Self-Deception as Experiential Avoidance

There is a thin, blurry line between self-confidence and self-deception. Too often do we prematurely declare that what we know is sufficient and universally true. These premature declarations hold the potential for dangerous narratives to become real. At the very least, our efforts to improve the world become ineffective. At worse, they become destructive. I’m interested in how this process unfolds in our lives. Rather than explore this through the science of emotions, intuitions, and cognitions, I will explore this through the notion of experiential avoidance in the sense that, when reality is more than what we want to deal with, we manufacture a reality that is easier to manage. And this can lead us down a very different path.

There is an abundance of statements and quotes people blurt out or post on social media that have little to no context and are mixed in with absolutist tones, declaring this or that idea is THE right one and that other ideas are stupid. They beef up these statements with emphatic words in an effort to convince others that what they are saying is true. They use emotional and moral reasoning to convince people of their incomplete insights. However, if we dissect it just a little bit, we can see that they hold no weight as a universal and complete truth. It has occurred to me that such fallacious and ideological declarations have more to do with a desire to be confident rather than competent. I think I know why. 

Competence is difficult to acquire; confidence is even more difficult. Yet, confidence seems to be what we want most, and this is driven by the need for status. When the drive for status takes precedence over the drive for mastery, we immediately become prone to self-deception. There is a distinction to be made between appearing confident and being confident. If we strive to be confident, we direct our aims to achieve competence and eventually mastery over a particular skill, ability, or knowledge set. Striving to appear confident changes the game completely. This approach tends to steer us toward acquiring just enough understanding of a particular skill, ability, or knowledge set to appear to hold some superior truth. 

There seem to be two forces at play here. One is a desire to elevate oneself in the hierarchy. The second is a strong avoidance of being at the bottom of the hierarchy. It could be said that the former is merely jockeying for a position higher in the hierarchy, and that is quite understandable. It is corrupt, but it usually doesn’t take too terribly long before our inadequacies are exposed, and our erroneous messages reasoned away. It is the former that I am more concerned with because it involves self-deception, with denial and avoidance being the main culprits. This is because we are blinded to the true reality of our circumstances and cannot see it to correct it. 

From the framework of experiential avoidance, self-deception causes us to manufacture a reality that is easier to manage than the reality we are truly faced with. This does not mean that the manufactured reality is pleasant. In fact, I’d say it rarely is. On the contrary, it is often the case that it is still quite unpleasant. The difference is the reality we manufacture from an experiential avoidance is designed to place us on the “right” side of the matter. In other words, if everyone else is on the “wrong” side of the matter, we don’t have to confront our own psychological aspects that would otherwise cause us to question, doubt, or even dismiss our cherished beliefs. Well, this is extremely difficult work, and what sane person wants to do the dirty work when we could easily convince someone that it is their responsibility to change?

Too early do we often feel a sense of confidence in our understanding of the world. By assuming what we know is all that we need to know, we cut ourselves off from the truth that remains in what we have not yet explored. When this self-deception carries over into our efforts to climb the hierarchy, we risk adopting ideological narratives, which makes it difficult to grow and develop towards a more integrated and wholesome person, for we deny the existence of our biases, inadequacies, and shortsightedness while rejecting the call to confront the part of ourselves that possess the very things we oppose in others. When we fail to address those same aspects of ourselves that we despise in others, we leave room for them to fester. The more they are denied, the stronger and more uncontrollable they become. Those unaddressed aspects of ourselves will invariably find their way out and into the world in destructive ways. We will hardly recognize their origins when they do and, therefore, will likely blame others, falling further into the cycle of ideological thinking. This produces no growth, healing, or redemption. 

By facing the true reality of our difficult circumstances, we give ourselves a fighting chance to discover something meaningful in our efforts to sort out the dark and inadmissible aspects of ourselves and circumstances. Although it requires immense work and courage, the implications of improving yourself with honesty and humility are profound and can lead to good and moral outcomes. Sometimes, we have to slay dragons to get the gold. The problem with self-deception is that dragons don’t always make themselves readily apparent. Therefore, we must be vigilant with our own capacity to commit the very transgressions for which we judge others, literally or conceptually.

In Sum

Striving to be confident can lead us to prematurely pigeonhole ourselves into a knowledge set that fails to elevate us up the hierarchy. This is because striving to be confident changes our motivations to such that merely seek status, which causes us to deny ourselves the competence that can only come with gaining mastery. And that is difficult and time-consuming! On the other hand, it is also more rewarding and leaves us with fewer self-deceptions that will later haunt us. This is because self-deception causes us to blindly manufacture circumstances that are easier to deal with than the true reality of our lives. In turn, we cut ourselves off from the rewards of facing our own capacity to do the very things we rail against. More importantly, avoiding the dirty work prevents us from differentiating the troublesome parts of the world that we erroneously declare as either right or wrong, creating a false reality that makes where we happen to be the right side of the matter. Suppose, instead, we make an effort to see the faults and virtues of those seemingly incomprehensible parts of the world. In that case, we give ourselves a chance to gain mastery of them, positioning ourselves to revolutionize the world rather than falsely dichotomizing it.