Eigenschauung
n.
the degree to which your view of the world is warped by your own presence in it, whether you’re a stunning beauty who assumes all strangers are chatty, a bully who thinks the world is perpetually at war, or a quivering leaf who walks around in an artificial cloud of deference; the awareness that although you’d like to think you perceive things cleanly and objectively, you’ve never felt the vibe of a room that doesn’t happen to have you in it.
German eigen, inherent + Anschauung, view. Compare Weltanschauung, “worldview.” Your Weltanschauung is how you see the world; your Eigenschauung is a reflection of how the world sees you. Pronounced “ahy-guhn-shou-oong.”
