The Self-Confident Personality

[joe1776]

The ability to adapt to changing environments is key to survival. For all animal species, the key to being able to survive and thrive rests with the ability to adapt to changing environments. Intelligent people with self-confident attitudes should be able to adapt well whether born male or female, of any race, in any culture, and in any era. Intelligence is very useful because it's the most adaptable of human traits.

Human behavior is mostly habitual. Someone or something triggers our reaction. How we react depends on our attitude toward that someone or something. Attitudes can change quickly. Example: If Tom's new neighbor seems friendly, Tom's attitude toward him will be positive and his behavior toward him friendly. If Tom later finds out that his neighbor has a history as a child molester, his attitude will change to negative instantly.

Personality change by the displacement method. Personalities are comprised of attitudes the way that paragraphs are comprised of words. Since our brains can't hold conflicting attitudes about the same someone or something, adopting positive attitudes will automatically displace negative attitudes.

The positive attitudes of self-confident people about their own self-worth:

-- They see all people as equal in human worth
-- They have no need to prove themselves superior in human worth to others
-- They cannot be made to feel inferior in human worth
-- They are unconcerned with their reputations within their social groups
-- They can lead or follow others if necessary but they are independent by nature

The positive attitudes of self-confident people about moral choices:

-- They regard conscience (moral intuition) as their only moral authority
-- They reject group pride and support policies that benefit the global community
-- They tell the truth unless the truth causes harm to innocent people
-- Faced with a moral dilemma, they cause the least harm or do the most good
-- They see the immoral acts of others as sickness and not evil

The attitudes of self-confident people about personal relationships:
-- They love unconditionally
-- They don't want to manipulate others and won't be manipulated
-- They seek 50/50 partnerships in all relationships

The attitudes of self-confident people about life:
-- They strive to maximize kindness and minimize unkindness
-- They have no need to own more stuff than they need to survive comfortably
-- They refuse fear, worry, anger, self-pity and the tendency to blame others
-- They ignore verbal bullies and use force to defend against physical bullies
-- They remain calm when under attack
-- They play the hand dealt for the best possible result
-- They form alliances to cooperate in worthy causes
-- They compete for survival when necessary

Smart, arrogant people often put on a self-confident mask. Even psychologists are sometimes confused between genuine self-confidence and arrogance. Arrogant people learn to act like they have self-confidence but they want others to notice it. So, they exaggerate. They make it a little too obvious. People with genuine self-confidence seem to have nothing to prove, to themselves or anyone else. So, we might not recognize their personality type right away.

Comments will be welcomed.

 

[Sirona]

I'm sceptical about the whole psychology stuff because to me it is like a transplantation of the Catholic confession to a secular world, implying that confessing your wrongs to a therapist is good for you and should be done often. I also feel that in many psychological models, one strength you have always goes along with a deficiency in another part of the spectrum, so regardless of where your personality structure fits in the model, you can never "win". One person's "self-confidence" is "arrogance" in another person's eyes.

 

[joe1776]

I'm sceptical about the whole psychology stuff because to me it is like a transplantation of the Catholic confession to a secular world, implying that confessing your wrongs to a therapist is good for you and should be done often. I also feel that in many psychological models, one strength you have always goes along with a deficiency in another part of the spectrum, so regardless of where your personality structure fits in the model, you can never "win". One person's "self-confidence" is "arrogance" in another person's eyes.

I share your doubts about psycho-therapy (talk therapy) but for different reasons which I wrote about in another thread in this forum.

Because individuals can be biased, the opinions of groups are usually more trustworthy. If one of Henry's acquaintances describes his behavior as self-confident but 15 others describe him as arrogant, the arrogant label is probably justified.