Self-image

Self-image

  By Tony Compolo 

A friend of mine has an adorable four-year-old
daughter. She is bright, and she is talkative. If
tryouts were being held for a modern-day Shirley
Temple, I think she would win, hands down.

One night there was a violent thunderstorm. The
lightning flashed and the thunder rumbled--it was one
of those terrifying storms that forces everyone to stop
and tremble a bit. My friend ran upstairs to his
daughter's bedroom to see if she was frightened and to
assure her that everything would be all right. He got
to her room and found her standing on the windowsill,
spread-eagled against the glass. When he shouted, "What
are you doing?" she turned away from the flashing
lightening and happily reported, "I think that God is
trying to take my picture."

Why don't most people feel that important--that good
about themselves? Why don't most people like themselves
as much as that little girl likes herself? Why are so
many people down on themselves, and why do some even
hate themselves?

I find that there is not too much correlation between
people's circumstances and accomplishments and their
self-concepts. I know people who definitely are
socially successful, having achieved a significant
number of worthwhile things in their lives, and who
despise themselves. Contrariwise, I know others who by
societal standards have not accomplished much at all,
but who think themselves as worthwhile and valuable.

Tony Campolo in John Van Diest, "Answers to Life's Most
Perplexing Problems," Multnomah, 1998, p. 166.