Science has shown we are all prone to self deception. And the perfect example of self deception is MBTI. And this site is just overflowing with self deception and MBTI. And the amazing thing is that no one shows the slightest embarrassment at gross self deception.
What is the self-deception? To put yourself in a box?
People rarely vote for their own good, either. They vote based upon misinformation, propaganda, and delusions marketed to them by politicians and corporations.
Yeah, of course. The politicians are taking all the advantage of these mind tricks. Think of the loop from government to opposition. The opposition is seen bold and honest as long as they are not in the government, so it is easy to vote them. Then they get up there and become as lame as the previous government. And it is ingenious to have a president as the apparent head of the country. You can keep him there for as long as the ratings go down, then you let him go and tell it was all his fault, and bring someone "clean" to the office. And the decisions remain the same, no matter who is up there.
Claiming a period of trials as a defining moment is more convincing when one can identify specifically what one learned from the experience.
Yes, true. But still, if you hadn't had that experience, you would have had some other experience and would have learned something. Any way you go, you will learn something. But, the value is in the fact that you see that you learned something, so in a way you take more constructive attitude to what you learned. It is more conscious ego transformation.
The honest way to be able to say you didn't really want the grapes is to remain detached from the outcome from the outset. Then, what happens happens, you deal with it, and move on.
Detached like a stoic or like a buddhist?
No, because even when something happens that is out of my control, I can control how I react to it, or even how prepared for that possibility I was to begin with. It's just seeing an internal locus of control, rather than an external one.
There are limits to how prepared you can be, and many times the reaction is just spontaneous, so you can't choose it in the traditional way. It is true, though, that you can control these things quite a lot, but my original point was that to claim that you are ultimately responsible is another trick of the mind in the same way as claiming that you are just a puppet is a trick. Either way you refuse to see the reality as it is. In the end it is impossible to see the reality as it is, so basically we all just kinda settle for our own view of how much of the external world we can control.
You are on the right track here, but the attitude change requires more than just getting the grapes off the fox's mind. Rather than refining his methods (improve his jumping), the fox should refine his goals (why go after grapes all the way up there, when it's far easier to get carrots and blueberries from Mr McGregor's garden!) See the broader goal -- tasty food -- and work smarter, not harder.
Yeah, that is the smart thing to do. But you see how many different solutions to the story there are now? The fox now has different personas, depending on the writer. We don't know enough to say if one is better than the others, they are just different adaptations that we are projecting on the fox. In certain situations it might be advantageous for the fox to train his muscles, in some cases he might use his intellect, but we prefer to see him solving the question in some way rather than the other.
I've done it myself, more so when I was younger and very socially anxious and isolated. I often thought of others my age as shallow, annoying airheads. I'd see them giggling with their friends (I didn't have any) or carrying on about how much fun they'd had on the weekend or at some school activity (I never did anything on weekends or after school), and I'd feel superior to them, like I had so much more intelligence and depth, and I was too special for them. I never voiced any of these thoughts, and I from the outside I must have seemed so shy and anxious and pitiful. And I was, but I was also ridiculously full of myself in a way. (I've heard of the terms 'shy narcissist' and 'covert narcissist', and thought they would have fit me pretty well back then).
Yes. I was the same. I used to think that people who need other people are weak, and other BS like that... But now that I think of it, it might have been the only way to explain to myself what was wrong with the situation. Otherwise I would have said that there is something wrong with me, and maybe I could not have handled that. So, in a way, my feeling of superiority saved me from a suicide. Well, at least that's a possibility.
As I've gotten older though, I seem to have gone in the opposite direction. I hold myself responsible when people don't seem to like me or my plans don't work out; perhaps even too much. I think I've spent so much time observing my father and seeing how helpless his attitude really made him...I mean, it often prevents him from feeling badly about himself, but at the same time it prevents him from doing anything to improve himself or his situation. Why would he, if he thinks it's all the world's fault and not his own? And the same would be true for me. I just feel this need now, to keep looking at myself and questioning what I'm doing wrong, because I'm the only person I can control. My thinking and behaviour is the only thing I can change. If I just insist nothing is my fault, that I'm perfect and the world is fucked up, then I'm throwing that opportunity away.
I have been banging my head to the wall, trying different things and seeing if any of them work for me. Now it seems like I am doing it in a way out of a habit. Like, I am quite ok with my situation now, but would prefer it to improve but will not take it so seriously that next time I come to a dead end I am all invested there and will be at loss. It's like, I can't define what I am now based on the things I don't have. Otherwise it would be an uphill battle all the way with no end in sight.
I recall a study from one of my psych classes (wasn't a psych major, but I took a few electives) about how people would highly value their fraternity membership as a result of enduring the humiliation. They'd decide their frat was totally awesome and worth it to justify what they went through. Is that the one you're talking about? That's somewhat different from the other examples, but it is a type of ego-protecting thing, as people want to think they made the right decision and their dedication was worth it.
Oh, now I get what Saturned was saying. I didn't see it as an ego protection before.