The act of judgment to some degree can’t be helped. Judgment is such a necessity of existence that one must engage it merely in the reading of this sentence, in getting up in the morning, and in brushing one’s teeth. To judge, one must affirm one’s correctness; one must affirm oneself. This leads to the consequential assumption that, not only must one judge, but one must self-affirm. Self-affirmation is a foundational, metaphysical norm of existence. It happens so quickly and readily that it is difficult to properly identify it, but it is there by necessity in one’s judgments and actions. It is particularly true in the self-affirmation of judgments. Judging is so foundational to a person’s psyche and self that there is a drive to protect developed judgments, even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary and in the face of one’s own demise. Judgment and self-affirmation are roots of human existence and the human mind.
Ideas and thoughts are self-affirming. They take on a life of their own once made. Meaning the person has a vested interest in maintaining the suspected/imagined veracity of any thoughts and ideas regardless of their true veracity. It is perceived as an insult to the intellect and integrity of a person if an idea thought was discarded. This is due to the personal quality of the process of making an idea or thought as well as the fact that the judging mechanism that made or adopted the idea is the one that continues in holding it. A judger is contained in their judging mechanism. It takes a special attempt of disassociation for a thought not to self-affirm in its original judgment.
This protection of meta judgments can lead to seeming absurdities. Some rather believe the worst thing is true and to have it become true rather than to believe the worst thing is true and for it not to be true. This protects the initial judgment and self-affirmation of the individual, keeping foundational assumptions about one’s worthiness of judgment protected. Likewise, a depressed person will continue to want to self-evaluate lowly in spite of the detrimental impact it has upon their person. They would prefer to be established as someone who judges correctly, whose judgment of self isn’t questioned, rather than switch to an alternative, competing thought about one’s worthiness. This creates a state in which one’s wider self-affirmation, that one is worthy of life itself and that one’s whole being is worthy of existence, is sacrificed to an acute self-affirmation in one’s foundational judging mechanism, that one can’t be wrong that one is chronically wrong.
Likewise, even those groups that attempt self-denial ultimately self-affirm. Christians can’t avoid self-affirmation, either. Like the depressed, they affirm themselves, their base judgment, in their attempt to not affirm themselves in Christ. They give themselves over to Christ, yet they do so in themselves and by their judgment. They’re self-affirmed in their judgment of their lord, in their surrendering to his image. Eastern religions deny the existence of self and attempt to release themselves from it, but they declare and attempt with their self. They affirm their self in making a statement or attempt at all. It is their statement and their attempt. Any initiative of judgment and loyalty to judgment regardless of what that judgment may be is a self-affirmation.
Self-affirmation is the acceptance of oneself and one’s existence and is a foundational part of a person’s being. It can’t be helped that we self-affirm, at least in terms of our judgments and values that we hold. We commit to our own positions and understandings, and, in this, a person self-affirms.