Self Image, Self Esteem & Self Confidence.

Who do you think you are? - literally. Not what your genealogy is - the line of descent traced continuously from an ancestor. Who are you as a person? What is your personality? What are your values? Importantly what is your self image - is it honest?

We each have a mental picture of ourselves, of our characteristics - 

intelligence, beauty, ugliness, talent, selfishness, and kindness...We have a tendency to create an ideal self. We have the capacity to overlook our flaws & exaggerate our good qualities. We are able to justify our actions or non actions. We have a different perception of ourselves as an individual & what we are like in social situations. Self-esteem is how a person feels about themselves and their abilities. Self-image is how a person sees themselves and how they believe others see them.

It matters to us how other people see us. There is a whole PR, (Public Relations), structure that has developed.  It's purpose is to manage and disseminate information from an individual or an organization to the public in order to influence their perception. The PR business has been with us for longer than you might think, probably back to America in the 1900's. But it seems to have existed in ancient civilisations, Greece for example. The world wars saw the concept of propaganda emerge. 

Today, with modern instant communication, PR has become an art form. A fundamental technique is to identify the target audience and to tailor messages that are relevant to each audience. Focus groups reveal   the needs and desires of the audience. A deep understanding of that gives the PR people huge power. Messaging is the process used to create a consistent story. The aim is to remove doubt & influence the "right" decisions.

My point is, more than ever, we each, individually need to be aware of how easily we can be swayed. We like to think we are in control of our thoughts & actions. We think that we make the right decisions. But do we? 

I think the 21st century is a dangerous world where our self image & self esteem is really important if we are to withstand the intense & widespread manipulation, propaganda, & interference in decision making, that has become our "post truth" world of "special advisors", P R specialists & general unelected, often foreign, malign operators. 

We need to sharpen our skills of research & critical thinking & fight back. The unacceptable is being made acceptable. We see that today in so many places - the sad refugee & migrant situation, wars in Ukraine, Gaza & 12 other countries, a global food crisis where people are starving....

We need to be people who will not accept other people's suffering & dying. As well as self esteem & self confidence we each need to be able to have the best self image possible as a human being. We each need to be prepared to challenge the propaganda narratives. 

It is a war that we need to win.