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Having an alter ego can reduce anxiety, benefit confidence: research

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Re: Having an alter ego can reduce anxiety, benefit confidence: research

#91

True Story: the guy who leads our sales team is a super star named John (legal name). He’s fearless, organized, focused, determined “and Canadian” as he would say. Any way, while he was a rising junior his GF came to the office one day and I heard her call him Jake (nowhere in his name legal name). I asked “who the hell is Jake?” to which she replied “oh, that’s what we call John back home”. I looked at him and he sa…

Actually, dissociation of character is a trait that is rewarded. Although people will claim they want kind-hearted people as lovers, they also very often conveniently ignore what they do for work, and how cruel they have to be, and the partners happily enjoy the shared money (or respect they have from the world). Lovers surely know it: hard to claim Che Guevarra’s wife, Stalin’s wife or Pablo Escobar’s wife didn’t kn…

> Che Guevarra’s wife, Stalin’s wife or Pablo Escobar’s wife

Comparing Che Guevarra and Pablo is totally unfair. Che was a true inspiration, born in a rich family, became a doctor and yet sacrificed his life and fought for what he thought would make the society just. On the other hand Pablo is just a gangster who did not care outside of his family.

Re: Having an alter ego can reduce anxiety, benefit confidence: research

#94

I need an alto ego... Frederick König. I am a man who can sit for hours working productively at his computer. I am a man who is not affected by boredom. I desire nothing more than to sit, and code. My productivity is off the charts and I am being considered for a promotion. I have excellent coding ability and can apply it with ease by sitting, and coding, for hours, and hours.

[deleted]

Re: Having an alter ego can reduce anxiety, benefit confidence: research

#95
It’s a variant of the suggestion often given in therapy and recently popularized by Jordan B Peterson I believe — and no matter what you may think of him as a person, it is a good strategy — “Treat yourself as someone worth taking care of”. Meaning: look at yourself as you would look at your own child, a pet, or anyone you would have the responsibility of looking after. It’s easy to miss meals, not dress yourself well and so on, but you might look at it differently if it was your kid or pet that was hungry. So take care of yourself as if you weren’t you!

The same thing goes with investments. To get over my own sometimes pathological cheapness (a combination of growing up poor and other stuff) I sometimes view myself as a corporation when making purchases: what do I need, are there goals I have that lack materials, what needs to be replaced — then I just sign a blank check to myself as it were and buy the things I need.

In a way, taking care of yourself does become easier when you pretend it isn’t you. Especially if you have issues with caring about “you” in the first place.

Re: Having an alter ego can reduce anxiety, benefit confidence: research

#96
post #70
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is funny, but I think the real insidious reason is that it takes away the "saying your name" psychological advantage.

What's insidious about that, exactly?

What if I want to sell them something back?

Re: Having an alter ego can reduce anxiety, benefit confidence: research

#97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, dissociation of character is a trait that is rewarded. Although people will claim they want kind-hearted people as lovers, they also very often conveniently ignore what they do for work, and how cruel they have to be, and the partners happily enjoy the shared money (or respect they have from the world). Lovers surely know it: hard to claim Che Guevarra’s wife, Stalin’s wife or Pablo Escobar’s wife didn’t kn…

> Che Guevarra’s wife, Stalin’s wife or Pablo Escobar’s wife Comparing Che Guevarra and Pablo is totally unfair. Che was a true inspiration, born in a rich family, became a doctor and yet sacrificed his life and fought for what he thought would make the society just. On the other hand Pablo is just a gangster who did not care outside of his family.

Why would you respect someone for sacrificing and fighting for what they think is just? Osama Bin Laden wasn't too different either. Many Islamic terrorists were engineers before sacrificing their careers and fighting for what they believed in. You're right that they are true inspirations to others, but you seem to imply that's a good thing. Gangsters are obviously also a true inspiration to others (hence glamorization of gangster life) but not really good for society.

I suspect that what you really mean is Guevara fought for what you think is just. But that's a weaker statement.

Re: Having an alter ego can reduce anxiety, benefit confidence: research

#98

I need an alto ego... Frederick König. I am a man who can sit for hours working productively at his computer. I am a man who is not affected by boredom. I desire nothing more than to sit, and code. My productivity is off the charts and I am being considered for a promotion. I have excellent coding ability and can apply it with ease by sitting, and coding, for hours, and hours.

Is that the person you desire to be?

Re: Having an alter ego can reduce anxiety, benefit confidence: research

#99
post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Che Guevarra’s wife, Stalin’s wife or Pablo Escobar’s wife Comparing Che Guevarra and Pablo is totally unfair. Che was a true inspiration, born in a rich family, became a doctor and yet sacrificed his life and fought for what he thought would make the society just. On the other hand Pablo is just a gangster who did not care outside of his family.

Why would you respect someone for sacrificing and fighting for what they think is just? Osama Bin Laden wasn't too different either. Many Islamic terrorists were engineers before sacrificing their careers and fighting for what they believed in. You're right that they are true inspirations to others, but you seem to imply that's a good thing. Gangsters are obviously also a true inspiration to others (hence glamorizati…

> I suspect that what you really mean is Guevara fought for what you think is just. But that's a weaker statement.

You might have mistaken me as a supporter of communism. I don't support communism. Osama Bin Laden exploited the religion for his personal gain. His goal is to become the caliph which is roughly equivalent to being the single military leader for entier Islam as said in the quoran. He did not bother about the people or had any ideology of his own.

Che did not exploit religion. He is an atheist, was supporter of women rights, he understood the value of education and setup schools for his young troops even during the guerrilla warfare. He knew he will not be the leader of cuba and Fidel Castro would be the leader of the country and yet he fought for what he thought would make the society just.

Che thought deeply, was highly intelligent and had the balls to sacrifice his life for what he thought would make the society better.

Gangsters are one who have balls to do violent things but do not care about society.

Re: Having an alter ego can reduce anxiety, benefit confidence: research

#100
I was watching the D-A-L anime the other day and thinking about this character

https://date-a-live.fandom.com/wiki/Natsumi_Kyouno

who has the power to become anything so decides to become what a kid would think is "flashy" and "cool" to cover up her own feelings of vulnerability.

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