Why "Self-Esteem" Is a Trap: The Method's View Beyond Judging

When people ask me, "How is your self-esteem?", I answer calmly: let's first look at where this need to rate ourselves even comes from. The method doesn't ask whether it's "high" or "low" — it looks at the mechanism itself, and it turns out the whole construct of self-esteem stands on sand.

Where the "self" being judged comes from

The algorithm of thinking is simple. I didn't choose my genes. Neuroplasticity took shape without my participation. So all my decisions are conditioned not by me — yes, I make them, but genetics and neuroplasticity weren't chosen by the mind. A kind of revolution happens in consciousness when you realize: a whole volume of information labeled "this is you" was placed in you — but it's not me as the real one in this moment. These are concepts, thoughts, judgments about me — I can use them or not use them.

Why rating yourself is impossible

What am I to be compared with? I exist in a single copy. And so do you — the only one. There's no one to compare us with. And who gave the right to compare and to put down? Someone who didn't create himself takes it upon himself to judge another who also didn't create himself. So I honestly stay: I don't know who I am. A person doesn't know who they are. Everyone "knows," only I don't — and that's honesty, not weakness.

The "self-rating sect"

People literally go numb from this self-esteem. When someone is depressed, they're taught to "raise" their self-esteem or to "lower" it — and all of it is delusion you shouldn't fall for. It's a slide into guilt, into damned mistakes. My advice from life: recognize the delusion and don't fall for the delusion. Don't rate yourself, don't rate others — you didn't create yourself, and you didn't create them.

Instead of rating — measuring

I don't rate, I measure. Concrete little things, the small details — I measure them and see whether they fit me or not. Everyone's good — you and I, all of us are good. There's simply what fits better, what fits worse, and what doesn't fit at all. You just need to be more attentive, more discerning. It's work with concentration: selecting what is yours.

A simple image — the joke about the vegetable warehouse. A patient complains of stress: "all day I make decisions." Where do you work? At a vegetable warehouse, sorting potatoes. Well, I have no "decisions" or "ratings" — I just measure each potato: under two centimeters is small, under five is medium, bigger is large. That's all. No worrying.

Here and now as the way out

When you concentrate one hundred percent on a concrete action in the present moment, those ratings simply have nowhere to enter your consciousness. There's no place left for them to catch on. Some call it "here and now," but for me it's much simpler. The drop wears the stone — it will surely shift.

Practice

1. Catch the moment your brain starts producing a judgment "I'm good/bad" — and note: this is a concept, a thought about me, not me in this moment.
2. Drop the question "what is my rating" — replace it with "does this fit me or not."
3. Take one concrete small detail of your current action and simply measure it, like a potato: fits / medium / doesn't fit.
4. Compare with experience: does it give strength and energy — or does it send you down.
5. Bring full attention back to the current concrete action — and notice there's no room left for ratings.