David Kekich : Will You be Able to Handle Superlongevity?

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David Kekich

Will You be Able to Handle Superlongevity?

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Okay. Let’s say we solve the aging puzzle on time. You won’t get sick. You won’t get old. You’ll be youthful and happy for as long as you want.

Or will you?

Don’t forget, more time will magnify the good and the not so good. If you enjoy high self-esteem, life will be good. If it’s not as high as you’d like, it might be a drag. That’s true no matter how long we live. So shouldn’t self-esteem be something we might want to pay attention to? Shouldn’t it be the foundation upon which we build our lives?

First, exactly what is self-esteem? I have the most sensible answer for you. It comes straight from Dr. Nathaniel Branden, often referred to as “the father of self-esteem”, and a cherished friend.

According to Dr. Branden, “Self-esteem is an experience. It is a particular way of experiencing the self. It is a good deal more than a mere feeling. It involves emotional, evaluative, and cognitive components. It also entails certain action dispositions: to move toward life rather than away from it; to move toward consciousness rather than away from it; to treat facts with respect rather than denial; to operate self-responsibly rather than the opposite.

“Self-esteem is the disposition to experience oneself as being competent to cope with the basic challenges of life and of being worthy of happiness. It is confidence in the efficacy of our mind, in our ability to think. By extension, it is confidence in our ability to learn, make appropriate choices and decisions, and respond effectively to change. It is also the experience that success, achievement, fulfillment—happiness—are right and natural for us.

“Self-esteem is not the euphoria or buoyancy that may be temporarily induced by a drug, a compliment, or a love affair. It is not an illusion or hallucination. Lots of things (some of them quite dubious) can make us “feel good”—for a while. If self-esteem is not grounded in reality, if it is not built over time through the appropriate operation of mind—for example, through operating consciously, self-responsibly, and with integrity--it is not self-esteem.

“Rationally, one does not focus on self-esteem per se; one focuses on the practices that support and nurture self-esteem—such as the practice of living consciously, of self-acceptance, of self-responsibility, of self-assertiveness, of purposefulness, and of integrity, as I discuss in The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem.

“Self-esteem demands a high reality-orientation; it is grounded in a reverent respect for facts and truth. Excessive and inappropriate self-absorption is symptomatic of poor self-esteem, not high self-esteem. If there is something we are confident about, we do not obsess about it—we get on with living.”

Well said Nathaniel.

Extreme life extension is as much about the quality of your life as the quantity. Both take work. If you’re willing to invest in your mind as well as your body, then I suggest you devour a copy of The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem.

This is such an important issue that I am going to cover more next week. Meanwhile, why not visit some of Dr. Branden’s historical blogs for more information? Start with:

http://nathanielbranden.wordpress.com/2008/03/15/answering-misconceptions-about-self-esteem/

Published Monday, August 10, 2009 1:52 PM by David Kekich

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advancedatheist wrote on August 19, 2009 9:38 AM

Two points:

1. Nathaniel Branden's "doctorate" comes from an unaccredited diploma mill called the California Graduate Institute, apparently because he couldn't get a real PhD in psychology, even from a mediocre but accredited state university. I've also read that he doesn't have a license to practice psychology in California, but instead holds a Marriage, Family and Child Counseling license, like the one Laura Schlessinger (who has a PhD in physiology, not psychology) used to have. So treat what Branden says about "psychology" with skepticism.

2. The empirical evidence doesn't support the pro self-esteem propaganda:

The Trouble With Self-Esteem

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/03/magazine/the-trouble-with-self-esteem.html

advancedatheist wrote on August 19, 2009 10:07 AM

I might add that to the best of my knowledge, Nathaniel Branden has shown no interest in cryonics or radical life extension for himself. Instead he has written apologetics for death, for example, in his book "Honoring the Self."

Terror management theory (TMT) from psychology also weighs in on the self-esteem delusion:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terror_management_theory

TMT, which has empirical scientific support, says that humans invented self-esteem as an "anxiety buffer" to protect us from fears of death, kind of like having a rabbit's foot in your pocket to protect you from harm. In other words, self-esteem derives from superstition and magical thinking.

Well, some of us don't want mystical beliefs like self-esteem to distract us from the universal emergency of death. We want solutions based on scientific and technological rationality.