Their lack of confidence could be seen in the performances of Joe Allen and Dejan Lovren, to name but two, or the sudden loss of self-belief that afflicted Raheem Sterling whenever he had a chance to round off some penetrative approach work by taking aim.
Or did he not give the work a number at all, because he was not satisfied with it?" The composer's daughter Katarina spoke of the self-doubt that afflicted her father at this time, aggravated by the continuing expectations and fuss that surrounded the Eighth Symphony.
In contrast, he is a mere "critic," afflicted by self-consciousness, "calculated and careful," taking life in through a filter.
It's not a bad comparison, for a man similarly afflicted by self-loathing and lost romance, and equipped to express it with a baritone both operatic and conversational.
It's a story of musician's block — of an artist afflicted with self-doubt that's amplified to metaphysical dimensions — and of the inspirations and inhibitions entailed by a profound sense of place.
It could be that they are still afflicted by self-consciousness, a desperation to prove to the established clubs that they belong in their company, a little like Manchester City.
I chose an ambitious, self-adoring senator from Texas as my point-of-view hero somewhat before the actual Texas senator, certainly no hero at all (though also afflicted with self-adoration), decided to run for President, but the Presidential campaigns probably did infect the rhetoric of the story.
But I did the best I could, thinking back on how I always liked to lie on the rug in my bedroom and draw with Magic Markers for a long time when I was a girl, not yet afflicted with self-consciousness, which would certainly arrive soon enough.
Over the years this complexity has become obscured, and "Uncle Tom" has simply become synonymous with a person so afflicted by self-loathing-turned-cultural-Stockholm-syndrome that they are willing to acquiesce to their own subordination in order to appease their oppressors.
Further, it has to be pointed out, that diagnostic information was based on parent report of physician diagnosed atopic disease, which poses the typical problems self-report can be afflicted with (see limitations below).
You will have failed to develop your better self the moment you are afflicted by the power of unkind strangers bearing Elite Status Membership, shoving you aside in their skilled race to a new boarding gate.
