Truly there is no more demoralizing thing than the habit of berating one’s self. How very often we find people who do this. They seem to derive the very keenest delight in telling how trivial is their worth in comparison to others.
This habit of self-depreciation is demoralizing to one’s character, because it has a very tendency to destroy self-confidence, and once one’s self-c0nfidence has been destroyed there is no hope for independence of any sort.
There is about the person who feels the right amount of self-confidence a real poise and balance which nothing else gives, and one wonders why there should exist the type who seems to glory in the fact that it is really lacking in this most valuable asset.
Self-c0nfidence, you know, is not conceit. Don’t conflict the two, for they are not one and the same, as so many persons seem to believe.
We admire above all things the man, as well as the woman, who has the courage to be self-confident–who know his virtues as well as his faults–and who wants credit for whatever he possesses that is worth possessing.
We admire above all the man, as well as the woman, who has the courage to give free rein to his thoughts, who has the indomitable courage to live his own life as he feels he should.
One must believe absolutely in one’s self. It means strength, and force and many other things which combine to make the full measure of a man or a woman, and to make it possible for one to achieve the goal of one’s effort.
The majority of the folk who drift into the habit of self-depreciation do so because they are so filled with disgust over those who have placed too great a value upon their abilities, that is who have substituted that thing we call nerve and its partner, “cheek,” for true ability, and, going to the other extreme, the disgusted one positively revels in a non-pretentious, humble air. But this leads to a weakness of character that shouldn’t be encouraged. As we have already said, it is demoralizing.
Genuine self-respect and a good opinion of one’s personality and true ability are wonderful weapons to wield against weakness, lack of confidence, and the other things which detract from one’s progress, both in character making and that thing we call success.
– Harriet Russell, Houston Daily Post, Houston TX., March 15, 1916
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