Self-love without self-respect is play money.

How much does that Participant Ribbon mean to you?   If you earn it, you know it’s real.  It doesn’t matter because someone gave you a ribbon, it matters because you achieved your goal.  (The corollary:  since attaining the objective is its own reward, don’t work toward a goal that doesn’t matter to you.)

I see a lot of people with incredibly high self-esteem and almost zero self-respect.  Many of them don’t miss it (too busy basking in the love,) but the system is out of balance and falls apart in times of crisis.  T’ain’t healthy, in my opinion, much less practical.