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An overexaggerated sense of high self-esteem is a defining characteristic of American culture. It was here way before the 1980s. I would say the delusion has it

An overexaggerated sense of high self-esteem is a defining characteristic of American culture. It was here way before the 1980s. I would say the delusion has its roots from the Puritan Calvinist pilgrims who thought that God has a plan for you and its predestined. Of course this notion would get further warped to, if you just believe you can and put in the effort, you will. In the US we love this stuff. We feel we can just will things into happening. Through the sheer force of will problems will just get solved. Unfortunately this behavior comes at the expense of just dealing with the issues in meaningful ways. We just pick elected officials who make claims that they can just solve hard problems without evidence. We need to come to grips with the idea that success or failure is all really chance. You are no better than the beggar on the street; you just have more luck. You don't really deserve anything. We need to learn to be generous, virtuous and pay it forward so we need not rely on an inflated sense of self-esteem to get out of bed in the morning.

username90 6y ago
I wonder if this is why American students are much more reluctant to pick STEM degrees than other equivalent countries? Like, they can't handle any setbacks hurting their self-esteem so they pick a simpler major instead of pushing through. Like, "I didn't really fail that calculus class, I just didn't want to study it so I choose a business major instead!".
finder83 6y ago
The part you're missing of the Puritan (Calvinist) theology though is that we're all sinners deserving only of condemnation with nothing deserving or redeemable in ourselves, but God chose to show us mercy and redeem us anyway. Not all puritans were Calvinist but if you're mentioning predestination, it kind of bears to reason that that group were. I kind of get what you're saying...but if its based in Puritanism, it's probably a perverted form of it I actually attribute the origins to the New Age movement (rooted and perverted from Hinduism) and the power of positive thinking that resulted of it during the 70s. Essentially if you believe in something hard enough then it can become true
- andrekandre 6y ago
  > Essentially if you believe in something hard enough then it can become true a.k.a "magical thinking" iirc

username90 6y ago

I wonder if this is why American students are much more reluctant to pick STEM degrees than other equivalent countries? Like, they can't handle any setbacks hurting their self-esteem so they pick a simpler major instead of pushing through. Like, "I didn't really fail that calculus class, I just didn't want to study it so I choose a business major instead!".

finder83 6y ago

The part you're missing of the Puritan (Calvinist) theology though is that we're all sinners deserving only of condemnation with nothing deserving or redeemable in ourselves, but God chose to show us mercy and redeem us anyway. Not all puritans were Calvinist but if you're mentioning predestination, it kind of bears to reason that that group were. I kind of get what you're saying...but if its based in Puritanism, it's probably a perverted form of it I actually attribute the origins to the New Age movement (rooted and perverted from Hinduism) and the power of positive thinking that resulted of it during the 70s. Essentially if you believe in something hard enough then it can become true

andrekandre 6y ago
> Essentially if you believe in something hard enough then it can become true a.k.a "magical thinking" iirc