The History of Self-Esteem

Pastor Eric and pastor Dan discuss the history of the self-esteem movement and its impact on modern society. They also discuss the recent conflict between Israel and Hamas and how that relates to self-esteem.

Episode Transcript

(00:05):
It's just your alter ego So hard toknow Beneath the piety The hidden
gifts to show It's just your alterego Alright, here we are, back again.
Oh, that ended suddenly,I wasn't expecting that.
I was trying

(00:29):
to fade it out.
Wow.
So that was...
That's our our theme songfor today from Petra Alter.
Yes.
Alter Ego.
Alter
Ego Altar.
A-L-T-A-R, not A-L-T-E-R.
Right.
A-L-T-A-R.
Alter
Altar.
Altar, altar, ego.
Put up on the altar and
worship that thing.

(00:50):
And and then that's the reason why wedid that is because we are gonna talk
about self-esteem and self-love andthe history of it, and I think it's
appropriate that we call it an alter ego.
That's right.
So, the it's been a while since we've,we've been on this thing, by the way.

(01:10):
It has been.
It's been a good little while.
Yeah, a lot, a lot hasgone on in, in my life.
Did I?
You have a daughter in law now.
I have a daughter in law now.
Which you didn't before.
I didn't before.
Yeah?
Yeah.
And then you had a death in the family.
I had a death in
the family.
Yeah.
We've had a funeral and marriage.
One, well the marriagefirst and then the funeral.
Yeah.
And that was difficult, butthe Lord was gracious in that.

(01:32):
Yes.
Now
all you need is a birth.
Yeah.
We're probably going towait a little bit on that.
But you know, eventually, soit'll be at least nine months.
Yeah, probably longer.
We'll see, you know but it's been,it's been ups and downs for sure.
But it is.
I really enjoy doing these podcastsand and so I'm glad, glad to be back.

(01:56):
Yes.
And back into the swing of things.
So self esteem we are, I've beenwanting to do this for a while.
Ever since I went to a conferenceNicholas Ellen did it's Ellis or is it?
Yeah.
Nicholas Ellen.
Ellen.
Yeah.
He did a, a breakaway.
I don't know if they call it that, butyou know, a workshop, that's right.

(02:17):
And it was on self esteemand it was, it just like.
It was kind of one of those wowmoments, you know, where I'm
like, Oh, you know, those ahamoments like, Oh, I see like that.
The Bible actually has a lotto say about self assumption.
I mean, I knew that before, but to haveit the way, of course, in a way that.

(02:41):
Nicholas Allen does.
Describe it with such clarity.
You know, I found it just inspiringand I've been wanting to talk about it.
A few times I've hinted at itfrom the pulpit, you know, but
so, we'll see how far we get.
This may be a two or three part.
Series.
Yeah.
On self
esteem.
It's so interesting.
I mean, I was just looking at the historyof self esteem here and the, and the,

(03:05):
the idea goes all the way back as faras the 1600s, which is interesting.
I, who would have thought thatthey would have been talking about.
Self esteem back in the 1600s.
Yeah, and in particular,it's the term self esteem.
Yes.
Right, because the idea goes allthe way back to the beginning.
Yes, that's true.
Of the fall of mankind.
Yeah, I mean, but the term.
But the term itself, yeah, 1600s.

(03:27):
Like, we think it's a modernterm, let alone a modern
concept.
Yeah, it's really not.
It's not.
You can be like God,knowing good and evil.
There's self esteem right therethat Satan was appealing to.
Yeah it, it really was the.
You know, the enlightenmentkind of propelled it.
As, as it did many, many terribleideas pretty much any modern

(03:52):
idea that is unbiblical can betraced back to the enlightenment.
I mean, it just spawned an, awhole age of man centeredness
yeah, back in the 1600s and then it kindof died out for a while in the 1800s.
Yeah and then in the 1960sand 70s it becomes super
popular and up until this day.

(04:14):
That's funny because I was thinking aboutmy school, I went to a Christian school
in the early 70s, and the teachers, Iremember they, somebody came up with
this song called, I am lovable, I amcapable, I am, I'm worthy of respect,
and we sang that song in school, andthat's exactly what it was, it arose

(04:35):
out of this self esteem movement.
Yeah.
The whole thing.
Yeah.
And it was a cute littlecatchy tune, you know?
It talked about just how lovable I am, I'ma crea Even to say that I'm a creation of
God, and therefore I'm worthy of respect.
Yeah.
Yeah, and it's, you know, it'scute and lovable, but it ends up...

(04:58):
Becoming a me centered, really a Godcomplex until we start singing songs
like, I, I, I, what is that song?
I believe I can fly.
I believe I can touch
the sky.
Really?
Let's see you do that.
I know.
There's a bridge right there.
I want you to try.
You
know, you know, yeah, it's, it's absurd.
Yeah.
And that's where it goes.

(05:18):
So, but the the theoriesbegin to get developed.
And the mid 1900s and in hisbook self esteem, self image and
self love by Nicholas Ellen.
He, a great book.
Highly recommend it.
But he, he points out the five theoriesthat were developed, the ratio of

(05:39):
achievement and expectation is theorynumber one, that a person's opinion
of self directly is related to howwell he meets his own expectations.
And then you have the positiveand negative self regard theory
number two, which is a person toovercome the outrageous demands and
judgments from within and thus tofunction well in society, he must

(06:02):
develop a positive view of self.
And then we had theory numberthree, the inferiority complex.
A person will experience a senseof inadequacy as a result of
not reaching some desired goal.
Number four, the impact of humanrelationships on one's view of self.
And this is the explanation for allof a person's conflict with others.

(06:23):
It's all about his own view of self.
And in his relation to others isbecause of a low view of self.
And then you have the attachmenttheory number five, which is a child
must have a close intimate bond withhis mother during childhood to avoid
irreversible mental health consequences.
Which may lead to problemswith attaching to others.

(06:44):
And that one has gotten a lot of press.
I've heard a lot about that.
Yeah, me too.
The attachment.
Yep.
Theory is an explanation.
Oh, he, he, you know, hedidn't bond with his mom.
That's his problem.
Yes, I've heard thaton, on many occasions.
He's got mommy issues.
Doesn't that kind of, it seems like thatkind of comes out of Freud, doesn't it?
In some way.

(07:05):
Well almost everything comesout of Freud in some way.
Yeah, that's true.
That's true.
That's true.
When it comes to psychology.
Yeah, that's true.
Yeah.
But, but yeah, his whole theory of,that, everyone secretly wants to,
what, kill their, kill their dad, marrytheir mother or something like that.
Yeah, something like that.
He was
really weird,
but.
Yeah.
Anyway.
Yeah, it sounds Freudian.

(07:26):
And so this is the, thefoundation of self esteem.
It is a focus on one's self.
Without a biblical context.
Yeah, there's no, there's no,none of, none of that takes into
account what the Bible says.
No.
No, it's just, it's just man,you know, man talking about.

(07:49):
What, what motivates man or what,what is causing man to behave and
you know, I like what he says.
He says, the factors for successor failure are to believe in
yourself, follow your heart, trustyourself, listen to your gut, right?
And so that becomes the basis forwhat produces success in my life,

(08:13):
which by the way, doesn't Disney
promote all those things?
Oh yeah.
I mean, that's likeevery Disney movie ever,
especially in the last, you know, inthe last 30 years, all these Disney
movies, that's exactly what they all say.
You know, I, I always think of Aladdinand I think of the genie as he comes

(08:34):
up on the he comes up on this carpetto Aladdin and he says, be yourself.
You want to win her over, be yourself,you know, and that's exactly what it is.
And every, every Disney movie has thatfocus, which by the way, I would say
that if you're a parent, you know,there's some great entertainment value

(08:55):
in Disney movies in and of themselves,but if you're not talking with your kids
about what's in those Disney movies,the reality of what's there, then
you're doing your kids a disservice.
Yeah, I, I think I've thought of thisas I've raised my own kids you know,
I think a lot of times as parents,we want to protect them from bad

(09:18):
languages as Christian parents andfrom, you know, con, bad content,
which I think that's appropriate.
But what we consider clean isoften riddled with bad philosophy
and just terrible theology.
And for me I've alwaysenjoyed dissecting movies.

(09:40):
So maybe, I guess, hereit comes naturally.
That, that was what I always purposedto do when we would watch a movie.
We would, I would talk about it withthe kids afterwards and dissect it.
I think there were greatopportunities for, for teaching.
Yes.
And then you, then you, youknow, you discuss what is the
biblical response to that andyou're teaching them how to think.

(10:02):
Yes.
So, you know, I wouldn't, I wouldn't say,you know, you need to shut off Disney.
I mean, you might cancel Disneyplus just because of how crazy
it's gotten and all that.
But that's not going to, that's,that's not the ultimate solution is
to, is to be training up your children.
That's
right.
Teaching 'em how to think biblical,teaching 'em how to think biblically.
It's not just thinking criti.
You want them to think critically,but you want them to think

(10:25):
critically based on the Bible.
Yeah.
And what the Bible says.
And you know, I remember doing that withmy kids a few times, like I was thinking
of, of Mulan, you know, Mulan was, is thisstory about this girl who basically defies
her father and she goes and does whatshe wants to do in, in and disobeys her
father and decides to go join the army.

(10:47):
Right.
And so that, what does that do isthat presents an opportunity to talk
about, well, Disney's promoting thisand saying, you just got to do whatever
you want to do, regardless of whatyour parents say, but that's not what.
Scripture teaches.
Right.
And so there, there comes an opportunityto sit there and go, well, Mulan did
this, but what she did was actually wrong.

(11:10):
It was sinful because she'sdishonoring her parents.
Yeah.
And the scripture tells uswe need to honor our parents.
But it's all because that'swhat she wants to do.
Which comes back to this self
esteem thing.
That's, that's what it is.
And Disney is kind of the, the propagandaarm of the self, self esteem movement.
Yes.
And we'll, we'll talk about some more,but the far end of it is absolute horror.

(11:37):
The far end of the self esteem movementis just, it's, it's a horrendous,
narcissistic self aggrandizing mindsetthat I mean, just the ultimate.
It's selfishness.
That's, that's where it is, where it goes.
Totally.
It.
And, and so that seedwas planted early on.
Like you said, the believe inyourself, follow your heart, trust

(11:59):
your movement tru, trust your yourself.
Listen to your gut.
You know, this idea thatyou somehow have you know.
This value within you that, that's,that's worth listening to and following
apart from any biblical worldview.
That's right.
The sum, the sum total of of,of everything is your goals for

(12:23):
yourself and the way others view,the way the others treat you.
That's the sum total of your existence.
I mean, that's the, theself esteem movement.
That is.
It's all about you.
That's right.
And then, you know, the, you havethe human potential movement in
the 60s and 70s, which said thatindividuals must pursue a realization

(12:43):
of their inner human potential throughthe exploration of body and mind.
They must gratify theirinterpersonal longings to gain
individual identity and meaning.
And so this is where you get youknow, feelings of power, self-esteem
and happiness as the end goal.
Self-actualization.
Yeah.
Self-actualization.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Maslow.
Maslow yes, he was the,the early adv advocate.

(13:06):
And, you know, the hierarchy,higher Hierarchy of Needs guy.
Carl Rogers.
Mm-Hmm.
. These were the guys who were pushing this.
Yeah, so self actualization, self-esteem.
And then, and then terms like humandignity theory, but I always find
this interesting when you, whenyou start looking at this stuff,
you know, you hear these terms andit's like, well, who would, who

(13:27):
would deny or reject human dignity?
You know, like that soundslike a, a great thing.
And, and, and the theory isindividuals have inherent values and
deserve to be treated accordingly.
Would we disagree with that?
No,
no.
No, I think, I think the Biblewould, would say that, you know,
you love your neighbor as yourself.

(13:47):
That in and of itself confersdignity on other people.
Right.
But what they don't do is theydon't talk about where that
inherent value comes from.
And that's where they end up like justextracting it from a biblical worldview.
The only inherent value is becauseof Being created in the image of God.

(14:09):
Yeah.
So you can't separateGod from the equation.
And that's the problem.
And so when you pull God out ofthe equation, you end up with
things like self actualization.
You know, this idea that you canbe, you become fully human by,
by being all that you can be.
You've got to strive tobe all that you can be.
And the focus is on self, right?

(14:29):
Be yourself.
That's what you were saying earlier.
You've got to be yourself.
You've got to reach your potential.
You've got to find yourself.
This kind of thought process, whichdrives the self esteem movement
and it leaves no room for God.
So, and what you get isconfusion and absurdity.
Yeah, you get today.

(14:49):
Yeah.
Today, you know.
You get chaos.
What's interesting is that youthink about all this, you know,
this human dignity that you find inyour own exaltation, so to speak.
You know, you're looking for.
The self actualization and you're saying,well, if I can reach self actualization, I

(15:10):
can be everything that I want to be, thatI will maximize my dignity as a human.
And yet in today's world, humandignity only extends to those.
Who agree wholeheartedly withyour assessment of yourself.

(15:30):
Right, right.
So if I do not agree with yourassessment of yourself, I...
You can actually reject my human dignity.
Yeah.
And you can treat me...
I'm like a subhuman becauseI do not agree with you.
Yeah,
yeah.
That's where you get the wholecancel culture, which that, that goes

(15:55):
much further than just, you know,canceling on social media in its end.
I mean, we're, we're heading youknow, like a rocket toward the kind
of things, you know, that we're,we're things like beating and
murder are going to be acceptable.
I think you see thatwith this whole Israel.

(16:17):
Hamas thing going on where Hamas comesin and they, they beat and they murder
and they rape and they're killing babiesand you know, on the college campuses,
they're, they're going out there chantingabout, you know, death to Israel.
You know, how, how did, howcan that even be possible?
Yeah.
You know,

(16:37):
because you don't, you don'tdeserve dignity if you don't look
at life the way they see life.
Right.
Which again, you're treatingpeople as less than...
Then, you know, dignified becausethey have their own state and, and,
and again, what you want to do is ifyou're Hamas is you're trying to take,

(17:01):
you're trying to exterminate Israel.
That's, that's never been lessthan the stated goal of Hamas.
But you know, again, this, this wholehuman dignity thing only goes as far as.
Because it's human dignity.
It's not based on, on, on God.
It's a human dignity that only goesas far as you agree with my humanity.

(17:27):
Yeah.
This is where self esteem and humandignity movement is bringing us.
And so it really isn't a surprisewhen you, when you look at it because
the ultimate promotion of self.
And that's to the expense of anyone inanything else that doesn't promote self.
And so, you know the alternativeto Christ is what it is.

(17:51):
Yes.
There's no hope in, in, there'sno, there's no, it is all about
self esteem, self actualization.
Your trust in your hope is in yourself.
Yeah.
100%.
100%.
100%.
And when anyone threatensthat, they become the enemy.
Yeah.
You know, I was thinking I wrote downhere Proverbs three, five and six.
And Nicholas Allen used this inanother session that I listened

(18:14):
to just, just the other day.
It says, trust in the Lord withall your heart, lean not on what?
Your own understanding.
Your own understanding.
Right.
In all your ways, acknowledge himand he will direct your paths.
So, because man is a worshiper,he's going to do one of two things.

(18:35):
He's either going to worshipGod and follow God, or he's
going to worship something else.
And usually that involvesself, ultimately at the end,
is you're worshipping yourself.
And you either live lifelooking to God, or you live
life on your own understanding.
And that becomes kind of the key theme ofProverbs, really, if you think about it,

(18:56):
that you can live life wisely by livingaccording to how God would desire you to
live and ultimately living for His glory.
Or you live completely and entirelyby your own understanding of life and
how to handle life and how to thinkand how to operate in this life.
And the end of that, which Solomonportrays throughout the entire,

(19:19):
you know, book of Proverbs.
is, it's an ugly end.
Yeah.
Yeah, it really is.
This is Proverbs 28, 26.
He who trusts in his own heart is a fool.
Yes.
Yeah.
That's the whole follow your heart, selfesteem, self actualization movement.

(19:39):
It is to trust in your own heart.
Yes.
Jeremiah 17, 5.
You know, cursed is the man who trustsin mankind and makes flesh his strength.
Who's heart turns away from Yahweh.
And that's the, that's because they're,they're opposing realities, right?
Either your heart is turnedtoward yourself or your heart

(19:59):
is turned toward Yahweh.
And so either you bring blessing toyourself or you bring curses to yourself.
Yeah.
You trust in either mankindor you trust in Yahweh.
Yeah.
You, you, you trust, you know,in yourself or you trust in God.
Yeah.
And in today's culture, you'retold the only way you're going to
survive life is to trust in yourself.
I believe in yourself.

(20:20):
So then there's the the eightiesand nineties, California ends
up playing a huge role ininfluence in this entire movement.
They begin to promote under the, the,what they call the California taskforce.
Self esteem and personaland social responsibility.

(20:40):
This idea that the problem withsociety is low self esteem.
So we're going to boost.
Self esteem, if we boost selfesteem, it's going to eradicate
poverty, drugs and they were alsotargeting premarital sex at the time.
That's gone out the window.
Nobody, nobody talks about that anymore.
And drugs are okay.
And yeah, we'll

(21:00):
even give you the clean needles, right?
Right.
And so this is, you know,it's just fascinating because
California is leading the.
The way in this and what we have in,in their attempt to mitigate poverty,
drugs or premarital sex or, you knowdisease and all that comes from that.
We end up with poverty, drugsand, and in all this diseases

(21:21):
and everything that comes out
of that.
Yeah.
It hasn't worked very wellto tell you the truth.
The society hasn't changed.
It hasn't gotten better.
Yeah, and they, they began to producestudies claiming that people with high
self esteem are more productive citizens.
So they started doing these studiesand they began this whole campaign.
That each person has the powerto solve his own problems.

(21:43):
If, if he just has a high self esteem.
So this is, this becomes a significantforce in influence in this movement.
What happens in California?
You know, spreads, right?
Yes.
And and so, there's, there's otherguys who are develop, you know,

(22:06):
influential in developing this.
There's, like, William James in Harvard,William James taught that self esteem
is a ratio between what aspires todo and what actually accomplishes.
And so if you accomplish what you set outto do, you'll have higher self esteem.
If you don't, then you have less.
Robert White, also at Harvard.

(22:28):
Self esteem is a product ofone's ability to master certain
aspects according to his identity.
resulting in feeling good about himself.
So if you feel good about yourself, thatis the product of a high self esteem.
If you feel bad about yourself, thatis the product of a low self esteem.
And then you gotChristopher Mrook, I think.
Mrook?
I'm not sure how to say his name.
He's was a professor at Bowling Green.

(22:51):
Wrote the book, Self Esteemand Positive Psychology, which
had a pretty broad impact.
Self esteem to him was havinga view of oneself as competent.
Which is as a result of dealing withchallenges in life in a productive way.
And so you feel good aboutyourself if you overcome obstacles.
And that's the goal of life.
It's to feel good about yourself.

(23:12):
That's what starts todevelop in all of this.
It's, it's really feelings based.
And so those guys kind of set the,you know, the, the grounds for the
definition of self esteem, whichultimately is that you need to feel good.
Yes.
You know, you really notice thatin this, is that there's more and
more of a movement towards feelingand how you feel about yourself.

(23:34):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And then you have scales like MorrisRosenberg develops the self, the, the
self esteem scale where, where you'restarting to test your, your level of
self esteem how, how, how satisfiedor dissatisfied are you with yourself?
If you have bad feelings about yourself,it's because of low self esteem.

(23:58):
If you have good feelings about yourself,it's because of high self esteem.
And now we're gonna, we're gonnafigure out where that is on the scale.
And so it starts to become more ofa science in, in their thinking.
But there, there's reallynothing scientific about it.
That's subjective.
It's subjective, right?
And so there, there's this, thisdevelopment where self esteem becomes

(24:22):
the number one important makeup of aman or, or aspect of a man, it's all
about yourself Seymour Epstein beginsto introduce personality which he called
cognitive experiential self theory.
And so we start talking abouthow personalities are related to

(24:43):
psychology and, and we begin tobegin to justify certain behaviors
based on our, our makeup, ourpersonalities, that kind of talk.
But he defined self esteemas a need to be love worthy.
So, that was novel at the time.
Notice it says without anyconnection to cause and effect.

(25:04):
But he, yeah, he...
So you're just love worthy, period.
He
extracted it from any cause and effect.
So, so, in their, in their questfor science, they've removed...
any science from it.
Like there's nothing concrete anymore.
It's just a general feeling of a, or, youknow, a general desire to be love worthy.
Yes.
Which on the surface sounds great, right?

(25:25):
Right.
We, we, we want to love people.
We want people to love us.
But again, it's a man centeredview of man without God.
There's no God at all in any of this.
Right.
And then the Bible has a lot to sayabout, you know, the, the grounds of
human dignity and, and loveworthinessand all of that the Bible is very clear

(25:48):
on, on who we are apart from Christ.
And and, and we'll get into that, butthere's, there's this rush, you know, all
of a sudden I don't, I don't, you know,this whole field of psychology and I think
there's a lot of funding that's going on.
And there's this rush toward youknow, developing self esteem in, in

(26:10):
developing theories and definitionsIn different terms like global
self esteem, specific self esteem,episodic self esteem, implicit self
esteem, explicit self esteem, stateself esteem, trait self esteem.
And so they're just kind ofparsing out all these different
aspects of self esteem.

(26:31):
And it all comes down to a a view of self,no biblical context, and a view of self
that, you know, that centers around aperson feeling good or bad about himself.
Or as a sense of greatness or anaptitude by how he identifies with
the culture or how the culture,culture identifies with him.
And so it is, it is, there'sIt's just how you feel and how

(26:58):
other people feel about you.
That's the basis of self esteem.
And so if you don't feel good aboutyourself, you have low self esteem.
And if people are, are are makingyou feel bad, then they are the
cause of your low self esteem.
Yeah.
And that
becomes, I mean, that becomes criticalin today's world because really.
Now we're saying that self esteem isregardless of what people think about you.

(27:24):
So I don't care what you think,I'm going to do this if I think
it's going to make me feel better.
Whether or not you likeit, it's irrelevant.
Whether or not it's rightor wrong, I get to determine
what's right or wrong, not you.
Right.
So you can't enforce your...
Your moral values on me, I get todetermine what is right because

(27:45):
that's what will make me feel better.
Yeah,
and if, if you judge me if, if you'regoing to judge me and you make me feel
bad about my choices, about my, you know,worldview then, then you are an aggressor.
You're an aggressor.
That's right.
You're evil.
You're, you're the cause.
This is, you know,you're, you're an abuser.

(28:08):
That's, that's where we're at.
And this is, you know.
How they, where they beginto redefine abuse into non,
into very subjective concepts.
You know, you can see where this is going.
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
You know, a guy gets up and hepreaches the gospel or he goes out
and he tells someone that, Hey,you're, you're a sinner bound for hell

(28:29):
and the wrath of God abides on you.
You've just committed a crimeagainst the self esteem.
That's right.
That's hate
speech now.
That's hate speech.
That's hate speech becauseyou violated his self esteem.
Right.
Right.
And so that, that'swhere we're at right now.
And it, so it makes perfect sense whenyou look at the craziness around us.
It is driven by this self actual,actualization, self esteem movement.

(28:54):
And it is tremendously you know, sorted.
Self esteem is seen as thegreatest driver of behavior.
That's right.
And it's the justificationfor, for, for everything.
That's right.
It's an excuse for anything.
There's no moral compass.

(29:16):
There's no moral compass.
When I become the arbitrator ofwhat I think is right or wrong.
Based on what I want.
I am fully self actualized now.
And I have become like God.
Right.
And it's all about me.
Yep.
And how dare you say anything . Sowell, I think we will wrap up that one

(29:43):
and we'll, we'll dive back into this.
Probably looking at a biblical framework abiblical response to, to this whole thing
this is Dan's classic Petra, . Yeah.
Yeah.
All right I hope you enjoy this andWe will be going into a part two,
so I hope you join us next time.
This is the Ministry of FaithBaptist Church here in Visalia,

(30:03):
and we'll see you next time.