How many of us give lame excuses on a regular basis? We give excuses to basically everything that we cannot accept for ourselves like excess body weight, cigarette smoking, excessive drinking, skipping our appointments.
According to Sigmund Freud, our personality is composed of these three: the Id, the Ego and the Superego. The Id operates on the pleasure principle while the Superego is basically our conscience, and operates on what is right. The Ego serves to balance the extremes of these two components of our personality. By making excuses, we are protecting the integrity of the ego.
Making excuses is one type of defense mechanism. The term “defense mechanism” is often thought to refer to a definitive singular term for personality traits which arise due to loss or traumatic experiences, but more accurately refers to several types of reactions. Making excuses as a defense mechanism is also known as Rationalization.
When something happens that we find difficult to accept, then we will make up a logical reason why it has happened. The target of rationalization is usually something that we have done, such as being unkind to another person. It may also be used when something happens independent of us which causes us discomfort, such as when a friend is unkind to us. We rationalize to ourselves. We also find it very important to rationalize to other people, even those we do not know.
The target of rationalization is usually something that we have done, such as being unkind to another person.
When you have done something of which the Superego opposes to, since the superego operates on the morality principle, your Ego will automatically defend itself by adding reasons to make the behavior acceptable to the Superego. This is a normal reaction of individuals to preserve the integrity of the Ego. If the Superego cannot accept the reasons that the Ego provided, the person will be assaulted with feelings of guilt which will later turn to anxiety and eventually, depression or mental illness.
Self-esteem needs is one of the components of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and in this aspect, we cannot help but rationalize to preserve our self-esteem. When self-esteem is destroyed, it will eventually lead to what have been previously mentioned – guilt to anxiety to depression to mental illness.
Any individual who uses this defense mechanism should be wary for he might be deceiving himself unknowingly. When this defense mechanism becomes something of a habit, later comes in another form of defense mechanism, which is Denial. The inability to accept things as they are is denial. In worst cases, the person who constantly uses such form of defense mechanism lost contact with reality.
Rationalization happens with bullies and victims. The bully rationalizes what they have done by saying that their victim deserved it, engaging in theft because of inability to stay longer in a job or unsatisfactory job performance – this is a dangerous thing. The reasons provided were self-seving. Self-Serving Bias uses rationalization when it leads to taking more credit for success than we deserve and blame others for our failures.
Photo by Vince Alongi
