I think that might help somewhat- thinking of rationality as something you do rather than something you are is definitely good regardless- but there’s still the basic problem that your self-esteem is invested in rationality. Rationality requires you to continually be willing to doubt your core values and consider that they might be wrong, and if your core values are wrong, then you haven’t gotten any use up to that point out of your rationality. I don’t think it’s just a matter of realizing your were wrong once and recovering self-esteem out of the fact that you were rational enough to see that- ideally you ought to constantly consider the possibility that everything you believe might be wrong.
Now, if you can get up to the level of thinking I just described, that’s probably still a lot better than basing your self-esteem on specific political views. It just doesn’t totally solve the problem, and you need to be aware that it doesn’t totally solve the problem.
I think that might help somewhat- thinking of rationality as something you do rather than something you are is definitely good regardless- but there’s still the basic problem that your self-esteem is invested in rationality. Rationality requires you to continually be willing to doubt your core values and consider that they might be wrong, and if your core values are wrong, then you haven’t gotten any use up to that point out of your rationality. I don’t think it’s just a matter of realizing your were wrong once and recovering self-esteem out of the fact that you were rational enough to see that- ideally you ought to constantly consider the possibility that everything you believe might be wrong.
Now, if you can get up to the level of thinking I just described, that’s probably still a lot better than basing your self-esteem on specific political views. It just doesn’t totally solve the problem, and you need to be aware that it doesn’t totally solve the problem.