Ramya Baratam
@ramya
Ramya Baratam
nihilism
rejection of all religious and moral principles, in the belief that life is meaningless
The Hedgehog Review
hedgehogreview.com
Reflections on culture
If I make what the market values the measure of what I value, then non-instrumental relations, obligations, and commitments lose priority and significance for what I am and what I do.
It’s important to know what you value so that as CEO of your Me, Inc you don’t just think about what sells you. It’s about what YOU value and desire and if you’re able to follow that intuation.
Thus, commodifying ourselves in the interest of maximizing our “exchange value” or “market worth” means that we envision ourselves as marketable objects. Doing so necessarily implies that the criteria of self-definition we use become more narrowly instrumental, impersonal, and contingent. To be successful at Me. Inc, my traits, values, beliefs, and... See more
Are we creating this concept of self actualization only to equate worth and be able to be worthy to be marketable or sellable in the market?
Personal branding follows the logic of product branding step for step. A successful brand, as the advertisers say, “knows itself.” Marketers must know the characteristics of their product or service and what it promises to deliver and use this knowledge to focus and position the product. To self-brand, therefore, individuals must get in touch with ... See more
Personal brands starts exactly like branding where you have to learn about thyself and see what you beating fit into a package to sell.
valorized
To give value
In this way, as Robert Dunn has written, self-formation is in fact exteriorized, since the locus is not on an inner self but on “an outer world of objects and images valorized by commodity culture.”14
Even when you thought you had all the control, brands are still influencing what you find important and how society will value things.
Are you only a ‘three’ on our self-actualization scale? Too bad! We can make you a ‘ten’ during one of our weekend seminars in Anaheim, minutes away from Disneyland, for only a few thousand dollars.”13 By purchasing the right workbook, following the right steps, or getting the right makeover, we can change the quality of our inner experience, enhan... See more
People are selling the notion of getting “better” over a weekend of meditation for a $1000 dollars.
This weekend, we were just talking about how everything that was natural, organic, sustainable, ways of the past are expensive because people don’t have the skillsets to do those things on their own. Healthy food, birthing naturally, and being able to achieve a sense of peace.
Advertisements rail against the conventional demands of society and sell products as instruments of liberation
In the movement towards self concept > than social constructs, brands are selling products as an idea of libration and freedom from the larger social constructs.
Maybe that’s why all these notions to improvement oneself is selling because we want to take control of our own destiny. That’s what is selling. The idea of a better version of you.