Nathaniel Branden's Six Pillars of Self-Esteem

When Nathaniel Branden published this book in 1994, he was in his sixties. Though he died in 2014, his ideas live on. The book is still in great demand at the library; plenty of holds by others meant no renewal for me. Thinking back to when self-esteem became a buzzword, I pondered how influential this concept has become, revolutionizing our culture's educational and child-rearing practices.

I was surprised to read of Branden's turbulent love life. His long extramarital love affair with Ayn Rand was followed by an acrimonious and very public break. I'm not surprised that philosopher and novelist Ayn Rand has largely been forgotten. Long ago I read Atlas Shrugged; I remember how my younger self found her characters cold, smug and unsympathetic.

The pillars of self-esteem live on, and Branden's ideas continue to resonate. He says we attract and feel most comfortable with those with similar levels of self-esteem -- in today's parlance, people whose vibrations match our own.

But we all need to improve our self-esteem. This is what gives us the courage of our convictions and helps us avoid being pressured into doing things that are not right for us, in the hope of being accepted. We can evolve, though this is no easy process. To aid the work, Branden has developed a set of sentence completion exercises that can be used to uncover our unconscious beliefs about ourselves. He has used these on himself and on his patients, and includes them in an appendix.

Paradoxically, many of us lack the necessary "courage to tolerate happiness without self-sabotage." This psychological dissatisfaction is why we laugh in rueful recognition at the old Groucho Mark joke about never wanting to join to a club that "would accept me as a member." Thus, an important goal of self-development is to reduce feelings of anxiety and insecurity, to "make them less likely to intimidate or overwhelm." To accept, manage and rise above such feelings relaxes us. "Relaxation implies that we are not hiding from ourselves and are not at war with who we are."

We need to think and act in order to evolve. Our consciousness, a tool by which to see ourselves, does not find its right use automatically and without effort. Moreover, self-esteem mustn't be reduced to feel-good notions "that divorce it from questions of consciousness, responsibility and moral choice." Indeed, consideration of right and wrong is natural. Predating social conditioning, the "concern with morality or ethics arises naturally in the early stages of our development."

Hypocrisy, says the author, is "self-invalidating." Sadly, many cultures promote it. They also transmit other values that conflict with the healthy development of responsibility, morality and self-esteem. For instance, many cultures inculcate the destructive and often unconscious belief that women are inferior. Another example is the concept of original sin. "The very notion of guilt without volition or responsiblity is an assault on reason as well as on morality."

"It would be hard to name a more certain sign of low self-esteem than the need to perceive some other group as inferior." This idea resonates powerfully, and offers a more hopeful way of considering the rash of tribal hatreds that beset humans. It takes work to eliminate the psychological group-think think makes the tribe "the supreme good and denigrates the importance of the individual." Branden aptly describes contemporary American culture as "a battleground between the values of self-responsiblity and the values of entitlement." Entitlement is a form of tribalism too, and for it to win the values sweepstakes would drastically diminish us all.

Improving self-esteem means evolving certain life practices: living consciously, self-acceptance, self-responsibility, self-assertiveness, living purposefully, and acting out of a sense of personal responsibility. Blaming, victimization, and demanding special consideration aren't healthy.

"Making mistakes is integral to a great deal of learning," so we need not blame ourselves when we err. Instead, we can use the new knowledge gained through experience. Once we decide to accept responsibility for ourselves, we can overcome hesitation, uncertainty and inaction, and follow our individual paths. Emotional maturation means transferring the source of approval from the external to our inner selves. "A commitment to lifelong learning is a natural expression of the practice of living consciously."

This book reminded me of a story related by contemporary thinker Mark Manson. A century ago, a decision to embrace self-responsibility pulled a young man back from the edge of suicide. That moment of choice set him on the path to evolve into the pioneering psychologist William James.