People who consider themselves socially undesirable may turn to defenses when
they hear that someone is attracted to them. They might tell themselves thea d m i r e ri sj u s tb e i n gp o l i t eo rm a y b ei ss c h e m i n gt og e ts o m e t h i n gf r o mt h e m .
Sometimes we defend ourselves from threatening observations we make
about ourselves. Each of us on occasion acts in ways that fall short of ourpersonal standards. Perhaps you have cheated a friend out of money, said
some hurtful things to a loved one, or lied to take advantage of an acquain-
tance. Even fully functioning individuals sometimes disappoint themselves. Inmost cases these people acknowledged their shortcomings and try to learn
from their mistakes. More commonly, people distort the situation ( “She really
shouldn ’t get that upset by what I said ”) or deny the facts ( “I didn ’t know the
money was his ”).
Distortion and denial often succeed in the short run by reducing anxiety. But
this relief comes at a price. Each distortion takes us further and further away from
experiencing life fully. In severe cases, people replace reality with fantasy. A man
may think of himself as the world ’s most desirable bachelor when in fact there are
no objective reasons to draw this conclusion. A student with poor grades might
convince herself that she is a genius whose thoughts are simply too sophisticated
for her instructors to understand. But a t some point the gap between self-concept
and reality is so large that even our defens es are inadequate. In this case, people
experience what Rogers called a state of disorganization . The protective barrier
against threatening information colla pses, and the result is extreme anxiety.
Conditions of Worth and Unconditional Positive Regard
Why is it so difficult to accept and incorporate certain information into our
self-concept? Rogers ’answer is that most of us grow up in an atmosphere of
conditional positive regard . As children, our parents and caregivers provide
love and support. However, they rarely do this unconditionally. Rather,
most parents love their children as long as the children do what is expected
of them. When parents disapprove of their children ’s behavior, they withhold
their love. The children get the message they are loved, but only when they do
what their parents want. The positive regard the children need and want is
conditional upon their behavior.
As a result of this conditional positive regard, children learn to abandon
their true feelings and desires and t o accept only the parts of themselves
their parents deem appropriate. In short, they deny their weaknesses and
faults and become less and less aware of themselves. Unfortunately, we con-tinue this process as adults. We incorpo rate into our self-concept only those
aspects that are likely to win the approval of significant people in our lives.
Instead of acknowledging and expressi ng feelings others might not like, we
deny or distort them. As a result, we lose touch with our feelings and be-
come less fully functioning.
The antidote for this self-defeating sequence is unconditional positive
regard . When we experience unconditional positive regard, we know we will
be accepted and loved no matter what we do. Parents should communicate
to their children that although they don ’t approve of a specific behavior,
they will always love and accept them. Under these conditions, children no282 CHAPTER 11 The Humanistic Approach