Self-perception is when an individual becomes aware of their own attitudes, emotions, and other internal feelings from observing their own acted behavior and/or the circumstances in which this behavior occurs.
Self-perception influences behavior change, aspirations, and self-perceived abilities in various social settings, whether in leadership positions or personal relationships.
Two components of self-perception
1. Self-esteem which is confidence in one’s own worth or abilities which determines the level of self-respect and
2. Personal efficacy which is a person’s beliefs about their own capabilities to produce effects/results.
I believe it is time we acknowledge that most of us, Black African people among other formerly oppressed groups, suffer from low self-esteem and do not have positive self efficacy. To no fault of our own, we are known as ‘broken people’, exhibiting signs of deep-rooted pain, anger, and general emotional fatigue stemming from the workplace-, socio-economic- and political triggers that are evoked by generational trauma, and overall negative lived experiences.
The negative experiences have led to racial identity dissonance in some cases, whereby Africans reject their own race, prefer belonging to other racial groups, adopt foreign values, or prefer people from other ethnicities more than their own. In extreme cases, complete racial identity disassociation, where a person becomes color-blind or rejects their own skin color as a psychological response to discrimination, exclusion, loss, and grief they associate with Blackness.
In some instances, Black people who are the few cases of success may also have self-perception problems that come out as ‘survivor guilt,’ stemming from the shared history of oppression where they feel guilty because they survived a life-threatening event that others did not survive.
Race is a huge part of how people view themselves as individuals or as a group and therefore is an important consideration in leadership. How individuals behave in their roles as either leaders or followers is largely influenced by how they view themselves within a given environment. How Africans perceive themselves determines emotions, attitudes, behaviors, and identities that they exhibit in the different contexts, including what triggers them, the situations they respond to, and how they respond.
Patriotism as a by-product of self perception
Patriotism is self-sacrifice for the nation/group. This attitude is very important to maintain the existence of the nation and the state. It is therefore imperative that the young generation as a successor generation of the nation develops patriotism in his life. But how can patriotism and self-perception be unified?
Ubuntu is the answer
Identification with African and African values of Ubuntu is an effective strategy to eliminate the “crab” mentality that came as a result of oppression and brokenness, i.e., self-hate, accepting the negative definitions of oppressors, viewing the other members of your community simply as competitors, predators, or prey.
The age old teachings say, “you must first bind the strong man”. This teaching can apply to the sources of negativity and conflict among Black people, i.e. bad energy, information, or motives which then become the root of ones’ views, desires, and character. Our identity as Black People should be attached to justice, evenness, and dignity being upheld among us inorder to achieve positive development at a personal level, then as a group and nations. There can not be a strong sense patriotism when there is negative energy, information, or motives within an individual that would cause them to reject the understanding of the power of collaboration and mutuality.
The African values and Ubuntu consciousness focuses on the individual’s relationship to the community and the individual’s responsibility to that community, to respect and defend the members of that community. Ubuntu is a non-Western philosophy that rejects an emphasis on individuality.
The African philosophy of “ubuntu” is where your self-perception is shaped by your relationships with other people. It’s a way of living that begins with the premise that “I am” only because “we are,” or “a person is a person through other persons” Ubuntu might serve as a counterweight to the rampant individualism that’s so pervasive in the contemporary world, leadership, and our communities as formerly oppressed people- and whose current state and culture is a result of multi-generational trauma.
The values that flow from Ubuntu foster a better attitude towards the environment and protect it much more robustly than those that flow from the present dominant “Western” individualistic system of capitalism. Principles of ubuntu emphasize a moral obligation towards others including past, present and future generations. In this way it advocates for a sustainable life that does not affect the ability of others, including future generations, to live and enjoy the gifts of nature- flora and fauna, clean air, and water.
Western philosopher Rene Descartes is famously known for saying, “I think, therefore I am,” laid the groundwork for how we, through western ideology, conceptualize our sense of self. But what if there’s an entirely different way to think about personal identity which is founded in the community- as informed by our old age African values of Ubuntu.
