Dan Prendergast, M.A.
Because people usually don’t seek out a therapist when times are good, we don’t frequently talk about using REBT principles in the context of successes and victories. However, just because a person’s situation is favorable does not mean that they are not capable of holding dysfunctional beliefs that lead to self-defeating behaviors and emotions such as excessive pride. Ellis described the “elegant solution” as a new belief that works for a person in good or bad circumstances. In the spirit of the elegant solution, this week I’d like to discuss how to use REBT to deal with, and hopefully maintain, success.
When faced with success, it is healthy to take note of your good performance and feel happiness and contentment. These are functional emotions which will probably motivate you to recognize and repeat strategies that worked well, and will probably promote good relationships with others. On the other hand, unhealthy responses relating to performing well might be described as excessive pride, megalomania, inflated self-esteem or intoxication with one’s own awesomeness. These are probably enjoyable in a sense, and I can see why very few people seek therapy for excessive pride. However, excessive pride is not very functional as it can interfere with interpersonal relationships and sabotage success. Excessive pride frequently leads people to excessive confidence in their decision-making or opinions. Making matters worse, excessive pride leads people to depreciate and dismiss others (who could be right!) and to disregard information that is inconsistent with their outlook. Prideful people run the risk of being badly surprised by realities that they had previously written off, and being the last to realize their own mistakes.
The fastest way to cultivate unhealthy pride is to think dysfunctionally about success. This dysfunctional thinking usually starts with the belief that some people are worth more than others, and that a person’s worth can be measured by arbitrary criteria such as wealth, career success, or association with noteworthy people or organizations. People who hold these beliefs can easily conclude that because they have been objectively successful they are therefore more worthy as people. From this place of inflated self-esteem, the most important thing usually becomes maintaining one’s heightened worth rather than continued good performance. Prideful people tend to be hypervigilant against showing human fallibility, which to them often represents a drastic drop in their personal worth. When setbacks do occur, the philosophy that feeds excessive pride (good performance = very high self-worth) can lead to depression (poor performance = very low self-worth).
Preventing success from “getting to your head” is relatively straightforward, though many are reluctant to surrender their awesomeness intoxication. First, it is helpful to challenge the notion that people are ratable, instead cultivating the belief that all people (yes, even you) are inherently worthwhile, too complicated to rate globally and unrankable in terms of human worth. Second, it is helpful to start rating performance, behaviors, traits or other outcomes separately from the global worth of yourself or others. If you are able to embrace this philosophy you will be better equipped to enjoy your success without excessive pride. You will probably also be able to handle your failures better, since you will be capable of critically evaluating and changing your actions without damning yourself.