Vanity is the desire to impress others or arrogance

What is vanity

Vivid examples of vanity can be found in children's fairy tales, classical literary works, the Bible and other sacred texts. Manifestations of this quality of character are expressed in political leaders, pop stars, and film actors.

To imagine an arrogant person, you need to remember fairy-tale characters and real personalities:

• Snow White's evil stepmother, ready to do anything to eliminate competitors for the title of "Most Fair";
• Lucifer is the sinless son of the morning star, who imagines himself equal to God;
• Khlestakov from The Inspector General;
• Napoleon Bonaparte;
• Adolf Gitler.

The girl can't admire herself

Pride and pride in society are forgiven for political leaders, actors, musicians, and fashion models. Celebrities are a reference point for an ordinary person, which means they are better than others and have the right to superiority. Psychology gives several detailed explanations of what vanity is:

• This is a person’s craving for recognition, praise, glory. He wants to be the center of attention, to be talked about, to be envied. Often the feeling of one’s greatness goes against logic; the individual thinks that all his actions are justified.
• This is a search for evidence of one's own superiority over others. Instead of personal growth and development, a person chooses self-deception. He humiliates others in order to look more beautiful, stronger, smarter in his own eyes.

The causes of high self-esteem are associated with unsolved mental problems in childhood. Due to an excess or lack of parental love and attention, the child develops inadequate self-esteem (overestimated or underestimated). Inflated self-esteem forces a person to react aggressively to criticism, seek flattery and praise, belittle other people's merits, and compare himself with other people. Low self-esteem is associated with humiliation and self-criticism, which is why an inferiority complex develops.

Lack of self-confidence prompts a person to seek approval from others, to expect compliments and positive feedback from people.

Absolution of sins: what is it called and why, priest

Forgiveness of sins in Orthodoxy is called the Sacrament of Confession.
Priests and bishops listen to those who have sinned, through whom God grants forgiveness to sincerely repentant people. Many people are embarrassed by the need to tell shameful things about themselves to a stranger. Is it not enough to pour out your soul in prayer? The fact is that sin is akin to illness. Only in a regular clinic doctors cannot cope with it. Specialists in spiritual illnesses are located in the Church. They will help determine the cause of the sin and find a spiritual cure.

Confession is a medical procedure assisted by the priest. A person who sincerely confesses his own sins with a visible expression of forgiveness from the priest is invisibly absolved of sins by God Himself

You can turn to the parish priest for spiritual advice.

Not only confession, but all church sacraments - baptism, wedding, etc. - Christ instructed His disciples to perform:

The clergy inherited this right from the Apostles.

Signs

In psychology you can find the following signs of arrogance:

1. Dependence on public opinion.
2. Excessive talkativeness to attract attention to oneself.
3. Attachment to flattery.
4. Envy of more beautiful, smart and successful people.
5. Overestimation of one's strengths and personal qualities.
6. Boasting.
7. High demands on your family, friends, acquaintances, and colleagues. A vain person desires increased attention, constant praise, flattery, and cannot tolerate criticism.
8. Eccentric behavior. An individual exposes his feelings and thoughts in an inappropriate manner to attract everyone's attention.
9. Doing good deeds for recognition. When an arrogant person does good deeds, he dreams that his activities will be known in society. For example, he gives alms to a beggar and makes a video about it for YouTube.
10. Addiction to likes on social networks. To take unusual pictures, people risk their lives, fall from great heights into the abyss, and get hit by a train.

Recognizing vanity in a child is more difficult than in an adult. Kids need recognition and approval from their parents, so they love to show them their achievements. If a little boy or girl wants to get the attention of adults, that's okay. It’s another matter when a child reacts aggressively to criticism and reacts painfully to any comments from adults.

Reasons why fornication occurs in a person

The depravity of human nature after the Fall - it rebelled against man, and we are doomed to wage a constant war with it. And we receive this body from our parents and pass it on to our children. Our nature is prone to sin and prone to vice, that is, we understand with our minds, but the body demands, rebels against the will. And who will win?

Evils of education. You know, there is a famous saying: “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.” Our personal example, the way we live, our behavior - all this is imprinted on the child’s soul, and then he imitates his parents.

The temptations of this world are a whole river of vice.

The dangers of vanity

Vanity is a dangerous character trait that destroys family, friendships and business relationships. Arrogant people constantly quarrel with others and often stop communicating even with close relatives.

An arrogant woman cannot get married for a long time and repels men with her contemptuous attitude. In the family, she shows selfishness, conflict, intransigence, touchiness, and greed. An arrogant wife makes endless claims and demands on her husband, and regularly gets offended and angry with him.

An arrogant man suppresses his wife and children and ignores their interests. He chooses for himself a quiet, weak-willed life partner who will agree to sacrifice her desires for the sake of her beloved husband. It is difficult for children to get along with an ambitious father; as a result of irreconcilable contradictions, they can run away from home and begin an early independent life.

When building a career, arrogance is a serious barrier. An ambitious employee reacts sharply to criticism, does not admit his own mistakes, and is rude to colleagues and management. A striking example is an arrogant salesman who looks with contempt at customers who come to the store for cheap goods.

Arrogant lion lord

Psychologists discuss problems associated with arrogance:

• inadequate self-esteem;
• interpersonal conflicts;
• disappointment in life (due to high expectations and demands on other people);
• lack of personal achievements (an arrogant person has no motivation for self-development);
• cessation of spiritual development.

The only area where vanity can be beneficial is show business.

The concept of suffering, its meaning

The essence and meaning of the concept of suffering lies in the word “sin”. So what are they for? Sins are needed to understand a person - what is good and what is bad. When a person performs any action, he analyzes whether he did good or bad? Draw conclusions and correct your mistake. This is the meaning of the concept of sin.

There is a good example: if you drive a splinter into your finger and tolerate it staying in your finger, you can “wait” for the whole hand to rot. And if a person pulls out a splinter, then his hand will remain with him and will not begin to rot. So it is with sin, if it is corrected in time, then even if a person receives suffering, he will be cleansed and will be pure. And you won’t have to suffer all your life.

The Almighty wants to see only Good in us. To do this, a person needs to strive for Good every day, every minute. Sins on this path will only be part of the “study”, the knowledge of Good and Evil. As a result of sinful actions, a person must understand that he has committed Evil and never repeat it again.

Torment and suffering will not make it possible to remove sin; in any case, 95% of sins cannot be removed through suffering. They can be removed differently.

To atone for sins, you need to understand and realize what you have done, you need to develop, actively act to atone for your sins. And if you constantly remain in suffering and negativity, a person will destroy his soul over time with his wrong actions.

We all feel a surge of strength and energy when we rejoice, laugh, love, empathize, help others, give thanks, etc. These are the forces that revive and develop the human soul.

How is vanity different from pride?

Vanity is not pride, although there is much in common between these two qualities. The dictionary defines pride as a feeling of joy, contentment, superiority, born as a result of one's achievements. You can be proud not only of yourself, but also of your children, parents, spouses, friends, colleagues, country, nation. Therefore, pride is a broader and more positive feeling.

Parameters by which pride can be distinguished from vanity:

• Satisfaction from real achievements. In the case of arrogance, a person feels unreasonably important and attributes qualities that do not exist in real life.
• Empathy for loved ones. A vain individual recognizes personal merits, a proud one can appreciate the merits of relatives, friends and partners.

A proud person does not conflict with other people, but distinguishes his own personality with the help of positive qualities, virtues, and achievements.

Are diseases given for sins?

Sin has corrupted human nature. Diseases are a consequence of falling away from the Creator.

The Old Testament describes examples when God struck people who had sinned with disease. Thus, Miriam, the elder sister of the prophet Moses, and King Uzziah fell ill with leprosy, a chronic infectious disease.

However, diseases are not always punishments sent from above. More often the reason is in a person’s lifestyle. He punishes himself when he engages in fornication and gives free rein to his other vices.

According to St. John Chrysostom, first of all, pain develops when indulging in the following passions:

• laziness;
• drunkenness;
• gluttony.

On the other hand, even saints get sick. For example, the apostle Paul suffered from poor eyesight. In such cases, the illness is a consequence of imperfection inherited from Adam and Eve and is allowed by God not as a punishment, but so that we can see how great, terrible and varied the consequences of rebellion against the Creator are.

Why is vanity bad?

In psychology there is no concept of “bad” or “good”. But a vain person faces the following problems:

1. Pendulum “arrogance-humiliation”. The human mind is characterized by dual perception. A sense of self-importance and excessive pride are periodically replaced by humiliation.
2. Selfishness. An arrogant person thinks about personal well-being and does not benefit society.
3. Bias. A person intoxicated with delusions of grandeur does not see his shortcomings and reacts aggressively to constructive criticism. He ignores his mistakes and does not know in which direction to work on himself.
4. Family conflicts. Ambitious men and women have difficulty communicating with the opposite sex and repel partners with their arrogant character. In the family, such individuals conflict with their spouse and children, and quarrel with relatives.
5. Loneliness. Arrogance destroys friendships, friendships and business relationships. Sooner or later, a vain individual destroys his relationships with others and remains alone.

Vanity is always a disappointment, because, intoxicated by delusions of grandeur, the individual loses touch with reality. Over time, the proud man will see his shortcomings, understand that his merits have been greatly exaggerated, and will lament this.

About Abba John, abbot of Mount Sinai, that is, Climacus, VI century

Once Abba Martyrius came with the Monk John to Anastasius the Great, and he, looking at them, said to Abba Martyrius: “Tell me, Abba Martyrius, where is this youth from and who tonsured him?” He answered: “He is your servant, father, and I tonsured him.” Anastasius tells him: “Oh, Abba Martyrius, who would have thought that you tonsured the abbot of Sinai?”

And the holy man did not sin: after forty years, John was our abbot.

At another time, Abba Martyrius, also taking John with him, went to the great John Savvait, who was then in the Guddian desert. Seeing them, the elder stood up, poured water, washed Abba John’s feet and kissed his hand; Abbe Martyria did not wash his feet, and then, when his disciple Stefan asked why he did this, he answered him: “Believe me, child, I don’t know who this boy is, but I accepted the abbot of Sinai and washed the abbot’s feet.”

On the day of Abba John's tonsure (and he took tonsure in the twentieth year of his life), Abba Strategies predicted about him that he would once be a great star. On the very day when Abba John was appointed our abbot and when about six hundred visitors came to us, and they were all sitting eating food, John saw a man with short hair, dressed in a Jewish shroud, who, like a kind of manager, walked everywhere and gave orders to cooks, housekeepers, cellarers and other servants. When those people dispersed and the servants sat down to eat, they looked for this man who walked everywhere and gave orders, but they did not find him anywhere. Then the servant of God, our reverend father John, tells us: “Leave him alone, Mr. Moses did nothing strange while serving in his place.”

Questions and answers

Features of arrogant behavior are actively discussed on forums. Psychologists are asked many questions about vanity and its manifestations in human life. The most common of them:

Pride, arrogance, vanity - all this is cured by humiliation

Humiliation is the other side of vanity. A humiliated person feels insignificant, worthless, inferior. It is difficult for him to communicate with friends and colleagues on equal terms; it seems as if they are superior to him in many qualities, such as beauty, intelligence, and talent.

But the human psyche cannot withstand prolonged stress; from time to time an individual looks for ways to relieve his psychological stress. There are different discharge methods:

• Aggression towards the weak. A humiliated person causes mental or even physical pain to others (those who are younger, weaker, more defenseless). For example, an employee listens to aggressive criticism from a manager, yells at his wife at home, she scolds a child, and a boy chases a cat.
• Eccentric behavior. In order to rise in his own eyes, a humiliated person attracts attention, deserves the approval and admiration of other people. Positive emotions do not last long; euphoria is followed by self-flagellation and self-deprecation. Such emotional swings shake the psyche, deepen psychological trauma, and internal split.
• The fight for a place in the sun. A humiliated person strives to prove superiority, restore his own importance, and increase self-esteem. To do this, she fiercely participates in contests and competitions, and “gnaws out” lucrative contracts from her competitors. Having become rich, successful or famous, an individual boasts of his achievements to others and proves his own superiority.

Although arrogance and humiliation are related to each other, one of these qualities is not an antidote to the other.

Why do so many people have this unreasonable sense of importance?

The basis for inflated self-esteem is formed in early childhood and adolescence. Often an ambitious personality develops among friends, teachers, and coaches.

The main reasons for vanity:

1. Children's psychological trauma associated with humiliation. Parents systematically criticized the child, did not recognize his achievements, and nullified all his efforts. Having become an adult, a person strives to earn universal recognition, praise, and flattery in order to compensate for his inferiority complex.
2. Conflicts at school. A student who was bullied by his classmates grows up arrogant, proud, and arrogant. These are his “masks”, a kind of defense mechanism from a cruel, inhospitable world.
3. An atmosphere of selfishness. When a baby becomes the head of the family, parents indulge all his whims, satisfy his desires and whims. The child skillfully manipulates adults, becomes spoiled, demanding, proud, arrogant.
4. Vanity is a protest in response to undervaluation by the other sex. For example, a girl in her teens was not particularly beautiful and was an “ugly duckling” whom boys laughed at. Having matured and become attractive, she takes revenge on men, showing arrogance and arrogance towards them.
5. Compensation for defects. An inferiority complex encourages an individual to intensive self-development. This is how an ugly boy becomes a worldwide genius in order to increase his own self-esteem and make up for the lack of some qualities with others.

There are many more reasons for vanity than those listed above. To find them, you need long-term work by a psychologist and contact with the patient’s subconscious.

How to get rid of vanity

There is no universal pill for vanity. But psychology provides several methods with which you can get rid of delusions of grandeur:

• Talk less about yourself, express your own opinion only when others ask for it.
• Admire other people's achievements.
• Listen calmly to flying words and excessive praise.
• Engage in self-development (then there will be no time left for pride in your own achievements).
• Stop comparing yourself to others.

If you start fighting vanity with frenzy, you can come to the other extreme - self-deprecation. You shouldn’t attach great importance to your own shortcomings and fight them hard. Detached observation of oneself from the outside is the best cure for any psychological problems and complexes.

Spiritual causes of prodigal sin

Unbelief – after all, it is the main cause of sin. And this also applies to those who live the church life. Unbelief is so ingrained in us that it has become a habit; we no longer even notice it. We fast, take communion, pray, go to services - but where is faith?! After all, we live with worldly dreams, amusements, and sins.

The next reason is gluttony. Fornication is based on the belly, when the belly is full, a person receives excess juices, as St. says. Theophan the Recluse, and excess juices excite human nature.

Immodesty of hands and eyes. A person should monitor his vision and not stare at people of the opposite sex. When we just look at a person, this is fine, but as soon as we have made our judgment about his attractiveness or beauty, then a wide path for sin opens up. Married people have it easier in this regard, since they have found their companions along the path of life, and they are already working to maintain their marriage and increase love. And single people who are still looking for their chosen ones are forced to look, evaluate, search. The main thing here is not to get used to this; the Lord, even before the creation of everything visible, chose collaborators for each of us on this path of life. If we allow God, if we believe in His providence, His love for us, then we will not miss our soul mate, since they were created for each other. Unfortunately, very often we do not allow God to do this, and we do everything in our own way, for which we often grieve.

Many Holy Fathers forbade people, especially single people, from going to public baths.

It is best to refrain from unnecessary temptations. Remember the life of St. Anthony the Great, when he and his disciple crossed the river, they separated so that no one could see the naked body of the other, and when they crossed, they got dressed and united again for the further journey. Because you cannot look at the naked body of another person without causing harm to your soul.

As for the hands, there are many dangers here. Many Holy Fathers, such as St. John Climacus and St. Ephraim Sirin, especially noted the fact that when a person washes, he should not examine his body, touch his private parts, or prolong this process. Because in this case, people who lead a chaste lifestyle can very easily become aroused by their own touches, and then sin cannot be avoided.

For married people this is not so important, but for single people it is very important.

People who have chosen the path of monasticism and asceticism have a very vulnerable place through which lustful passion can penetrate their soul - this is the love of sweet, tasty food or laryngeal rage. This happens at the beginning of the monastic path, and when the monk has already gained some spiritual experience, then fornication seeks another path - this is arrogance.

If a monk has not achieved humility, then the Lord sends him fornication temptations in order to humble him. The third reason for ascetics to experience fornication is if they condemn their neighbors. Abba Evagrius and other Holy Fathers write that by judging your neighbors, you yourself fall into this sin. Condemnation kills love in a person. Each of us loves our child, no matter what, even if he does something, gets into a fight, or anything else. We still love him, protect him, shield him, forgive him. And if someone else’s child does something, we are immediately indignant, we condemn him and we will touch upon his parents about how poorly they raise their child, etc. Condemnation in a person kills not only love, but also prayer and reverence - this is a very insidious passion and one must be on guard with it.