{"id":150,"date":"2014-04-02T14:02:51","date_gmt":"2014-04-02T11:02:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/suomenkuvalehti.fi\/kirjeita-aidille\/?p=150"},"modified":"2014-04-02T16:43:09","modified_gmt":"2014-04-02T13:43:09","slug":"finlands-national-disease-low-self-esteem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/suomenkuvalehti.fi\/kirjeita-aidille\/finlands-national-disease-low-self-esteem\/","title":{"rendered":"Finland\u2019s national disease of low self-esteem"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Dear Mom,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, I was in a meeting presenting concepts for an ad campaign, and I got this: \u201cIt sounds very good. Actually, we\u2019re afraid it sounds too good. We don\u2019t want to give the impression that we\u2019re better than we really are.\u201d Um, ok, so basically you like it, but you\u2019d like me to change it so that your brand sounds… um… less good? \u201cYes, that\u2019s right.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well, that makes perfect sense if you don\u2019t think about it. Isn\u2019t the whole point of advertising to find the best things about a brand and make them even more desirable? I mean, come on. Show me someone who prefers mediocre to amazing and I\u2019ll show you… well.. a Finn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As I mentioned in my last letter, the Finns suffer from the national disease of low self-esteem. It\u2019s a nasty illness with many complications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s the delusion that another person\u2019s success is a direct reflection of your own failures. A friend wins an award for her work. You\u2019re first thought: \u201cSo she\u2019s officially better than me now? I could win an award like that too, if only I wasn\u2019t a pile of shit.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And then there\u2019s the: \u201cWhat?!?! Someone from my hometown won the lottery? Ok, whew, it was only 50,000\u20ac. Because I swear to God, if one of my stupid neighbors had won millions I would have personally burned their house down.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And speaking of money, you really don\u2019t talk about it here, because God forbid someone should know how much you earn \u2013 ESPECIALLY if you earn a lot. Why? I already told you \u2013 because everything you have is something someone else doesn\u2019t<\/em> have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coming from New York, this has been one of the hardest lessons I\u2019ve had to learn over the 20+ years I\u2019ve been living here. But I have. These days I feel uncomfortable if someone compliments me in public. And although I often think about how beautiful someone looks, those words rarely come out of my mouth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now that I have children, I\u2019ve been giving this disease more thought. Thanks to their diverse genes from New York and Kurikka, my kids have escaped lactose intolerance and allergies. But what are their chances of making it to adulthood with healthy self-esteem if they grow up in Helsinki?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I wouldn\u2019t be worried if we lived in New York (or anywhere else in the U.S. for that matter). There, every kid believes he or she can be president some day. Change the world, do something amazing. How do they know? Because we tell them. Constantly. At home, in school, on TV, everywhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I remember having a long conversation many years ago with Pekka Himanen<\/a>, a (then) young philosopher who was visiting Helsinki from Berkley, where he was working at the time. We debated whether it\u2019s healthier to grow up in Finland, where really the entire society is founded on the common belief that no one is inherently \u201cbetter\u201d than anyone else, or in the U.S., where all 300+ million of us are going to grow up to be president.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The problem with being taught that you\u2019re going to grow up to do something totally amazing and awesomely life-changing is that most people don\u2019t. There\u2019s only one Oprah. And Barack Obama\u2019s job is already filled. So when you end up living in the suburbs and making a nice living as an accountant, you feel like a failure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here, on the other hand, you could grow up to be the marketing director of a large successful company that pays copywriters to make sure no one thinks your brand \u201cis trying to sound better than it actually is\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I honestly can\u2019t remember which option Pekka Himanen thought was better, or if he had some brilliant philosophical solution to suggest. And even if he did, who cares. I bet he thinks he\u2019s smarter than me just because he got his Ph.D. at 20. Asshole.\nJust kidding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think the best option lies somewhere over Greenland \u2013 about half way between Helsinki and New York. I bet kids in Greenland grow up knowing that celebrating other people\u2019s successes makes it easier to feel good about your own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ll send you a postcard when we get there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Love,\nLissu<\/p>\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dear Mom, So, I was in a meeting presenting concepts for an ad campaign, and I got this: \u201cIt sounds very good. Actually, we\u2019re afraid it sounds too good. We don\u2019t want to give the impression that we\u2019re better than we really are.\u201d Um, ok, so basically you like it, but you\u2019d
\nlike me to …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":147,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"asauth_required_access_level":0,"asauth_cansharepaid":"true","om_header_attributes":[],"footnotes":"","om_featured_image_focal_point":[],"om_primary_tag":0,"om_contributors":[],"om_co_authors":[],"beyondwords_generate_audio":"","beyondwords_project_id":"","beyondwords_content_id":"","beyondwords_preview_token":"","beyondwords_player_content":"","beyondwords_player_style":"","beyondwords_language_code":"","beyondwords_language_id":"","beyondwords_title_voice_id":"","beyondwords_body_voice_id":"","beyondwords_summary_voice_id":"","beyondwords_error_message":"","beyondwords_disabled":"","beyondwords_delete_content":"","beyondwords_podcast_id":"","beyondwords_hash":"","publish_post_to_speechkit":"","speechkit_hash":"","speechkit_generate_audio":"","speechkit_project_id":"","speechkit_podcast_id":"","speechkit_error_message":"","speechkit_disabled":"","speechkit_access_key":"","speechkit_error":"","speechkit_info":"","speechkit_response":"","speechkit_retries":"","speechkit_status":"","speechkit_updated_at":"","_speechkit_link":"","_speechkit_text":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[17,105,104,103],"class_list":["post-150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kirjeita-aidille","tag-finland","tag-greenland","tag-pekka-himanen","tag-self-esteem"],"om_views":null,"acf":{"tuuma_off":false,"tuuma_kysymys":"","tuuma_vastaus":""},"asauth":{"required_access_level":1,"share_token":"","is_paid":false},"yoast_head":"\nFinland\u2019s national disease of low self-esteem - Kirjeit\u00e4 \u00e4idille<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/suomenkuvalehti.fi\/kirjeita-aidille\/finlands-national-disease-low-self-esteem\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"fi_FI\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Finland\u2019s national disease of low self-esteem - Kirjeit\u00e4 \u00e4idille\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Dear Mom, So, I was in a meeting presenting concepts for an ad campaign, and I got this: \u201cIt sounds very good. 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