the principle of motivation by confidence; the degree of his motivation by fear is the degree of his mental illness.
To the extent that a man lacks self-esteem, he lives negatively and defensively. When he chooses his particular
values and goals, his primary motive is, not to afford himself a positive enjoyment of existence, but to defend
himself against anxiety, against painful feelings of inadequacy, self-doubt, and guilt.
If a man's life is in physical danger, say, if he suffers from some major disease, his primary concern in such an
emergency situation is not the pursuit of enjoyment but the removal of the danger, i.e., regaining his health, re-
establishing the context in which the pursuit of enjoyment will again be possible and appropriate. But to the man
devoid of self-esteem, life is, in effect, a chronic emergency; he is always in danger—psychologically. He never
reaches normality, he never feels free for the enjoyment of life, because his method combating the danger consists,
not of dealing with it rationally, not of working to remove it, but of seeking to persuade himself that it does not
exist. Since A is A, since facts are facts and are not to be wiped out by self-made blindness, he can never succeed;
but most of his evasions, repressions, and self-defeating actions are aimed at this goal.
Fear is the ruling element in such a man's psychology. Just as fear rules him psycho-epistemologically,
undercutting the clarity of his perception, distorting his judgments, restricting his cognitive ambition, and driving
him to ever-wider evasions—so fear rules him motivationally, subverting his normal value-development,
sabotaging his proper growth, leading him toward goals that promise to support his pretense at efficacy, driving
him to passive conformity or hostile aggressiveness or autistic withdrawal, to any path that will protect his pseudo-
self-esteem against reality.
Values chosen in this manner may be termed ''defense-values." A defense-value is one motivated by fear and aimed
at supporting a pseudo-self-esteem. It is experienced, in effect, as a means of survival, as a substitute for rationality.
It is an anti-anxiety device.
Such a value is unhealthy, not necessarily by virtue of its nature, but by virtue of the motivation for choosing it.
The value itself may not be irrational; what is irrational is the reason for its selection. Productive work, for instance,
is a rational value; but escaping into