The invulnerable self-esteem

I have stated that self-esteem is a fragile creature that depends on the stability of it's environment to stay intact. But there is an unusual way to create a high self-esteem that does not depend on environment. The method is what I call a nihilist method.

Some people discover the nihilist method because their educational background or mental exploration, lead them to an appreciation that self-esteem might be an arbitrary construct without any intrinsic meaning. They key word here is appreciation, not understanding. Someone might understand or know the diversity of cultures in the world, but (s)he might not appreciate it.

Anyway, in short, they will think that it really truely irrelevant what they think about themselves, and they mean it.

Education background and mental exploration that lead to such appreciation are:
1. Theoretical physics
Explanation: Exploration of high level of abstraction will eventually make you wonder whether there is any intrinsic meaning to.. anything)

2. Philosophy

3. Or simply too much time to daydream :-)

Ironically, by treating self-esteem as a meaningless construct, they can gain a high and stable self-esteem. Another choice of avenue is that they will totally disregard self-esteem in their life.

An example of famous people whose self-esteem might be of this type is Scott Adams, the Dilbert creator. Given his ability to entertain different hypothesis, it is not a far stretch to say that he appreciated this possible construction of self-esteem at some point or another.

There are quite many people holding this kind of self-esteem.