Sorry you still don’t meet the definition of hypocrite.

You are labeling yourself a hypocrite based on your thoughts, thoughts that likely change every second, while giving no weight to your actions. Its actually a interesting question. What is the self? Are we our thoughts, are we our actions, both? Neither?

A man who has low self esteem and terrified of fire and dying rushes into a house ablaze in flames and rescues a child. The media labels the man courageous and a hero. The man does not like being called a hero, he remains afraid and “knows’ he is no hero and so continues to judge himself negatively. Is the man a coward,  is the man courageous?

A person is not a label and is more then the some of his actions and thoughts. It is the ego that likes to focus on labels to keep it simple but this simplicity creates anxiety, we ‘know’ we are not that.  I have this thought I am this thought, I did this action, I am this action. Such identification to a moment of time and space is unskillful. The moment has past… which thought which action are we now?

I suspect that as you grow you will discover that high or low self-esteem does not define you. As you have already discovered you act in either case. You are capable of helping others. Capable of creating positive experience for others even when internally you battle negativity. That meets the definition of courage.

• This reply was modified 6 years, 10 months ago by Peter.