese, honor and shame are on the same side of the coin. c.i.

Craven point taken....

Japan and China are vastly diiferent. Though I have studied much of they're differences in culture. Mostly from interesting Philosophical view points. Or on past Population Control.(China). Now if you were to look at certain people in Japan. Very different.. We should talk about this somewhere else some time. Not invading someone elses topic.

Yup it shoudl be a tgread on the Asia forum.

One clarification, I wasn't questioning ci's assertion, just amusing myself in that individual pride makes for logomachies.

"I'm smart with money, he's cheap"

I think the public/private whatchamercallit (it's frequently a schism in us less-well-adjusted folks) is a very interesting key into this. It makes me think about something I read recently (I'm guessing it was that Simpson's and Philosophy thing, gift what was read on a plane) about Sartre writing about the childhood of Gustave Flaubert. I hope it was Sartre. I know it was one of them French existentialists. Somebody out there should know better than I do.

Flaubert began talking rather late in his childhood -- didn't speak until he was five or six, I think. His upbringing was, on the face of it, relatively normal (Sartre claimed). All of his physical needs were met. His family was fairly affluent. He wasn't neglected in any visual way. Why, then, did it take him so long to talk?

Sartre maintains that it's because he received no encouragement. His mother gave him everything his body needed, but none of his efforts at interacting with the outside world was reinforced with enthusiastic acknowledgement. This was tantamount, in Sartre's eyes, to active discouragement, and young Gustave's attentions were turned inward. He would remain a socially awkward, introspective person for his entire life.

Whether this holds much weight I don't know; it seems to me a rather facile, pop-psychology explanation of a probably deeper person, and probably had Montessori in mind as much as it had Freud (though Sartre was surely influenced either with or against the latter's work). I find it very interesting in an existential framework -- and maybe in relation to pride, but I can't say for sure as I'm working out what I want to say as I type. Sorry for the brief hijacking, at any rate...

The most content people seem to be those whose public face best matches their own view of who they, essentially, are (I would posit). This would make sense to Sartre because, to him, the only thing that ultimately matters is what we do, and our public face is determined by what we do. If there is no dissension between one's conception of oneself and one's actions in the physical world, then one is free of psychological tension. One is like, to wantonly borrow from another field, like a creature well-adapted to its niche, doind and desiring to do nothing for which it is evolved (or designed, if you prefer).

The alternative situation is that which many of us (or I and Flaubert, at any rate) suffer: we lack the means or the will to make our externalized self match up to our internal self. As time goes on, you are more and more limited by the external reality -- the life -- you've set up for yourself. People see you in a certain way and have certain expectations of you that might not match your own view of yourself. You may not feel you get the respect you deserve, for, though you may have done nothing to actually prove this to anybody, you deserve a certain amount of attention or respect.

Okay, I'm going to more or less stop myself here, because I'm going somewhere I haven't fully pondered yet, and I actually have some work I should be doing for the first time in a month. I'll just mention that the jumping off point here was the question of how important our "face" actually is. What are we, after all, but a sum of our actions? Pride, perhaps, is "good" when based on past and present actions, and "bad" when based on unactualized potential -- however real or imagined that potential might be.

Just want to say that, though I don't have any store of wisdom to offer you, li'l k, I think I hear where you're coming from and I'm sympathetic (and only starting, hopefully, to learn how to deal with it myself).

Though I could be projecting.


P.S.: The rabbit describes things about herself which make her un-Australian. I love beer, barbecue, self-effacement, sport. Perhaps we should switch places, dlow? The Pacific Northwest has lots of beer and sport, but is noticeably short on good-humored humility and bbq weather.

I think you got it.

Meanwhile, I'm very interested in the newest research about why we are how we are, and how much of it seems to be genetic predisposition. (I SO want to read Blank Slate -- almost done with "Fury", that'll be next.) For example, was Sartre's problem lack of encouragement, or something more inherent? Would any child in Sartre's place have reacted similarly? Was it part and parcel of his later artistic flowering? Read this recently:



From a fascinating article about how some people are just "naturally" happy:

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/31/health/psychology/31BEHA.html

My own take on the pride issue, having read this thread in fits and starts and so possibly reiterating points already made:

I think there is nothing ever wrong with having a quiet, firm appreciation of one's own accomplishments. I think problems only arise in expression. Expressions of pride can be taken as rebukes (I can do this, you can't) or self-delusion (you say you can do it but I can see you can't), or self-absorbed (I don't particularly care what you can or can't do, this is what I can do). So if there are indeed problems with "pride issues", I think it is the expression that needs to be worked on, not the underlying pride.

Mechanistic explanations of emotion and disposition, however appealing and sound they may be, always leave me feeling both stimulated and despairing. The brain fabricates a lot of explanations for states of being, though. Where did I read recently about a study in which subjects brains were electrically stimulated in an area which induces fits of laughter? Dunno. It might have been here. The upshot was that the subjects unfailingly had a reason for laughing, be it a chart on a wall or the expression on a researchers face. Fact was, they were just laughing because an electrode made them.

Sorry about the verbal diarrhea there. Must learn to think things through before throwing them out there. Should probably have a journal...

No no no it was really interesting stuff.

Yeah, I read that too (so maybe it was here?) and agree that it's all rather unsettling.

I was mainly taken with various comments on the line of pride, in the pejorative sense, referring to a sense of self-worth which is drawn from a (possibly willful) refusal to acknowledge the true scope of one's own accomplishments. It resonated with me because I am very familiar with the occasional experience of suddenly seeing myself as the world sees me -- absent the internal monologue which attempts to buttress self-image and justify apparently petty or cowardly actions.

Frequently used adjectives of a person who perpetually lives in such a state might include, in addition to prideful, arrogant, aloof, prickly, contentious, cocky, smug...

Hope I'm not reading too much into k's question. As a young 'un, it's easier to think and talk about myself than accurately perceive the states and intentions of others...

But we see ya as a brilliant, witty, kind sort -- how do you see yourself?

Seriously, I know what you mean. It's something I've thought about a lot. I used to work with kids/ young adults who read at the 3rd grade level but wanted to be lawyers. There was often an astonishing disconnect between their actual abilities and what they perceived their abilities to be, and I realized, what is the alternative? What alternative would I wish for them? To sit huddled in the corner and "realize" that burger-wrangling was all they could aspire to? And that line of thought of course led me to, I think I'm so great, but how do I know I'm not just as self-deluded in my own way? Am I really so organized? Am I really so creative? Etc.

I've tried to be clear-eyed, and that can be sobering, indeed.

Thanks. Frankly I don't attach much importance to skills which aren't put to any good use, though. Am working on that...

Yeah, am very familiar with those sorts of examples. The patiobitch works in admissions at a professional school, and gets frequent inquiries from people along the lines of, "Why can't I get admitted? Whattaya mean a 2.1 GPA isn't good enough?"

Am actually thinking rather more bleakly, i.e., who cares if you are smart if it's of no use to anybody? (Was raised in a quasi-socialist household; can't quite shake the conditioning.) But it's definitely the same sort of disconnect, whatever the root might be.

Interestingly, if you try to attribute it to childhood, you can blame either excessive or insufficient parenting for the failure to perceive one's own limitations. That is, the kid who's had too much encouragement thinks everything they do is great; the kid who's had too little has had to devise artificial methods of justifying their behaviors and limitations in the absence of any real praise or guidance.

Not that either interpretation carries any weight. I've been preoccupied lately with the ability to philosophically justify things which are just plain bogus. Damn books...

I see. Well, being useful is certainly a lofty goal, and I hope you attain it. I think it's really hard to categorize, though. I mean curing cancer or something would be pretty clear-cut (although even that would be arguable -- population issues and whatnot), but what makes approving grants (right?) UN-useful? From the perspective of someone who has begged abjectly for grants more than once, it seems pretty dang useful.

But I do understand the urge to do something Big and Important, and think you're probably on your way.