Some changes that people make are an improvement; others, a degradation. The people who have espoused the dogmas of positive thinking, self-esteem and winners-and-losers did not become better people, they became worse people. So whenever change is considered, it must be certain that it is an improvement and not a degradation.
Some criticisms that one may hear are legitimate. I have been told by many people that I need to slow down in my poetry and comedy performances. At first I thought that it was a fluke; then more people started telling me that. So I took that criticism to heart and slowed down.
Other criticisms made are not legitimate at all. I have been told – by the same person – that I don’t love myself and that I love only myself. I have been told that my writing is great but my personality is terrible, and I was told that my writing is terrible but my personality is great. I have been called a Communist, a Nazi, a Republican, a flaming liberal and a leftist libertarian dumbf*ck. I have been called a misogynist and I have been called a p*ssywhipped idiot and a male feminist. I have been called a Wog idiot, a stupid Chinese, a crazy Russian, an American idiot, a dirty Jew and an Aussie c*cksucker n*gger f*g. These claims contradict one another, so they can’t all be right.
So we have Jesus commanding to remove the beam from one’s eye before removing a splinter from one’s brother’s. There is a problem with that. If a beam is in my eye, I cannot see it enough to remove it. I need to use mirrors. I need to see what my eye looks like in the reflections in other people’s eyes. And of course all these have beams in them as well. So when you look at your reflection in another person’s eyes, it is a bitch trying to figure out what is the beam in your eye and what is the beam in theirs.
When all the mirrors you see are from the same cultural locale, they are all going to have that beam in them, in addition to whatever beam they may individually have. Some people claim to speak for “other people” or “everyone else,” and of course that is ridiculous. The world consists of 8 billion people, most of them nothing like the people making that claim. These people see it as arrogance to have any perspective other than theirs; but they possess a far greater arrogance. They usurp the authority of 8 billion people. They claim to speak for all people. What they really speak for is one cultural locale among myriads, many of the other locales being much better than theirs. So then it becomes valid to introduce perspectives of other cultures, to see what is a function of the cultural locale and what is the function of oneself.
Is it important to pursue self-improvement? Yes, but it actually has to be an improvement. Many qualities are seen as bad when they are not. People may see chutzpah, or originality, or creativity, or obsessiveness, or passion, as bad when these things are completely valid. There are other qualities – such as self-esteem, winners-and-losers thinking and positive thinking – that are seen as good when they aren’t. So if someone is demanding personal change, it becomes necessary to see what change it is and whether it is an improvement or a degradation. And the person’s values must be figured out so as to see which of them are right and which of them are wrong.
This is quite a tall task, and one demanding a lot of mental effort. The outcome is clarity both as to yourself and as to other people, both culturally and individually. This clarity works to remove the beam from everyone’s eyes, and clarity is achieved all around. It is a task well worth taking.