Respecting ourselves or hating who we are: Why do we turn self improvement into another form of self-rejection?
Self-improvement is “the intentional, lifelong process of upgrading your knowledge, skills, health, character, and overall life strategy through your own efforts,” as stated by James Clear. Personal growth is a current trend on social media, and everyone is trying to participate in different activities, exercises, studies, classes, and a lot of different things to improve themselves and who they are. This was always seen as something good and a path that guides us to becoming better versions of ourselves. However, recently, the action of self development has become more like a pattern of disrespect rather than a form of self respect. We are hating parts of ourselves without understanding why. We are comparing ourselves with the people who seem to be more successful than us. We believe we are not good enough, and that we are not doing enough. Those sensations are making us deeply focused on becoming who we want to be or who we think we should be. Even though this seems important for evolving, the drastic changes we are executing even with good intentions, are leading us to self-rejection and constant dissatisfaction.
On social media, the most common thing around influencers is to expose everything they do and pretend that all of those things are good for them. Everyone is constantly posting their daily diaries of gratitude, daily prayer, health habits, learning achievements, meditation, and sleep routines. Trends like “The great lock in” emphasize discipline, motivation, focus on hobbies, wellness and mental health. This is making people invest their time and energy in achieving personal and professional goals. Therefore, this culture of self improvement is not entirely negative or unhealthy, but it can be since it is becoming almost a requirement to succeed. Clear goals, persistence, dedication, hard work, personal time and routines can allow people to grow, to love, to learn more, to enjoy their own company, and to further understand themselves, their backgrounds, their habits, and their characteristics. However, every excess conceals a deficiency, and the extreme need for self-improvement can be hidden by a strong feeling of insufficiency. This feeling has roots in life experiences, social pressures, comparison, trauma and lack of self trust. Noticeably, all those roots that connect people to insecurity are only being more encouraged by self-development. It works as a literal repetitive pattern of feeling dissatisfied with who you are and trying to improve those characteristics through a strategy that only highlights what makes you insecure. Consequently, by the excess of self development, you are not necessarily trying to improve yourself and become a better version of yourself; you are trying to change yourself to hide parts of yourself that you dislike and criticize. The more you try to improve what for you is a lack, the more flaws you are creating, because you are trying to improve things to feel more worth it through others lenses.
This cycle does not come from something we established for ourselves, but it actually comes from our surroundings. According to Science Direct, 76% of general social media posts are centered around self improvement content, so sometimes even without noticing, we are consuming elements that pressure us to “become better versions of ourselves." Even so, these create, without our realizing it, fragmented illusions of what the ideal version of ourselves is, because as we see everyone around us trying to create better versions of who they are, we treat our current selves as insufficient. It is undeniable that this also comes from our constant human dissatisfaction due to our natural dopamine mechanism. Still, normalizing increasingly intense self-improvement as a tool for hiding flaws that are parts of us and as a measure of self worth is not normal. It is not common for us to believe that we need to change every part of our being, to fit in what is considered being someone who is self developed. Unfortunately, as the trends of self-development grow, the number of burnout cases also increase, along with body dysmorphia and eating disorders that have doubled over the past years, as highlighted by the National Library of Medicine. As a result, a balance has to exist among self-improvement and self-rejection. We can strive to achieve a goal and work hard to accomplish it. We can read more and study more to become more knowledgeable, and we can do more physical exercise to improve our health, self-esteem, and physical appearance. Despite that, we cannot make this part of our personality, because, as humans, we will always want to improve because we never feel that it is enough, even when we get what we have always desired. Furthermore, we cannot use this approach to becoming better versions of ourselves to hide what we don't like about us, since, if we do so, we will never improve these specific traits, but actually hide it through other skills we are trying to develop, as if one could cover up another.
When treating self-improvement as a measure of self-worth, we will be forever unhappy individuals, in an endless cycle of dissatisfaction, because we will always have something to improve, something to get better at, something to work on… When we are self developing, we will achieve something that will temporarily make us satisfied. Still, not too long afterward, we will find another characteristic that seems incomplete and needs correcting or improving. We have to comprehend that we, as human beings, are incomplete. We are not perfect, and even when people in social media, at work, or wherever we go want to pretend they are by exposing unrealistic routines and results as if they don't have flaws like ours, they also are also unhappy with certain parts of themselves.The point is that they don't expose those facets. For that reason, it is crucial for us to determine in our own selves, based on who we are and what we believe, what we should change in ourselves and what, in fact, needs to be improved. Otherwise, we will measure how much we are worth based on what other individuals think that they should improve in their own lives, objectives and routines, rather than using who we are and what we consider our core values as measures. This will involve accepting the parts of us we try to hide by extreme self-development, and approaching insecurities with a distinguished perception; is this something I can change, something I have to accept, something I can shape, or something that I can develop?
After all, self-improvement is key for developing as persons, especially if this process involves self- acceptance and not self-rejection, using developing approaches to hide further insecurities, just like we see in society, and especially in social media. While observing trends that address these themes, we still have to be careful when deciding what part of this trend we will follow and focus on personal growth measures that are realistic for who we are, who we want to be, and what, in fact, can be changed in ourselves, so we avoid getting into endless cycles of dissatisfaction and comparison, without expecting to feel fulfilled all the time. Therefore, self-improvement needs to walk side by side with self-acceptance, so we can grow without abandoning who we are and what we prioritize, finding a balance between becoming better selves and hating ourselves unintentionally.
Sources:
Comments