Wellbeing Series with MoNya-Mental
11/ 08/ 2020 Self-Esteem and Confidence What is Self-esteem? Self esteem refers to how a person believes and thinks about their own worth and value, often in comparison to others. This perspective impacts how that person feels as a result of their own evaluation of worth, which heavily influences the choices and decisions that one makes and how they lead their lives. People with a low self-esteem often rely on others to do things, support and make decisions for them. The concept of the Self is what we think about the "I"; We often think of this in context of what we think of ourselves, whether we are deserving or not. There are 4 key attributes that highlight the esteem most people feel for themselves: self-confidence, Identity, Sense of belonging, Ability, The availability or lack thereof of key challenging vs supportive elements result in the following: Inflated self-esteem. People with inflated self-esteem think they are better than others and have no doubts about underestimating everyone else. This is also referred to as arrogance and this limits the ability to develop beyond the self. Healthy self-esteem. People with this type of self-esteem accept and value themselves as well as they accept and value others. Low self-esteem. This when one grossly undermines themselves, and therefore often others, complicating their ability to trust and collaborate openly. Why is Self-Esteem important? A healthy sense of self, allows for an internal sense of security and worth. You therefore do not feel the need to gain validation or permission from others. You will generally have positive relationships with others seek to support and improve others as well as you will already feel more confident about your own abilities. You're also open to learning and feedback, which opens you up for further development and to acquire and master new skills. Healthy self esteem invites a deeper relational depth, rooted in challenging and supporting self and others. People with a healthy sense of self, actively seek work they enjoy beyond any financial or material rewards. They value honesty in self and others, They accept responsibility for their quality of life, and do not blame others. They care about their health generally through maintaining good habits and routines that are supportive of such. They like children as they enjoy the teaching and sharing their life lessons with children. They avoid self-destructive behaviours, like addictions of any kind including work and any aspects that get in the way of building meaningful relationships with others. Health self-esteem also thrive at Taking calculated risks, more than sticking to safe and limiting activities. Those with as poor sense of self however create complex difficulties with others when they often agree to things that they are not sure of nor have skills for, in a bid to try and impress. This is often what leads to cheating, corruption and generally destructive behaviours. They tend to take up tasks and roles that they are not competent in, while this is not in itself a problem, the associated arrogance gets in the way of them gaining the core skills required to become competent. Low self-esteem is a key feature in people who struggle with Depression/ sadness/low mood, anxieties, generally avoidance of difficult situations. It is also associated with feelings of inadequacy, as they compare themselves to others. It is also difficult for them to accept compliments as they doubt themselves. They also sabotage their own efforts through neglecting their own needs, especially emotional ones in a bid to please others. They are highly sensitivity to criticism, their temper is also quite low with very little flexibility. They also place an excessive preoccupation with impersonal problems, like work and gossip. Psychosomatic symptoms such as sensitivity to pain, fatigue, insomnia and headaches are quite common. What causes them or how do they develop? Some of the many causes of poor or low self-esteem include: Unhappy childhood where parents or guardians and other significant adults were extremely critical, or challenging and hardly supportive. The reverse is also known to have similar impact, where there was too much support and very little challenge to develop own coping skills. This core orientation to life contributes to poor academic performance in school resulting in poor life choices. Prolonged stressful life event such as toxic relationships or economic hardships also contribute to associated confidence. While these are the core issues that underlie self esteem, disrespect through undermining negative words and exploitative actions that amount to emotional abuse can also cause a poor sense of self, often where one is unlike to remove themselves for whatever reason. Inducing shame, fear, anger etc. will ruin a child's self-esteem. How does this impacts general performance, productivity and mental health? While low self-esteem can be easily dismissed as a character trait, or mistake it for kindness or humility, it has long-term damaging effects, as can be seen from minor activities like "not speaking up in class/public or work meetings, phobia of presentations" to longer-term threats, like relationship problems or self-damaging behaviours. These are inabilities to express oneself or challenge injustices in healthy ways, often bottling up issues leading to explosive arguments that are often damaging. How to build or rebuild your self-esteem. Working on your self-esteem can be challenging and takes courage and the right support, by doing this work, you will have much higher satisfaction with yourself – and reconnect with your own truth and joy. 1. Seek out professional help. Going to therapy can help you identify and understand the origin of your low self-esteem, Identify and challenge your negative beliefs and what's positive about yourself. Consider yourself worthy. This is the most important aspect of life. There will be conditions when you will feel depressed and consider yourself a waste. Improve your physical health: 2. Prioritize exercise that feels good for your body. Even small amounts of movement, such as breathing, walking or yoga, can actually boost your serotonin levels in the brain and help you feel calmer, help you make better decisions, feel stronger and feel more in control of yourself. 3. Put your health first with well-rounded meals. There is a strong mind-body connection, so when we are feeling healthy physically, it can have a dramatic impact on our self-esteem, as well as how we feel emotionally. It is, of course, important to be mindful if exercise and eating healthy is becoming extreme, compulsive, interfering with other aspects of life, as this can become detrimental to self-esteem and have other emotional consequences. 4. Make a list of your priorities or goals. Make it a habit to outline your goals each day, week, month or year. Try to stick to them so you don’t get derailed by other people’s needs, demands, and requests. This takes a lot of self discipline. Improve in one area every month. Choose twelve areas where you think you need improvement to change your life. 5. Pause and assess before automatically saying “yes” to a request. Is this something you can do, want to do? Ask yourself: Am I saying yes because this is something I actually want to do or just so this person will like me/need me/approve of me? 6. Start lifting yourself up! Its all about you... Leave love notes to yourself around your home, office, car or any other space that you spend a lot of time in. For example, I am beautiful, I am confident, I am successful, I am worthy! (Because you are). Before long, these affirmations will not feel foreign to you – and you will start to feel it and believe it! 7. Start meditating, using positive affirmations. There are a lot of free apps that you can choose from. 8. Notice, and try to limit, when you are comparing yourself to others Ask yourself, why is it that what this person is doing/saying/wearing matters to me so much? A concrete way to minimize this is to reduce exposure to social media. 9. Find your favorite way to unwind, relax, and pamper yourself This is a wonderful way to invest in yourself and honor your worth. 10. Replace “I’m sorry” with more situation-appropriate interjections Such as “excuse me” or “beg your pardon,” where appropriate, or, depending on the situation, replace sorry with "thank you" – such as “thank you so much for your patience" when you're running late. 11. Establish positive relationships—and avoid negative ones Give yourself a break, be kind to yourself Become more assertive and learn to say No. Take On challenges and give up being too critical of yourself Working with a therapist is a great way to identify and capitalize on your strengths, and pave the way for self-empowerment.
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