Lorenzo D. Leonard
Because life is dominated by external and material value, the traditional means to satisfy this basic human instinct are simply not enough to fulfill the internal need to feel relevant and credible. Satisfying this basic instinct will also require extending a great effort to cripple or destroy the credibility, relevance, and value of another person or group. The competition to climb the ladder of success is quite crowded, and inequities and inequalities are formed favoring one class, race, ethnicity, religion, and gender over another.Though the achievement is distorted, credibility and relevance easily translate into power and influence. The individual or group unable to achieve an equivalent experience will find only one option available to process the disappointment; experience becomes the lone material for developing a self-perception. With this being the only option, self-perception will primarily reflect deflated information. By educating to the merits of character, the individual gains genuine and stable material to develop self-perception and establishes authentic credibility and relevance that does not have to be proven. Traits such as integrity, vulnerability, and transparency come to have real meaning and purpose, rather than mere expression.
