The Dream.

Most people have dreamed of becoming famous once or several times in their lives, whether as an artist, pop singer, inventor, head of state, or royal. When 10–12-year-old youths are asked, most of them will want this and choose fame over well-paid work.

The Reality:

I have seen the inside of the lives of many people of different ages and genders. Through my work, I have met, and still meet both children, teenagers, and adults of different ages, as well as old people. And I daresay, I have seen THE BACKSIDE OF THE FACE OF FAME.

– The feeling of losing ones’s freedom completely. What the celebrities themselves say:

(If you are tired of celebrities saying this or that about themselves, their calamities, ups-and-downs, or about the world, just scroll down to Part 2. or the case of The Beatles, and the chapter about The psychology of fame and the seven stages they usually encounter and have to solve, if they don’t kill themselves or jump off the rollercoaster of fame long before that.)

Incarcerated or hunted down: What is it like not being able to move outside your home, or stick your head out the window without being chased by the celebrity press, or observed and photographed? Even in your own garden or terrace, you are not allowed to be at peace.

 Lady Gaga said: As soon as I leave my house, I lose my freedom and belongs “to everyone else.”

The Burden of fame: Harrison Ford called “fame and the loss of privacy comes with it, as a burden.”

 Anne Hathaway said: “fame fucked me up for a really long time.”

The Price: George Cloney told Esquire UK, 2014, that fame always has its price: “The truth is you run as fast as you can towards it because it’s everything you want. Not just the fame, but what it represents, meaning work, meaning opportunity. And then you get there and it’s shocking how immediately you become enveloped in this world that is incredibly restricting. “ It is known that Clooney after a back injury during the recording of “Syriana” in 2005, considered taking his own life due to the pain.

A fugitive on the run: Johnny Depp: Would not like to seem unthankful but told “Today “in 2014, “It’s a little bit like living like a fugitive. Everything has to be some sort of strategy. To get you into the hotel, to get you out of the hotel, to get you into the restaurant, to get you out of the restaurant.”

Fame a game of life and death:

Amanda Seyfried: The anxiety and panic associated with fame are perceived by many as a dilemma of life and death. Actress Amanda Seyfried tells “Nettavisen Livsstil”(Lifestyle) that: Anxiety and panic attacks caused by fame feels like life or death ”

Kristen Stewart called fame “the worst thing in the world.”

Happy of having had a life before fame: Robert Pattinson: Still saying what he said to GQ in 2013: “It’s strange, you don’t have a normal life anymore. You spend much time trying to fight it, but in the end, you find another way to live.” He then added, “People don’t realize how lonely you are. In any case, I feel fortunate because success didn’t reach me very young, at least, I had the opportunity to have a life before.”

– Stalking stars and fame.

Not a few celebrities experience stalking, ie certain people who seem threatening and who follow them wherever they are. Very many also experience death threats and must have bodyguards around the clock.

Halle Berry said she was moving to France because she was receiving death threats from a man who claimed he was going to slit her throat.

Death Threats: Kim Kardashian received death threats like: “I’ll pray you will die, Kim,” “Kill yourself,” and “Die in HELL!” are just a few of the threatening messages that she was bombarded with.

Selena Gomez received several death threats from rabid fans of Justin Bieber when she was dating him.

Taylor Swift received Twitter death threats from One Direction fans who thought the singer dissed her ex-boyfriend, Harry Styles, during the Grammy Award. “Go die you have messed with the wrong fandom !!! Hell is yours !!” and “TAYLOR SWIFT YOU DID NOT JUST MOCK HARRY STYLES GO DIE YOU WORTHLESS HOW,” are just a few examples of the tweets she received

Barack Obama has had over 10 credible assassination threats made against him since he won the 2008 Presidential election.

Michael Jackson experienced many threats. In just a year 2004, most of them came from a Canadian man that was given one-year probation for emailing death threats to him. Of course, Michael Jackson was privileged enough to buy his own little world at “Neverland” that was a refuge from the world but at the same time a prison.

Part 2.

Lifted up by millions of fans and supporters.

The Rolling Stones were worldwide known for their brilliant pop and rock music, not least their many stunts challenging traditional roles and conduct. (Psychological Universe does not know so much about their troubles with fame)

– Gratitude to the fans:

Humility, thankfulness, and modesty: Many pop stars and celebrities are very thankful to their herds of fans. Meeting them at concerts and shows creates most often a magic and spectacular atmosphere of admiration, joy, happiness, and a feeling of togetherness. My impression is that especially Korean k-pop groups and bands are enormously thankful for their “army of fans”.

With the ultramodern mega arenas and stadiums, there can be around 80.000 fans lightning up the seats and grandstand with thousands of flashlights waving up to the platform where the bands play and dance. But among millions of supportive and positive fans, there are lots of fanatic and crazy people that represent a permanent threat to the solo artists or members of a big band. Here the murder of John Lennon is an extreme and tragic example. So let’s take a look at the case of the Beatles.

The Beatles and the downside of fame.

The Beatles were world-famous already in 1964, according to “The Historian and The Beatles”,- Reviews of Beatle Biography” (E. T. Weber 2019). Here Weber describes how these four English Liverpool guys, very early had a goal to get world-famous. They wanted according to this review to be “the very top of the world’s pop”, “a position” that inherently confers global fame.”

The Beatles, photo capt. from Review of Beatle Biography

 – Wanting their faces disfigured.

 How did the Beatles’ lives evolve because of their musical and lyrical creativity and success?

Reality proved swiftly and sharply to be double-edged: Weber cites Andrew Loog Oldham witnessing Lennon and McCartney fantasizing about being involved in an automobile accident that would disfigure them so utterly it would render them unrecognizable.

In that respect, it’s sufficient to remind ourselves of what happened to Paul Walker in 2013.

Paul Walker‘s face was totally unrecognizable after his fatal accident in his red Porsche on 30 November 2013, driven by a friend. A great fan of him showed me a picture of his face taken just after his death. The photo has now been removed from all platforms I think because it was terrifying just to look at it. There’s no reason to believe, to my knowledge, that this was a suicide attempt by any of them. Instead, it was young men’s typical boyish addiction to sports cars and over speed. And perhaps a world-famous movie star’s attempt to escape with a friend from photographers or paparazzi. I don’t know.

Family and friends. Back to the Beatles.

“Ringo Starr recounts that fame had changed even familial relations (op cit.).We certainly know that it affects not only the relation to parents, but also to your wife/husband, children, and friends. Sometimes, as Ringo Starr recalled, his extended family could react abnormally over a small spill of tea that normally would have been brushed off.

George Harrison said according to this historian of popular music, that they had sacrificed their nervous systems. Unlike the British Royal Family or other royals, they were not already from birth trained to cope with fame’s difficulties; “The Beatles were thrust into the fire with very little preparation.” (George Martin op cit.) They had a kind of protective circle around them, but huge problems arose that their manager Brian Epstein had not foreseen.

How does fame impact people psychologically?

The Journal of Phenomenological Psychology revealed some interesting facts about fame after the two researchers Donna Rockwell and David C. Giles had interviewed rock and pop stars, television celebrities, actors, athletes, and musicians. (In: “The Beatles and the phenomenology of fame”.) They found that many of its consequences were potentially damaging to both the individual’s self-worth and genuine, healthy, interpersonal relationships.

7 TYPICAL STAGES OF AN INDIVIDUAL’S EMOTI0NAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL RESPONSE TO FAME: (0P CIT.)

Stage 1. Elation:

Having just achieved fame, the individual is showered with attention and adoration. Every possible door is open to them, and the celebrities recount experiencing personal feelings of value and worth.

Stage 2. Overwhelmed:

Some while after the great breakthrough the individuals begin to describe fame as similar to a tornado; a force out of their control for which they are unprepared and unsure with how to cope.

Stage 3. Resentment:

The “animal in a cage” stage is when the individual begins to resent their fans and the intrusions caused by fame. Many movie stars and pop stars feel imprisoned by their fame in some way.

Stage 4. Addiction:

Despite their ambivalence to fame, the individual knows they are also addicted to it. They despise its intrusions but also loathe themselves for still craving fame. According to the study, this stage can be particularly destructive, because this is an addiction that can only be satisfied by the participation of other people or fans. That is the only way for the individual to get their fix.

Stage 5. Splitting:

Realizing that your famous self is not your genuine self — hence the creation, by some of the split personas: one for the public, one for their private family and friends. Also includes the realization that fans don’t know the real individual, and that their adoration is, therefore, questionable, leading the individual to question their personal value and worth.

Stage 6. Loneliness and Depression:

Individuals can lose lifelong friends due to the distance caused by fame, leaving them increasingly aware that they are isolated, having lost friends who knew the “real” them. The loneliness can be intensified by the belief, by others, that those who are famous have no right to be lonely or depressed.

Stage 7. Wishing for Something Else:

This is a stage in which the individual becomes involved in investing in causes they regard as authentic, while still longing for genuine, caring relationships with friends and/or family.

The most important antidote to the curse of fame.

Self-love and the ability to speak for oneself:

Quite coincidentally, BTS, and Psychological Universe have been been matched and co-working worldwide with the main message on this international website. I am therefore very thankful for their important contribution to convey these values to the younger generation. This is a generation that instead of “dull” written pages of info, prefer music and YouTube videos from their idols, to really understand the importance of a life saving message.

The message itself is divided into three areas.

1. First, it is about being able to give oneself unconditional love and consideration, regardless of mistakes and shortcomings.

2. Secondly, it’s about being able to stand up for oneself, and daring to say what you feel and need in order to have a good life. (This BTS brought with them in their speech to the UN in September 2018, and even in their fight for their rights to BIG HITS entertainment.)

We all know these days, the struggle outside and inside of the Court that Britney Spears has had, to be given the right to speak and act on behalf of herself.

To have a cause bigger than showbiz and career:

Global environmental protection:

3. Last but not least, the third message of the Psychological Universe is about being able to take care of what we all come from and depend on – namely nature and the environment on earth. That message also was BTS’s main content of their speech this September, when they, together with Korean President Moon Jae-in, were invited to the UN General Assembly to speak on the importance of global environmental protection. (To get the attention of their later speech among the younger generation, they worked for 14 hours in the assembly hall to make this video.) https://youtu.be/9SmQOZWNyWE

The interview with BTS and UN’s 2. Secretary together with President Moon Jae-in: https://youtu.be/wAXcMD5dOBA (unfortunately because of jet-lag, dry air during the long flight to N.Y. and extremely hard work in the UN Hall of assembly to make the dance video without playback, their voices are not as perfect as usual.)

The significance of self-esteem:

Psychologically, the first thing – self-love, is the key to being able to feel good, and give oneself the care and attention needed. As BTS has understood, this is not about egocentrism or egoism. On the contrary, this is about a deep respect for who you are, before you achieve anything externally. If you are in contact with this mere “existence of yourself in the world”, you’ll also be able to maintain self-respect during days when you don’t achieve well, and even make mistakes.

This is even a prerequisite for managing the genuine love and care for others. At the same time it is the best way to avoid depression and suicidal thoughts, witch is something I work intensely with every day together with “my colleagues in life’s difficult balancing act.”

Such work takes time, it is a long process, and it is not enough to have a speech in the UN about it, or in the UNICEF. But it means a lot that the world’s most popular band from Korea, says this to its millions of young followers around the world. Followers who like many others of us struggle with their self-esteem.

The important difference between self-confidence and self-esteem

Younger people may not always have the same struggle with self-confidence. Self-confidence is about how good and successful you are. But self-esteem, the deeper sense of human dignity is not about performance, but about having value by just being YOU in the universe.

Has BTS managed their international fame?

We will later see if BTS has managed to cope with the transitions between the seven stages in the price of fame, mentioned above. 

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Then you are not necessarily distorted. You are a completely normal human being! There is nothing wrong with wanting what triggers pleasure chemicals in your brain and gives you positive emotions. It is neither strange that once you get the taste of it, you want more of the same, or maybe something that gives an even stronger light experience. Yes, the feeling of having a happy life. Nevertheless, this pursuit of “the enjoyable life” raises an important question that is particularly interesting from a psychological point of view.

How far are you willing to go?

Yes, how far are you willing to go to obtain such “goods” as money, sex, drugs, fame, and power?

Another question that arises in this context is: How happy will you be hunting precisely for this bunch of qualities? This last issue will be discussed in another article. (I have at «Psychological Universe», already discussed the relationship between one of the above factors, – «MONEY and HAPPINESS» in the article. with the same name) Money and Happiness

But first, you can ask yourself the question: What would you put at the top of your own priority list? What is most important for you to achieve in life? Here you are free to add other goals and features than those mentioned above.

“The ‘dark’ and the ‘light’ mind.”

As you answer the question above, we can look at how our attitudes toward other people, our surroundings, and ourselves, affect the way we seek to achieve our desires and goals. For the sake of simplicity, I want to distinguish between achieving one’s goals in a CONSIDERATE way, as opposed to achieving them RUTHLESSLY.

However, I am not so enthusiastic about oversimplified personality psychology, where people are put in boots. Nevertheless, some of what Paulhus & Williams (2002) describe as “The Dark Triad” can shed light on a recognizable pattern of achievement in some people. Here the authors operate with a bunch of characteristics that they call

1. Machiavellianism, 2. Psychopathy or Sociopathy, and 3. Narcissism.

The ruthless

1. Highly calculting and cunning people:

If you fall into this category and want money, influence, power, and sex, it always happens in a calculated, cunningly, dominant, and often threatening way. Under this so-called Machiavellian category, you are also enormously cunning and self-absorbed. (cf. the Italian political strategist Machiavelli),

2. People with obvious psychopathic traits:

If you are in this category, you lack compassion for others, are cynical and unscrupulous in your pursuit of what you want. Others are used only as an object for your needs or instruments to get what you are looking for. You often resort to threats against others, both mentally and physically. It also means that you use violence, possibly ultimately murder to achieve what you want. In other words, crime is no stranger to you. Because you too can have a very seductive and flattering demeanor, you can trick many into believing that you want them well. At the same time, it may seem that you basically like to hurt others.

3. Narcissists:

Your misunderstood and shallow self-love makes you feel entitled to everything you do, no matter what the consequences for others. Since your vain self-love gives you notions of greatness, you are also easily offended, and this can lead to a vendetta against those who prick beneath your surface.

Sex, Power, and Money.

In 2013, psychologist Ki Beom Lee and colleagues at the University of Calgary investigated the correspondence between the hypothesis of people who were believed to fall into the “Dark Triad” and their subsequent behavior. They looked at the tendency to sexually exploit others (“Sex”) and to dominate and exploit others (“Power”), as well as the preoccupation with material goods and ostentatious wealth (“Money”)

The condiderate.

To find answers to this, they had to use many different tests and questionnaires. They also had methodological problems along the way. But in the end, they came up with a dialectical opposite to the so-called “Dark Triad”, which they called the “Honesty and Humility” dimension. (Lee & Ashton 2014) (This is one of the six dimensions of the personality trait system “HEXAGO”, which is the result of a multinational collaboration around clusters of traits related to specific personality types.)

It turned out that those who cut low on this “Honesty and Humility” dimension, also turned out to act largely on the basis of “The Dark Triad”. Nevertheless, the above-mentioned survey shows to be unrepresentative of the entire population as 70% of the subjects were women.

“The Light Triad”.

The Light Triad Barry Kaufmann and colleagues (2019) found that people with personalities who fell under the “Dark Triad” were usually also younger people, most often men, who did not have close ties to others, and in addition were unscrupulous. These men used a so-called immature psychological defense to push away the realities of what they were doing (most often denial, ie they had less displacement defense, which is a more nuanced form of defense).

Barry Kaufmann and co-workers were annoyed that it is most often the atrocities that get the most attention in the media and research. Thus, they took hold of Ki Beom Lee’s work, and nuanced the content. They set up a direct counterpart to “The Dark Triad”, in what they called “The Light Triad”. This cluster of traits consists of three important personality traits with a broad common denominator. That you can see the best in your fellow human beings and can enjoy the success of others. In addition, you assume that other people are good-natured, so you do not have to protect yourself all the time.

Having Trust in other people:

The ingredients of the Light Triad are:

1. Humanism.

Here defined as the respect for the inviolable dignity of every human being.

2. Kantianism.

The ability to consider every human being as a goal in itself, not just as an object of your needs. And last but not least:

3. Having faith in other people.

Here we are talking about individuals who have a relatively good basic self-esteem, not only because they do something great but by virtue of their mere existence.

Other characteristics that coincided with a high score on the Light Triad were a positive curiosity and interest in the surroundings. A vibrant vitality, a broader perspective on life, great love and willingness to cooperate, as well as the ability to forgive others and show gratitude.

(All these characteristics turned out to coincide with the HEXAGO – system, where H = Honesty-Humility, E = Emotionality, H = Extroversion, A = Agreeableness, C = Conscientiousness, O = Openness to Experiences.)

Every person is unique in themselves:

As a clinical psychologist, I do not frequently use such categories, but consider every person as unique and original. I find that each individual is considerably more complex when it comes to the way they organize their personality when adapting themselves to the world. Consequently, this complex pattern does not fall into such gross categories.

However, I have a feeling that some researchers look for patterns that give a kind of recognition in the population, and can predict different forms of reactions and behavior. The way we organize our psyche, I think is psychologically interwoven with the relationships that we evolve from.

In my opinion, it is a co-evolution of properties and later maintenance of this relational thinking and action pattern. The maintenance takes place by seeking new conditions that confirm and represent the old behavioral patterns as well as self-esteem.

Despite this urge to repeat, many people still break with the old and develop towards higher awareness and responsible presence in life. Often such positive changes must be encouraged through life crises and other dramatic breaks with the usual.

When it comes to destructive personalities, however, it is my experience that the more ruthless and psychopathically organized a person is, the more repetitive, clichéd, and caricatured he becomes in his way of feeling, thinking, and behaving. When I have patients with spouses, cohabitants, or friends with severe psychopathic traits, it is very easy to predict their next reaction, action, and strategy in different contexts. It’s just like the way of feeling and thinking, yes the whole way of being has become too cramped. There is no or very little openness, as we see in people characterized by sincerity and humility.

The joys are very short-lived, and materially conditioned or linked to constant new conquests of positions or market shares. (In that sense, the Norwegian NRK series “Exit” is a very good example of a business environment, where the male characters will definitely belong to The Dark Triad).

Then I also know from both research and experience that these people have once been both confirmation-seeking, open, and friendly children. Unfortunately, they have been raised and treated by a disturbed parent or adult, which has ruined their sensitivity.

Unfortunately, their later victims often feel very sorry for the psychopathic person they live with. True, it was once a pity for them as children. But as adults, in my opinion, there is no pity for them at all. It is the people and the victims who largely suffer both by and for them.

Not very many ruthless among us, but the few really know how to make the world unsecure.

As we see below from the figure of B. Kaufman and co, there are many more considerate people out there than ruthless ones. There are also some at the border. This will be more in line with a nuanced view of human characteristics and adaptation patterns that I called for above.

Consequences.

I do not want to spend time pushing in political positions here. But it is only for the reader to look at the world around him during the age of globalization, and the emergence of the prevailing neo-liberal way of organizing the world.

What, for example, does the Q-Anon movement and the looting of Congress in the United States say about the ability of the few ruthless leaders to create conflict and crises and bring many into this wave of hatred.

Take the rotten hedge fund acquisitions of US mortgage debt that eventually led to the worldwide financial crisis in 2008. What does this say about the relatively few ruthless speculators’ impact on the world community? See movies like: (Wall Street Money Never Sleeps, 2010, The Big Short. 2015) And what does that say about extremism and terror?

I rather leave it to the readers and use their own experiences and imagination to think about this.