Life Tips Daily

People tend to have very good opinions of themselves, have you noticed that? Coincidentally, other peoples’ opinions of them tend to be very different from their own in direct proportion to how egotistical the person is. But why is that?

Self-esteem is an interesting facet of our psyche which essentially dictates what we think of ourselves. Some people think very highly of themselves, which you would think is the smart thing to do. However, it turns out that this is not usually the case. People who think too highly of themselves are considered to have taken it too far - into the realm of being “egotistical”.

As an egotistical person, one will generally be more concerned about everything to do with oneself than anything to do with anyone else. This aggravates other people, especially if there is bragging involved. Most of the time, the annoyance comes from the fact that the person really isn’t as good and talented and muscular and intelligent and lean and sexy and healthy and successful as they claim to be.

Now things start to get complicated; even if the person is as great as they say they are, people are still put off by it. For a different reason though; bragging upsets people even when it’s not a lie. This is because they’re either jealous or they don’t care. Either way, it’s very important to keep this in mind because knowing when to stop praising yourself is a key to developing successful social relationships.

So okay, we get that bragging and thinking too highly of yourself can get you in trouble, so logically, we could assume that doing the opposite would produce favourable results. Ha, we’d be wrong. Turns out that thinking too little of yourself can also be problematic, especially when you voice it because then people get annoyed with that too. You see the paradox now.

So what can you do? Well, there is a solution. Obviously, there is a middle ground between too much and too little self-esteem. But that middle ground can be a little hard to pin-point. Here, it’s important to introduce a new term: “self-confidence”. It’s not quite the same thing in the way I’m using it because I’m using the term to describe thinking highly of yourself without verbalizing it and upsetting people.

So you can be confident in what you know to be true about yourself, without displaying that aggravating amount of insecurity by trying to make the whole world know about it as well - let your actions speak for you and let other people notice it that way. People naturally admire someone who seems to know where they’re at; someone who’s proud what they’re doing and has enough confidence in it not to be concerned with showing it off.

So be confident instead of self-centred and you will have overcome the Pride Paradox!

The internet is certainly a wonderful place full of interesting opportunities for enrichment and entertainment. Among these, there are so-called “Second Life” games. These wonderful pieces of internet-based software allow you to effectively leave this world and immerse yourself in a virtual alternate dimension where you can pursue just about anything you can in this world, only without ever leaving the comforts of your home.

For those of you not familiar with this - and I’ll use the game aptly called “Second Life” as my example - the basic idea of the game (more of a simulator, really) is that you join up, download the free software and get your free account and then create what’s called an avatar. This avatar is basically a virtual representation of you which you can create, edit, and custom-design to be as close to the real you as you like - or as far from it.

Once you’ve got your avatar, you can begin “playing” around in this world. Among other things, you can chat with people, explore exotic places with them, buy and sell land, attend concerts, build any object you can imagine with their advanced polygon construction tool, open up stores to sell services, and make some good money at it.

That’s right, you heard me correctly, you can make money at it. And I don’t just mean the game’s “Linden” dollars, I’m talking actual, real-world money. How is this possible? Well, Second Life features a thriving online economy which trades millions worth of $US every month in its various marketplaces. This economy is all based on the players and how much they buy and sell. In this way, people can actually win and spend large sums of REAL money in a completely virtual world.

The question then arises…is this a good thing or is it leading to something bad? People have argued that it’s a good way to escape the real world for a while and enjoy the freedom of the world that Second Life can offer, but then there are those who take such things to extremes and try to devote their entire lives to it.

Depending on how open you are to new ideas, this could be either a positive step in the direction of virtual reality systems of the future, or a negative step away from the meaning of life and the value of appreciating a natural existence. I guess time will tell who is right.

For more information on Second Life, visit their site at http://secondlife.com/

I would like to present you all with a short bit of writing which compares the work of good and evil in a strange and somewhat funny way. I wrote it, and it’s not intended to express my opinion necessarily; simply to take a look at the subject in an accessible way.

~*~

It was a dark and stormy night. Beyond that, there wasn’t much remarkable about this setting. In fact, considering it was London, the dark and stormy wasn’t particularly remarkable either.

A casual observer might not even have noticed the short, drenched figure hobbling quietly in what was probably intended to be a straight line down the street. Periodically, the hunched figure broke off its wavering path and walked up to the doors of an apartment where it would produce a paintbrush from the folds of its coat and hastily inscribe a series of concentric circles on the door. Well, may as well be nice and clear about things; no use beating about the bush.

A casual observer was also likely to miss the small tail protruding from the underside of the the dilapidated coat which covered the figure from top to bottom. It would be difficult to say “head to foot” because, with the cloak on, there didn’t seem to be a discernible difference beyond the fact that one area seemed responsible for locomotion. The tail switshed back and forth lazily, occasionally pausing to hover still for a brief second before continuing to bob with the movement.

When it reached the end of the street, the figure pulled out a small device and tapped at it until it made a rewarding electronic ding noise. Seemingly satisfied, it turned briefly to examine the street it had come from, smirked and continued on its way, making sure to look both ways before crossing the street. After all, even demons could be killed in car accidents.

Back on the opposite side of the street, a tall, austere-looking gentleman in a startlingly white suit was making his way along the same path. Well, perhaps a little straighter. Miraculously, the rain seemed to avoid his elegant and well-pressed suit, leaving him quite dry.

Walking up the steps to the first house, the gentleman sighed and opened his briefcase, removing a damp sponge. He used this to meticulously scrub off the red circles, returning the door to its previous dirty brown. Observing his work, the man realized that, ironically, the door had looked better with the circles on. Shaking his head and putting the sponge away, he reminded himself that the owners of the houses would most likely prefer the ugly brown to the alternative if they knew.

In this way, the gentleman in the white successfully erased all of the markings and proceeded into the street where he was hit by a bus turning the corner. In a flash of light, he was gone, and the bus’ startled and worried occupants hardly noticed the small, hunched figure making its way back across the street and along its previous path.

Contrary to popular belief, Evil, it figured, would always triumph over Good because Good was stupid and had trouble keeping up with the times. The hollow sound of its chuckling was heard by no one else as it produced the paint brush and once again marked the doors of the houses on the street.