Learning self-reliance saved my life, and it could save yours too. Think about it: our external sources of reliance, that is, what we rely on other than our sole selves, nearly always fall victim to the universal laws of impermanence. In simpler words, we can’t rely on a lot in this world because of how nothing stays truly permanent. Now, there are many external things in our lives that we rely on, and admittedly, it’s impossible to go through life without relying on at least some of them. Obviously, we have our basic external needs like food, water, and shelter, but what about the more intricate, emotional needs? I believe that human connection and our inevitable dependence on other people is both what complicates and enriches our lives. Though human connection may be fleeting, it remains an external source of reliance that we cannot dodge. This aspect of dependence intrigues me, as it seems to be a universal experience to have been disappointed, abandoned, or mistreated by the people that we choose to rely on. The regret over trusting someone that was ultimately unreliable is a familiar feeling to the masses, and many that I personally know often wish that in the turmoil of these situations, they could simply rely on themselves. They go as far to despise their need for human connection, for it is through these relationships where we are at our most emotionally vulnerable. At one point, I felt the same bitter feeling after losing the connections I had with irreplaceable people in my life. I tortured myself by wondering why I couldn’t just be reliant on myself. Why did I blindly trust in my relationships, assuming the inherent good in those around me, just to have that trust shattered? Thus, a more insightful question arose: How can I accept my dependency on others while retaining my autonomy as an individual? How can I truly learn… self-reliance?

Now, I didn’t automatically go on some noble quest to search for an answer to this query. Much less, could I even articulate these thoughts when I first started having them at just 13 years old. At this point in my life, my self-esteem was practically at the rock bottom, and I would go as far to say that I mostly lived for the sake of others. Therefore, my dependency on others was greatly amplified. This made it so that, when I was faced with the shock of people leaving my life, I was defenseless. I know that many people echo the same sort of story, and factors that can usually be tied back to a lack of selfhood or confidence in one’s self often affect how our dependence on others can hit unhealthy extremes. It was in this state that I wandered aimlessly and unknowingly into the answer to all my problems. It was actually through reading Michael Schur’s How to be Perfect, which was pretty much a hilarious, yet insightful, attempt by the comedian to understand philosophical principles that strive to act as the highest of moral standards. I distinctly remember being pulled into the novel after I read the title of the first chapter, which was, and I quote, “Should I Punch My Friend in the Face for No Reason?” As you can see, this book was clearly a blessing in a… very, very heavy disguise. Anyway, Schur goes on to address many philosophical principles that all take their shot at perfecting human judgment, but one of these really resonated with me in the context of my question…

So, let’s discuss Aristotle's concept of moderation. In simple terms, Aristotle listed moderation as the essence of moral excellence– that finding a perfect average when building our characters could theoretically create a morally perfect human being. Think of a balancing scale. A virtue, a perfect point of moral excellence, will be at the middle of this scale. However, on one end of the scale, there’s a deficiency, an overall lack of what that virtue is supposed to be. On the other end, you have an excess, an overall surplus of what the virtue is supposed to be. Let's consider the virtue of courage. If we have a deficiency in courage, we fall into cowardice; in the same manner, if we have an excess of courage, it turns into rashness. Our job as morally sound people is to avoid deficiencies and excesses, or extremes, as much as possible, and instead work towards embodying virtues. Now, before I go any further, of course I’ll have to address the glaring flaw in this concept: how in the world do we even identify this perfect point of moderation? After all, isn’t everyone’s view of moderation biased? My answer to this is that you are completely correct. There are bound to be errors in evaluating what moderation truly is, especially within the limitless contexts that you can put it in. However, I argue that it is through these errors that we shape our idea of the most effective manner of moderation, and I hope to share some of my mistakes that I have made to help others get closer to embodying this virtue. Thus, through my extensive experiences and journey to become self-reliant, I find it appropriate to opinionatedly– and as objectively as possible– apply the concept of moderation to the virtue of self-reliance. Furthermore, we can deduce what the extremes of self-reliance are in order to tell us what to avoid when working towards such an invaluable virtue. Let’s set the characteristic of healthy self-reliance (i.e. self-reliance practiced in moderation) as our perfect point on our scale. Take a look at the visual below– see where I’m going with this?

When there is a deficiency of self-reliance in one’s life, one tends to develop an excessive reliance on others, making it easy to walk straight into developing a doormat mentality. A doormat almost never communicates their own needs or desires out of fear of losing or disappointing the very people they choose to excessively depend on. In essence, being a doormat teaches you to ALWAYS put the needs of others before your own. From personal experience, relying heavily on other people is a risky game to play, as it is easy to fall into the trap of basing your worth off of your services to others. When you begin to rely on people to such an extent, it’s easy for you to be taken advantage of, rid of your self-esteem, and ultimately become a doormat for others to walk all over. Now, if you are like me, you may think that possessing the selflessness that a doormat has is somewhat of a noble cause. I even thought that I was on the right track by being a selfless person– that I was acting like one of those heroes you see in movies that just “beautifully” sacrifice without thinking. And yes, I was partially right in that sense, that helping others is a beautiful thing to commit to. However, the problem manifested when I began to struggle to rely on myself and prioritized others almost every chance that I got; my problem came when I did not exercise moderation. Allow me to pose a few questions to those who resonate with this extreme.

1. What will happen when you burn out?

2. What will happen when people start to take advantage of you?

Let’s address burnout for a moment. We’ve all gone through it, as unfortunately, all of us have our limitations. However, a common pattern that I have observed in people who lean towards this extreme is that they often don’t think twice before sacrificing. After a while, their commitments and obligations to others begin to build until they are inevitably stretched thin. People who possess this mindset often never stop to think about themselves, as it is their instinct to help someone out in distress, even if it takes the majority of their time and energy. They often highly value their services to others, which can quickly turn problematic. The sacrifices they make may seem harmless, but the sad truth is that time truly reveals how much you lose in the process. This reality hit me when I realized that the bottom line is, not everyone is going to truly value your efforts or sacrifices. I started noticing this when I began to make myself known as a reliable person to everyone around me. Some were mindful and caring people who always made sure that they were asking for help at an appropriate occasion and frequency, while others had absolutely no shame in taking advantage of my efforts as much as possible in order to get ahead or quickly solve their issues. While this was an important realization, as it exposed big flaws in my extreme mindset, it was still a shallow one, as I was still focusing on the reaction of others instead of how much these situations would drain me. As I started exploring more of this mindset’s impact on me, I went further and ultimately realized the truth of that cliché saying that I never really took seriously: you can’t help others until you help yourself. I know, I know, you’ve heard it a billion times, I get it. At one point, I even scoffed at this saying, as when I offered people help in this extreme mentality, it had an overwhelmingly positive effect on them. So, I was stumped. What helped me get out of it was to think of this in a way that emphasized the value of service to others:

You are not helping people in the most effective manner if you are not in the best physical, mental, or emotional state you could be in. Even if it seems like you are having a positive impact on those around you, you could end up hurting more than helping. You could quite literally do the opposite of what you intend if you do not first assess what YOUR capacity is. Instead of blindly sacrificing left and right, ask yourself: Am I in the best state to address the problems of someone else right now? Do I physically, mentally, or emotionally have the capacity to address this? Will addressing this cut into important commitments in my life? If you answer yes to any of these, maybe you should re-evaluate the frequency with which you help others, and instead focus your time and energy on taking care of yourself! If you experience burnout-- which you absolutely will if you mindlessly sacrifice to others-- you simply cannot help others as effectively as possible. It is absolutely essential to start putting yourself first and rebuilding your selfhood in order to prevent any harm to yourself AND the people around you. With this in mind, let’s address the main point that I’m trying to make here that will further emphasize the individual self:

3. What ultimately happens when you start to excessively seek validation from other people?

The only power that we have in our lives is defining ourselves. It’s as simple as that. When you go out seeking validation from others, you are giving that infinitely valuable power to someone else. No matter how trustworthy or good that person may be, you simply cannot give that overbearing power to anyone other than yourself. When you continuously give parts of yourself to other people, such as your time, effort, advice, insight, or whatever it may be, you are left with no self to express as your own. How can one rely on oneself if they have no self to rely on? The fate of someone with a doormat mentality is to live an existence that is shallow and meaningless, for YOU are the one that is supposed to give your life meaning, not others. Even if your intent is to improve the lives of people around you, it is impossible to do so if you stretch yourself as thinly as this extreme requires you to. To let others define you to such a large extent is absolutely unacceptable, which is why I urge readers that resonate with this extreme to start building a strong sense of self-reliance. To rely on yourself ultimately means that you get to define yourself, take your powers back from the hands of others, and learn to fight for yourself instead of allowing yourself to get walked over. Once you finally develop self-reliance, it will prevent yourself from being taken advantage of once more. Perhaps the most valuable takeaway from recovering from this mentality is that instead of basing your worth on your services to others, you will live a life where your worth is inherent. Once you achieve this mentality, there are very few things in life that can prevent you from succeeding. 

What I find interesting about egotism is that it often comes from the same place as the doormat mentality but in a different manifestation. The foundations of an overinflated ego can ironically be traced back to a lack of self-confidence and selfhood in one’s life, which is exactly where doormat mentality comes from! However, egotism comes from a “fake it ‘till you make it” mindset, in which one feels the need to brag or lie about their accomplishments in order to feel better about their insecurities. Before I get into egotism, I must first say that we ALL have some work to do with our egos. Looking back, even when I was more associated with doormat mentality, I still recognized certain egotistical behaviors in myself that were just as harmful (note that you may experience both of these extremes, even if you lean more towards one than the other). When people see the word “egotistical,” I’ve noticed that they almost automatically deny associating with such a thing, as they consider it with pretty much the same weightage as being a selfish, insufferable, and bad person. I am here to assure the reader that this is not the case at all, as being egotistical can manifest in much more relevant and smaller ways. For example, do you have trouble acknowledging or facing mistakes? Do you lie to make yourself seem better than you really are (most commonly through social media)? Do you put up a false self because you have doubt or shame in your true self? Believe it or not, these can be classified as egotistical behaviors. It’s not necessarily what we stereotypically think of when we think of an egotistical person, which focuses more on incessant bragging and arrogance, but rather an exaggeration of one’s self from a place of deep insecurity or false sense of importance. These people take self-reliance and overinflate it, relying entirely on the false self that they have created instead of acknowledging their own faults at face value. Before I dive into egotism, I felt the need to warn the reader not to automatically deny having these characteristics, especially because being egotistical is so demonized in society today. Instead, I urge them to recognize these behaviors, as this is the greatest first step that you can take. 

When there is an excess of self-reliance in one’s life, it is frighteningly easy to become an egotistical person. If one begins to rely on themselves too much, they begin to only listen to their own definition of themselves, leaving absolutely no room for growth or consideration of rational, constructive criticism from the people around them. Falling into egotism teaches you to only consider your agenda, feelings, and views when making decisions. Furthermore, it often creates a false sense of self that one must lie to live up to. Egotism is a prime example of how warped your perception of the self can truly be if you overindulge in the idea of self-reliance. A person who plays into egotism completely isolates themselves from the criticisms of others, leading to an exaggeration of their accomplishments to further dodge their shortcomings. From these observations, it’s safe to say that egotism is most strongly linked to a lack of self-awareness and clarity in one’s life, which can be extremely detrimental to personal growth. After all, it is through our shortcomings in which we learn in the first place. It’s easy to fall into this pit of egotism, as I’ve closely observed it in the people around me and have learned to stop myself from falling into it. The cycle is as follows: with this predisposed inability to acknowledge their faults, one exaggerates their successes, grows in internal insecurity, creates a gaping conflict between their false and true selves, and it eventually becomes so hard to keep it up that they eventually crumble from the inner insecurity and lies that they feed themselves. This cycle can ultimately destroy a person, and it becomes extremely difficult to work towards relying on oneself if one cannot even perceive themselves in an accurate manner. To further emphasize what falling into egotism does, allow me to pose a few questions:

1. What happens when an egotistical person makes a mistake?

From observing the many people I interact with, there is one common denominator in those who associate with this extreme: they struggle to learn and grow. This is undoubtedly linked to the aforementioned inability to acknowledge their faults, and based on my observations, it can prove to be extremely harmful to a person. So, what exactly happens when an egotistical person makes a mistake? The most common response I have seen is denial. Sometimes, it’s comparable to a childlike instinct to deny rather than a rational, conscious choice of denial. When confrontation occurs, the egotistical person has the idea of their “flawless” selves so deeply engraved in their mind that they shut out anything that may contradict it. The egotistical person dodges criticism; the self-reliant person craves it. I notice this behavior more often in my high school peers and younger children, as an immature understanding of mistakes can heavily contribute to this tendency. The self-reliant and mature person will understand that mistakes are challenges to improve yourself, not something that you deny or shy away from confronting. In most cases, the egotistical shy away from confrontation because they fear change instead of embracing it. It all loops back to the contradicting insecurities for those that associate with this extreme– they never embrace change, either from the childlike misconception that everything negative comes from change, or because deep down they fear that they aren’t good enough to be capable of it. What I find interesting is that most egotistical people outwardly feel entitled to themselves, yet simultaneously hold an internal feeling of hopelessness and stagnation. To break out of this mentality, the first step is to develop a strong sense of awareness and have an open mind. Don’t be the person who makes a mistake, then lives in denial of it. If you do, the same mistakes will come back to bite you an infinite amount of times, creating further turmoil in your life and preventing you from achieving internal peace or reliance on yourself.

2. What happens to their priorities?

Very few things in this world are more confusing than the priorities of an egotistical person. This aspect of egotism is extremely harmful for a multitude of reasons, the most essential of which is that we act correspondingly to our priorities. You might think that the egotistical person puts their first priority as themselves, but I find a more apt description to be that the egotistical person puts their first priority as whatever brings them the most pleasure. There is a small nuance in these statements, which is vital in understanding the behaviors of an egotistical person. I previously touched upon prioritizing oneself as a healthy behavior in which you assess your own capacity before taking on responsibilities. However, the simple statement of always prioritizing happiness has alarmingly detrimental undertones. If we live by the simple value of chasing what brings us happiness, our growth as individuals will suffer because of it. Think of it this way: prioritizing yourself means prioritizing your well-being, which is made up of many dimensions, only one of which is happiness. Excessively prioritizing only your happiness can lead to an imbalance in your well-being and can even disrupt other dimensions of yourself. In contrast to people who possess a doormat mentality, people who indulge in egotism often take the healthy saying, “prioritize yourself over others,” in the excessive direction to justify their pleasurable, yet not necessarily healthy, decisions. In simple terms, sometimes we need to do things that bring us displeasure or comfort in order to grow as people. I would go as far as saying that moments of discomfort have the greatest impact on the shapes of our characters. Excessively chasing something with a goal that is as narrow and shallow as happiness in the greater context of your well-being greatly contributes to the warped mindset of an egotistical person, as it fuels the tendency to shy away from mistakes and may even act as a justification to the lies that a person may tell themselves in order to keep themselves stable.

The part that most frustrates me about people who associate with this extreme is how they prioritize their relationships in their lives. Instead of forming meaningful and lasting relationships, they often chase shallow and temporary ones. Why is this so? Well, the simplest way to put it is that all meaningful relationships require a lot of effort and maintenance, while shallower ones require much less effort and serve as simply a transactional relationship for mutual benefit. I believe that this is one of the greatest flaws in the mindset of an egotistical person, as prioritizing transactional relationships makes it much harder to form meaningful connections that people desire. Furthermore, for an egotistical person, it is much harder to form lasting relationships when the people who truly care about you hold you accountable for your mistakes and push you to improve as a person. The egotistical person will surround themselves with shallow relationships, not just because it’s easier to maintain, but because these people almost allow them to indulge in their flaws without any challenges to improve or grow. Thus, any potential chances of lasting relationships are diminished once the person starts to challenge them to improve, tying back to the unhealthy tendency of shying away from change.

I urge those who see these behaviors in themselves to reflect on their priorities and relationships in their lives. I find that the most effective way to make good decisions and develop well-formed priorities is to analyze both sides of the situation. Ask yourself: how will this affect me AND the people around me? This is the most effective way to combat an unhealthy prioritization of your happiness, as it is not only more considerate of others, but it also challenges you to improve further dimensions of your well-being, not just your happiness. Furthermore, one should learn to develop lasting relationships with people by not shying away when they confront your flaws, especially when it seems to be a recurring issue. I know that sometimes I and many others would take rational criticism as a personal attack, but developing an open mind allowed me to take my criticisms and view them more positively as a challenge. It goes without saying that some criticism is bound to be mean-spirited and illogical, so it is important to exercise good judgment on what criticisms you choose to act on. However, aside from that exception, opening up your mind to rational criticisms from those around you will both align your priorities and strengthen your relationships, opening up a pathway to a healthier self-reliance that benefits those around you in addition to yourself.

3. How does indulging in egotism ultimately destroy your life?

It is said that “ego makes you overestimate your own abilities and worth, and under-estimate the effort and skill required to achieve your goals.” The most dangerous aspect of egotism by far is the lack of awareness that accompanies it. Your failures may become more consistent, your lack of skill will become more apparent, and the worst part will be that you will have no clue why. Indulging in egotism is just one big lie to yourself in an attempt to cover up shortcomings in your character. However, covering up your mistakes and pretending you are someone that you are not will only lead you further from becoming your best self. It is through facing your mistakes head on in which you work towards building a self that you can fully and truthfully be proud of. Egotism creates a divide between yourself and who you want to be that grows deeper by the day. If you cannot truly differentiate your authentic self from the person that you want to be, and acknowledge the effort that it’s going to take to be your best self, there is no way that you can healthily rely on yourself. I’ve found that a healthy sense of self-reliance can be the most powerful tool in working towards your best self, which is why this mentality is so counterproductive. The idea of egotism is to uphold your reputation as someone that you wish you were, instead of putting in the effort to truly become that person. To effectively work towards embodying a self that you can be proud of, one must be aware of all their flaws, be comfortable with the uncomfortable, and never shy away from their mistakes. Through these steps, you will be able to truly know yourself, and only then can you healthily begin to rely on yourself.

As best shown through the two extremes of doormat mentality and egotism, an unhealthy understanding of self-reliance can stretch to encompass one’s entire character, and that’s no exaggeration. Just look at any person around you, and I guarantee that just by observation, you will be able to associate them with one of the extremes (although the extent will vary). For how relevant these two extremes are on their own, it came as a shock to me that no one tried to relate them back to the middle ground that is self-reliance. As justified previously, these extremes are manifestations of an unhealthy amount of self-reliance that can go in either a direction of an excess or a deficiency. Perhaps the most concise way to link these two very different extremes is that you cannot rely on yourself if your view of yourself is distorted. 

Both extremes seek to distort your perception of self in an excessive manner. If you distort your perception of yourself in one way, it becomes even more likely that you will seek to distort it in other ways due to a lack of self-awareness. Therefore, it’s likely that once you fall into one extreme, it becomes increasingly likely to start exhibiting the other at the same time. An unhealthy understanding of one concept, especially one as important as self-reliance, can cause the combined damage of two extremes if one fails to acknowledge these behaviors and take action against them. This explains why certain mental health issues, which commonly involve misconceptions of the self, are so tricky to overcome. If you cannot be sure of yourself, you lose your anchor to reality, unknowingly drifting into dangerous and sometimes irreversible behaviors. This is why it’s so important to acknowledge your association with these extremes before it reaches a point where it becomes nearly impossible to work your way up to a healthy middle ground.

Now, it’s finally time to address the question that everyone has been waiting for. How do you build self-reliance? How do you work your way up to the healthy middle ground from the pit of extremities? It’s something easier said than done, but it is to build trust in yourself. Allow me to provide the 2 steps that took me from someone who experienced the side effects of both these extremes to effectively building a healthy sense of self-reliance: 

Introducing Order

The biggest thing that I would advise people to do is to introduce order and routine in their lives. It seems somewhat simple to do, but the underlying effect of implementing order in your life is that you slowly start to build trust in yourself. For me, this was working out every day. Each time I worked out, I was holding up a simple commitment that would better myself, which instilled trust and confidence in myself despite any emotional turmoil that I was going through. I could anchor myself down to reality each day by waking up and starting it with a commitment to my well-being. It made me realize something; people really don’t realize the power they have over themselves or their lives. Sometimes, all it really takes is a little bit of discipline to start significantly chipping away at harmful behaviors. Once I made this commitment to myself and held myself accountable for it, I found the motivation to bring this strength into other areas of my life. Soon, I found myself making more commitments to better myself through writing, making music, and further exploring my interests. Instead of hurling insults at myself through my insecurities, I would often refer back to the amazing commitments I had made to myself and stuck with. I found myself turning uncertain, negative emotions into a healthy sense of pride that could be backed up with commitments that were based in reality, not misconceptions or distorted thoughts. For egoists, strong commitments should seek to humble them. In working hard, the egoist should learn how much dedication it takes to truly live up to something you can be proud of, recognizing that lying about it or living in denial is the easy way out. People who associate with the egotistical extreme should commit to building a self that they can truly be proud of, while learning along the way that acknowledging their mistakes will strengthen them beyond belief. Making commitments to yourself grounds you, allowing yourself to keep a clear judgment and eventually logically work your way out of either extreme.

Self-Reflection

Alongside the introduction of order in one’s life, I would make self-reflection an important habit to speed up the process of your personal growth. Self-reflection can strengthen the doormat through their accomplishments, while simultaneously humbling the egotistical for their mistakes. Self-reflection should encompass both the positive and negative aspects of the self in order to truly reach full awareness, which is essential in the process of learning to rely on yourself. This gives you the valuable strength of solving your own issues with a healthy and developed judgment, allowing you to quickly resolve any problems that you may encounter without external help. Paired alongside concrete commitments that can contribute to a positive view of yourself, self-reflection is especially important in more negative scenarios, such as when you make a mistake or if you’re in emotional turmoil. I find that, in the midst of such negativity, it becomes increasingly difficult to think rationally. A self-reliant person will stay calm in such scenarios, yet someone with these extremes will often struggle handling them. They often act impulsively, which is a major contributor in creating more doubt and further instilling  extremes in a person. To overcome this, I’ve observed that there are 3 simple steps you must take yourself through in order to rationally process negative situations and avoid falling deeper into an extreme. As an example, let’s consider the scenario of a friend hurting you through an insult during an argument, and work our way through these stages.

1. Why am I feeling this way?

This stage is especially important because if you cannot answer this question, you are most likely overwhelmed by emotion and will need time in order to address it to the best of your ability. In these situations, simplicity is important to cling to until you can grasp a greater understanding of the situation. Therefore, the answer to this question should be as simple as possible. In our example, a good answer to this question would be, “I feel this way because of what my friend said to me.” This question brings a good level of awareness into the situation, which will be important in accurately interpreting the next few questions.

2. What negative effect has this had on me?

This question is more targeted towards those with a doormat mentality, as it allows them to truly think about the harm done to themselves instead of their usual behavior of downplaying or dismissing it. Use the awareness from the last question to think as objectively as possible about this one and try to explain it to yourself with greater detail. Try to phrase it as a cause and effect to form the foundation of an understanding, then try to elaborate from there (“when ___ happened, it made me ___”). In the example given, you could focus on what exactly your friend said that struck a chord within you. At the beginning of any situation, an emotionally mature person would always give the other person the benefit of the doubt unless harmful intent has been made clear. In the meantime, build your perspective in the clearest way that you can.

3. What negative effect has this had on others?

This question is more targeted towards those with egotistical behaviors, and it will likely pull them out of their behavior to impulsively deny any wrongdoing. It also provides a place for ways to improve and recognize any harmful behaviors that need to be fixed. Many from both extremes also have the tendency to play the victim instead of acknowledging the possible harm done to others, which is why this step is essential in bringing clarity to the situation. In other words, consider whether your feelings in the last question were truly rational when given the full context of the situation. In the example given, perhaps your actions may have triggered the insult. Although it doesn’t excuse what your friend said, it’s important to acknowledge any possible wrongdoing you did as well, especially for those that associate with the egotistical extreme. It’s important to consider the feelings of others instead of automatically invalidating them, as doing so would excuse you from taking accountability for any wrongdoing; thus, you wouldn’t learn or grow from such situations.

Such a balanced way of thinking is extremely important in cultivating a healthy sense of self-reliance. Since self-reliance is an inherent balance, it makes sense that in order for it to develop, it requires a much broader perspective than living through a singular perspective of a certain extreme. I’ve found that many continue to associate with extremes simply because they do not acknowledge it in themselves, for believing in such a twisted version of yourself requires that you twist the world around you to fit your narrative. I wrote this not just to share my own experiences, but to hopefully bring awareness to people about how to get closer to being their best selves– selves that they can learn to understand and have control over. The most harmful part of these extremes is that they take your true self away from you. They take away the control that holds your life together, the control that renders you as truly human. What is self-reliance, if your sense of self is taken away or distorted? It’s meaningless. Don’t let these extremes be an opposition in the journey to be your best self.