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The cult of the “self-made man” hurts us a lot

When I think of the myth of the self-made man, that is of the man who “making himself” becomes an “entrepreneur of himself”, to put it simply, or rather, in rich words, I apologize, that here we do not want poverty not even hearing about it, I am automatically reminded of a university student with a designer shirt and a large watch on his wrist who attends the faculty of economics, obviously working on his idea of ​​startup of the century, obviously an App. But since I don’t want to fall into useless and stupid stereotypes, I’ll go beyond this preconceived image that forms in my brain, apologizing on its behalf. Sometimes he exaggerates. The fact is that I have been hearing about this story of “doing it yourself” for years and above all I have been reading or hearing the phrase “my own entrepreneur” all the time.. By now it has become a joke, I know, a bit like saying “I went to the University of Life” or the street, but behind every joke there is always something true, and this is also true in this case. It is especially true in this case, I dare to say, because the cult of the self-made man, not to mention that a female equivalent does not exist and this is already not a good sign, is anything but a joke. It is more than a sentence to write to be nice in your biography on social media. The cult of the self-made man has existed in our society for a long time, as well as its effects on each of us, regardless of the designer shirt and the large watch on the wrist.

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Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, are some of the names that come to my mind, some of the main cult subjects of the postmodern era, people who created real business empires, getting that much coveted success and becoming filthy rich. Because in the end, when we talk about the self-made man, we talk about this: success and wealth. When we talk about the man who made himself, who started with nothing and came to have everything, success and wealth are included in this “everything”.. So it is not a “whole” after all “everything”, but it is a part “whole”, which tells many things about the idea we have made of life and of the concept of realization within it, of the tools and means to pursue it. Some time ago I heard a so-called “successful” entrepreneur speak. He was very smartly dressed and kept adjusting his flashy tie as he spoke. From that day I remember that at one point he said he had to return one BMW to the dealer because his wife wanted it white and he had bought it black instead. Besides, his tie was very expensive. I remember he said the price but I don’t remember the figure. I also remember eyes steeped in admiration around me, eyes of people who would do anything to be in his place, to be able to tell such a story someday. It didn’t give me a good feeling at all that moment, in fact I almost removed the rest. That time I really think I had to deal personally with the cult of the self-made man: a middle-aged man, rich and important, who communicates the price of his signature tie, the color change of his BMW to which his wife had forced him, and a host of young eyes wide open in his direction, in which the idea of ​​having just met the future was clearly legible and disturbing.

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A successful future, where success depends on money, and money from an important job position, perhaps at the head of some area of ​​a large multinational or, even better, of your startup that has quickly become a company with a dizzying annual turnover. A future as free and fulfilled entrepreneurs, where freedom passes through the possibility of spending money on goods that few can afford, and realization through the possibility of telling it.

Something is wrong, it is mercilessly clear. Or at least, it should be. If not, then what is written in the title is true: The cult of the “self-made man” hurts us a lot.

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