I have heard many claims that people attract attention based on how they feel   
   about themselves. I do not believe that this is true. In fact I have seen many   
   cases of the opposite. If you feel too good about yourself, other people will   
   want to tear you    
   down. If you feel too bad about yourself, other people will want to cheer you   
   up.   
      
   A related claim is “The Law Of Attraction” - that like attracts like. I   
   have also seen many cases to the contrary. There are many macho men who   
   attract very feminine women. There are many kind people who attract very   
   mean-spirited partners. There are    
   many wise gurus who attract very stupid students. In none of these cases do we   
   see like attracting the like.   
      
   So it goes that people believing such things are told to work on self-esteem   
   and suchlike in order to improve what they are attracting. I have reasons to   
   say that this approach is wrong. You do not attract people based on how you   
   feel about yourself. You    
   attract them based on what they think you to be. If others think that you are   
   a jerk, they will not be good to you however you feel about yourself. If this   
   is the case, the correct response is not working on your self-esteem but   
   surrounding yourself with    
   the kinds of people who value what you are. That way you will be surrounded by   
   people who esteem you rightfully, whether or not you esteem yourself well. If   
   you are a poet and you are surrounded by people who have no value for poetry,   
   you will not be    
   esteemed well regardless of how well you esteem yourself. You will be esteemed   
   better however if you surround yourself with people who do have value for   
   poetry.   
      
   Now I have been exposed to many people who have such ideas, and any number of   
   them have made all sorts of negative claims about me. Quite simply I have a   
   massive bullshit detector, and these are some of the forms of bullshit that I   
   detect. There are many    
   valid reasons to challenge these ideas. Especially with the issue of   
   self-esteem, the idea has gotten far too big for its merits. Rewarding   
   self-esteem does not make better people; it makes worse people. If you have   
   high standards for yourself you will    
   find it harder to feel good about yourself than if you have low standards for   
   yourself. Rewarding self-esteem rewards low standards; and that means, worse   
   people.   
      
   With the Law of Attraction, we see even worse things. If anything bad happens   
   to you, you have caused it. So then, logically, if a witch who believes such a   
   thing gets burned at the stake, she will have to say that she has brought it   
   about. If a New Age    
   community comes under attack from Islamists, they will have to say that they   
   have caused it. This kind of thinking robs people of ethics and compassion.   
   Which means that it is an evil set of beliefs.   
      
   As for the treatment that you attract, it is not based on how you feel about   
   yourself. It is based on how others see you. Sometimes they would feel like   
   you feel too good about yourself and will want to tear you down. At other   
   times they would feel like    
   you don't value yourself enough and will want to build you up. I have known   
   some amazing people who felt badly about themselves. I did not treat them   
   based on how they felt about themselves, but how I felt about them. I have   
   also known jerks who thought    
   of themselves too well. I likewise did not treat them based on how they felt   
   about themselves, but how I felt about them.   
      
   In short, all of these attitudes have gotten far too big for their merits. And   
   all of them are wrong, for reasons stated above. Not everyone who has bought   
   into such things is an idiot, but even those who are not idiots are deluded.   
   People's treatment of    
   you is not a reflection of what you think about yourself but of what they   
   think about you. Different people attract different things for all sorts of   
   different reasons. And self-esteem is an absolute canard and a concept that   
   degrades the character of    
   mankind.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)