Our self-esteem affects all areas of life. On our self-image, on the decisions and actions we take, and on our achievements. For a woman, no less than for a man, it is important to have healthy self-esteem and be confident. We will look in detail at how to increase a woman’s self-esteem and self-confidence in this article.
There's a little surprise waiting for you at the end.
- 6 main reasons for low self-esteem in women
- How a woman can increase her self-esteem and self-confidence - 8 simple steps
- Conclusion
Based on self-esteem, whether it is high or low, it is clearly written in our heads what is good and what is bad. What is right and what is wrong. How we should look and behave. How our other half should look and behave. How our children and other people’s children should behave, etc. It all depends on how highly we value ourselves and how much our real ideas about ourselves conflict with our ideals.
What is self-esteem: definition and its impact on our lives
To achieve success in any area of one's activity, a person must be self-confident and be able to convince others that he is right.
People with low self-esteem cannot be happy by definition: their entire existence consists of doubts, disappointments and soul-searching. Meanwhile, a bright, eventful life passes by, going to those who do not doubt that they are right and confidently walk towards their goal.
A person with low self-esteem considers himself unworthy of happiness, and therefore subconsciously inferior to others in everything. To change the situation in your favor, you need to change yourself - there is no other way.
In this article I will tell you why a person’s self-esteem is so important, what reasons influence its decline, and how to increase self-esteem for a man, woman (girl), and teenager using the most effective methods.
Self-esteem is an individual’s idea of the importance of his personality in relation to other people and an assessment of his own qualities - strengths and weaknesses.
Self-esteem is extremely important for the full functioning of the individual in society and the achievement of various life goals - success, self-realization, family happiness, spiritual and material well-being.
Self-Esteem Functions
The functions of self-assessment are as follows:
- Protective – ensures stability and relative independence of the individual from the opinions of others;
- Regulatory – enables a person to solve problems of personal choice;
- Developmental – provides an impetus to personal development.
The assessment of our personality by others - in particular, parents, peers, and friends - plays a decisive role in the early formation of self-esteem. Ideally, self-esteem should be based only on the individual’s own opinion of himself, but in reality it is influenced by many different factors.
Self-esteem is a person’s attitude towards himself: towards his capabilities, physical and spiritual qualities. An adequate assessment of one’s own capabilities helps to avoid mistakes and at the same time is an incentive for further development.
Psychologists believe that ideal self-esteem is the most accurate assessment of a person’s abilities.
Low self-esteem makes a person doubt, think and make wrong decisions, while too high one leads to making a large number of mistakes.
In most cases, we are dealing with a person underestimating his capabilities, which is why a person is not able to fully realize his potential and does not understand how to increase self-esteem.
Well-known coach in the field of success psychology, Brian Tracy, believes that low self-esteem is the main reason for a person’s financial insolvency. After all, if you feel bad about yourself, you don’t have confidence in your abilities, then you are doomed to be poor, and you won’t even have to dream of having your own business.
On the contrary, increasing your self-esteem leads to an increase in your income and earning more money. So if you have financial problems, be sure to look for the reason in your emotional state.
A pathological manifestation of low self-esteem is an inferiority complex.
Self-esteem is the key to achieving success in any area of human activity. Self-confidence leads to making important and timely decisions, and underestimating one’s strengths reduces the level of a person’s personal energy, makes him constantly doubt himself and, instead of taking action, think about action.
Why is it important to love yourself and what will happen if you don’t?
Increasing self-esteem means loving yourself: accepting yourself as you are with all your shortcomings and flaws. Everyone has disadvantages: a self-confident person differs from someone who is always doubtful and insecure in that he sees in himself not only shortcomings, but also advantages, and at the same time knows how to present himself favorably to others.
If you don't love yourself, how can others love you? It is known that consciously and subconsciously people strive for contact and communication with self-confident individuals. It is these individuals who are most often chosen as business partners, friends and husbands (or wives).
If you doubt yourself and blame yourself for every little thing, you are automatically programming yourself for further failures and making decision-making more and more difficult. Learn to praise yourself, forgive yourself and love yourself - you will see how the attitude of others towards you will change.
Signs of low (-) self-esteem
A person with low self-esteem usually exhibits the following qualities:
- excessive self-criticism and self-dissatisfaction;
- increased sensitivity to criticism and the opinions of others;
- constant indecision and fear of making a mistake;
- pathological jealousy;
- envy of the success of others;
- passionate desire to please;
- hostility towards others;
- constant defensive position and the need to justify one’s actions;
- pessimism, negative worldview.
An individual with low self-esteem perceives temporary difficulties and failures as permanent and draws incorrect conclusions. The worse we feel about ourselves, the more negatively those around us treat us: this leads to alienation, depression and other psycho-emotional disorders.
How self-esteem is formed
The ability to adequately assess one’s own strengths and weaknesses is formed in a person from childhood. Excessive demands and strictness of parents or neglectful attitude of friends can have long-lasting consequences. As a result, a person grows up, gets an education, gets a job and starts a family, but the need to constantly prove something to others remains and negatively affects the quality of life.
Friends and loved ones also continuously influence self-esteem - a dear person can instantly raise it or lower it. Criticism addressed to oneself is especially painful, as it inevitably reduces self-confidence (both in the short term and in the long term). In addition, we ourselves often become the source of uncertainty. By focusing on failure, we come to disappointing conclusions and engage in self-criticism, reducing our own initiative.
An equally common source of low self-esteem is negative experiences from childhood or a consequence of psychological problems. Initially, it is formed due to certain characteristics of upbringing and norms of behavior imposed on the child by parents. Further, perceptions of one’s own attractiveness, athletic success and various abilities are added. All events that occur that force a person to rethink his own value affect his self-esteem. And from a certain moment it begins to play a decisive role in life, forcing a person to give up ambitions. To overcome this vicious cycle, you need to actively work on improving your self-esteem. Let's continue.
High self-esteem and self-confidence are an important factor in achieving success.
Before I talk about ways to increase self-esteem, I want to emphasize the importance of self-love for achieving success and well-being. For some reason, it is believed that selfishness is a sin, or at least something that should be avoided.
In fact, the lack of love and respect for one’s own personality is what gives rise to numerous complexes and internal conflicts.
If a person has a low opinion of himself, it is unlikely that others will think differently. And vice versa - self-confident people are usually highly valued by others: their opinions are listened to, people strive to communicate and cooperate with them. Having learned to respect ourselves, we will gain the respect of others, and also learn to adequately relate to the opinions of others about us.
Signs of high (+) self-esteem
People with healthy, high self-esteem have the following benefits:
- accept their physical appearance as it is;
- self-confident;
- are not afraid to make mistakes and learn from them;
- calmly accept criticism and compliments;
- know how to communicate, do not experience shyness when communicating with strangers;
- respect the opinions of others, but also value their own view of things;
- take care of their physical and emotional well-being;
- develop harmoniously;
- achieve success in their endeavors.
Self-confidence and self-esteem are the same necessary factors for achieving success and happiness as sun and water for a plant: without them, personal growth is impossible. Low self-esteem deprives a person of perspective and hope for change.
Self-confidence when communicating with men
How to increase self-esteem for a child - what affects self-confidence
If a girl has difficulty communicating with men, then she needs to start taking small steps. For such a woman, every action is a success. Even if she has difficulty finding words, shakes all over and says absurd things, the very fact that she came up is already valuable. You can add it to your achievement diary.
Optimistic girl
Important! Autogenic training is a very effective technique for increasing self-confidence. First, it stabilizes the mind. Secondly, in a state of relaxation, any attitudes are much easier to instill. The state in which a person is during auto-training resembles a light hypnotic trance.
Low self-esteem - 5 main reasons
There are a great many factors that directly or indirectly influence our attitude towards ourselves. These are genetic characteristics, external data, social status, and marital status. Below we look at the 5 most common reasons for low self-esteem.
Reason 1. Improper upbringing in the family
Our attitude towards ourselves directly depends on proper upbringing. If our parents did not encourage us, but, on the contrary, scolded us and constantly compared us with others, we simply will not have a reason to love ourselves - there will be no basis on which faith in our abilities will be based.
A decrease in self-esteem and a lack of confidence in one’s own words and actions is influenced by parents’ criticism of any initiatives, undertakings and actions. Even as an adult, a person who was constantly criticized in childhood subconsciously continues to be afraid of mistakes.
Parents (teachers, coaches) should know how to increase the self-esteem of a child who suffers from doubts and lack of self-confidence.
The best way is praise, unobtrusive encouragement. It is enough to sincerely praise your child several times for a correctly completed school task or a carefully drawn drawing, and his self-esteem will inevitably increase.
Psychologists say that the family is the center of the world for a child: it is there that all future characteristics of an adult personality are laid. Passivity, lethargy, uncertainty, and other negative qualities are a direct reflection of parental suggestions and attitudes.
Self-esteem is usually higher among only children and those who were born first. Other children often develop a “little brother complex,” when parents constantly compare the younger child with the older one.
An ideal family for adequate self-esteem is one in which the mother is always calm and in a good mood, and the father is demanding, fair and has unquestionable authority.
Reason 2. Frequent failures in childhood
No one is immune from failures, the main thing is our attitude towards them. A strong traumatic event can affect the psyche in the form of a guilt complex and decreased self-esteem. For example, some children blame themselves for their parents' divorce or their frequent quarrels: in the future, the feeling of guilt is transformed into constant doubts and an inability to make a decision.
In childhood, completely harmless events take on cosmic proportions. For example, having taken second rather than first place in a competition, an adult athlete will sigh and continue training with redoubled force, while a child may receive psychological trauma for life, especially if the parents do not show proper understanding of the situation.
What fuels low self-esteem in childhood? Failures, mistakes, ridicule of peers, careless remarks from adults (parents first of all). As a result, the teenager develops the opinion that he is bad, unlucky, inferior, and a false sense of guilt appears for his actions.
Reason 3. Lack of clear goals in life
If you have nothing to strive for in life, you do not need to strain and make volitional efforts. Lack of clear goals, laziness, following standard philistine imperatives - this is easy and does not require the manifestation of personal qualities. Such a person does not plan to become successful and rich; he is passive at his core.
Often people with low self-esteem live on autopilot, half-heartedly. They are satisfied with gray tones, an inconspicuous lifestyle, the absence of bright colors - there is no desire to get out of the swamp. Such people stop paying attention to their own appearance, income, stop dreaming and striving for changes. Naturally, self-esteem in such a situation is not just low, but completely absent.
Growing up, a person becomes passive, and then shifts all these problems onto his family when he gets married.
Here the conclusion suggests itself: it is just as necessary for a man and a woman, that is, an adult, to increase self-esteem as it is for a child. After all, everything starts from childhood, and then nothing changes unless an adult himself makes an effort for this.
Reason 4. Unhealthy social environment
If you are surrounded by people without specific goals in life, who are in constant spiritual anabiosis, you are unlikely to have a desire for internal transformation.
High self-esteem and ambition appear where there are role models - if all your friends and acquaintances are accustomed to living in the shadows, without showing initiative, then you, most likely, will be completely satisfied with such an existence.
If you notice that everyone around you is pathologically accustomed to complaining about life, gossiping, judging others and overly philosophizing for no reason, you should think about whether you are on the same path with these people?
After all, such people can become energy vampires for you and prevent you from awakening your true potential.
If you feel that this tendency is taking place, change this environment or at least limit communication with him.
It is best to communicate with people who are already successful, have their own business and know how to earn money. We have already written before on the topic of how to make money, we recommend that you read this article.
Reason 5. Defects in appearance and health
Low self-esteem often occurs in children with defects in appearance or congenital diseases.
Even if parents behave correctly towards such a child, he can be significantly influenced by the social environment - first of all, the opinion of peers.
A typical example is overweight children who are given offensive nicknames in kindergarten or school. Low self-esteem in such cases is practically guaranteed if appropriate measures are not taken.
In this case, you should try to eliminate the existing shortcomings, and if this is not possible, then you need to begin to develop other qualities that will make the person (child) more developed, charismatic and self-confident.
Example
If a child is overweight and has a corresponding unattractive appearance, then with the right approach to developing his abilities and talents, this disadvantage can be turned into an advantage.
Perhaps he will show an ability for sports (weightlifting or wrestling, or boxing), or vice versa, he will be able to become a sought-after actor with his inherent type.
In general, there are thousands of examples where people with huge physical disabilities have achieved worldwide recognition, created happy families and at the same time live the life that “healthy” people can only dream of.
The most striking example of this is Nick Vujicic , a world-famous speaker and preacher. Nick was born without arms and legs , naturally experienced a huge inferiority complex and even wanted to commit suicide.
But, thanks to his willpower and desire to live, he achieved public recognition and helped thousands of people around the world find themselves and cope with psychological difficulties.
Now Nick is a dollar millionaire and a favorite of thousands of people, because he helped them change their lives. By working on your self-esteem, you can reach unprecedented heights and even repeat the success of Nick Vujicic, despite the fact that now your condition may not be the best.
We have already written here about how rich people think and what it takes to become a millionaire.
How to Increase Self-Esteem and Confidence - 7 Powerful Ways
How to increase self-esteem and love yourself? There are many ways to make yourself believe in your own abilities, but I have chosen seven of the most reliable and effective options.
Method 1. Change your environment and communicate with successful people
Since man is a social being, he is completely dependent on his environment. How to believe in yourself and increase self-esteem with the help of other people? It’s very simple – you need to change your environment.
I already wrote above that communicating with uninitiated, sluggish and lazy people without ambitions and desires for change is a direct path to decreased self-esteem and lack of motivation in life.
If you radically change your social circle and start communicating with successful, purposeful, self-confident people, you will almost immediately feel yourself changing for the better. Gradually, self-respect, self-love and all those qualities without which it is impossible to achieve success will return to you.
By communicating with successful and prosperous people, you will learn to value individuality (including your own), begin to think differently about your personal time, find a goal and begin to achieve success on your own.
Method 2. Attending events, trainings, seminars
In any city, events, trainings or seminars are held where specialists teach everyone to gain self-confidence and increase self-esteem.
Experts in applied psychology will be able to turn a timid, indecisive individual into a strong-willed, self-satisfied and purposeful person in a few months: the main thing is to have an initial impulse and desire for change.
There are many competent books that talk in detail, with examples and explanations, about the need for self-love and respect: if you want changes, familiarizing yourself with such literature will be very productive.
I recommend reading the following books: Brian Tracy “Self-Esteem”, Sharon Wegshida-Cruz “How Much Are You Worth? How to learn to love and respect yourself."
The books “The Charm of Femininity” by Helen Andelin and “Heal Your Life” by Louise Hay will be especially relevant for increasing female self-esteem.
It is also useful to watch video content on this topic - documentaries and feature films that help increase self-esteem.
Method 3. Leaving the “comfort zone” - performing unusual actions
A person’s desire to escape from problems into a personal comfort zone is quite understandable. It is much easier in difficult situations to console yourself with sweets, alcohol, and savoring your own powerlessness. It is much more difficult to face the challenge and do something that is unusual for us.
At first it may seem that outside your comfort zone there is a hostile and inhospitable world, but then you will understand that real life, full of beauty, adventure and positive emotions, is exactly where you have not been before.
Staying in familiar conditions is like living in an invisible cage, from which you are afraid to leave simply because you are accustomed to it. By learning to leave your comfort zone and still remain calm, collected and balanced, you will gain a powerful incentive to raise your self-esteem and shape your new image.
You can start small - for example, stop sitting in front of the TV after work, and buy a gym membership, go jogging, yoga, and meditation.
Set a goal - to learn an unfamiliar language in six months or to meet the girl you like tonight. Don’t be afraid if you don’t succeed the first time – but new sensations and increased self-esteem are guaranteed.
Method 4. Refusal of excessive self-criticism
By stopping self-flagellation, blaming yourself and “eating” for mistakes, flaws in appearance, failures in your personal life, you will achieve several goals at once:
- Release enormous amounts of energy. You will not lose your attention to self-criticism, and there will be time for other, more creative and worthy tasks;
- Learn to accept yourself for who you are. You are the one and only person on this planet. So why compare yourself to others? It is better to focus on achieving your own goals according to your potential and your idea of happiness;
- Learn to see the positive traits of your personality . Instead of dwelling on the negative, purposefully find your strengths and work on developing them.
In the end, any failures, disappointments and mistakes can be turned to your advantage by using them as life experience.
Method 5. Playing sports and leading a healthy lifestyle
In the course of experiments conducted by European scientists, it was found that one of the simplest and most effective ways to increase self-esteem is to engage in sports, physical exercise, or activities aimed at improving health and well-being.
A healthy body is a container for a healthy spirit and correct thoughts, and vice versa: it is difficult for a person who is heavy to lift, with an untrained body, to make decisions and act independently.
Having started playing sports, a person begins to perceive his appearance less critically and treat himself more respectfully. At the same time, increasing self-esteem does not depend on the results of training: even if the changes are minor, the process of training itself is important.
The more actively you exercise, the better you begin to feel about yourself.
Any physical activity (especially for a person working in an office) is an opportunity to gain confidence and love yourself. There is a completely scientific explanation for this phenomenon: during sports, a person intensively produces dopamine - neurotransmitters responsible for reward (in bypass they are sometimes called “joy hormones”).
Biochemical changes have a positive effect on the psyche and increase our self-esteem.
Method 6. Listening to affirmations
Affirmations are one of the most effective ways to reprogram your own consciousness. In psychology, affirmations are understood as short verbal formulas that, when repeated many times, create a positive attitude in a person’s subconscious. In the future, this attitude contributes to changing character and personality traits towards improvement.
Affirmations are always formulated as a fait accompli, which forces a person to accept them as a given and think accordingly. If our subconscious considers us self-confident, successful and purposeful, then gradually we really become so.
Typical examples of affirmations for increasing self-esteem: “I am the master of my life,” “I can have everything I want,” “I believe in myself, so everything comes to me freely and effortlessly.” These linguistic formulas can be repeated independently or listened to in the player: the main thing in this practice is regularity.
Helpful advice
Read these phrases into the microphone, record a track of several minutes from them and listen to them in your free time. This technology is recommended by Western psychologists and has proven to be highly effective.
Method 7. Keeping a diary of successes and achievements
A diary of your own victories and achievements will help teenagers, men and women, to raise their self-esteem.
Start such a diary right now and write down everything that you managed to achieve in a day (week, month). A success diary is a powerful stimulating tool that will make you believe in yourself and allow you to increase your own effectiveness many times over.
Every day, write down any victories you have, no matter how small.
Example
- I took my grandmother across the road;
- I wanted to eat junk food, but I restrained myself;
- Woke up and went to bed on time (according to plan);
- Gave a gift to my beloved (beloved);
- Earned 10% more than the previous month;
All these “little things” relate to your personal successes, be sure to include them in your success diary and read it regularly.
If you write down only 5 simple things a day, then this will already be 150 of your achievements per month!
Not so little for one month, would you agree?!
One of our articles was written about how to become rich and successful from scratch, and keeping a success diary can be the first step towards this.
Advice from psychologists
- Nothing develops a woman's self-esteem better than achievements. Therefore, you need to make small progress every day, after a while they will grow into big ones.
- Relaxation techniques should not be used as a universal tool. He can only relieve symptoms, while confidence is the product of long-term thinking about its causes and painstaking work to eliminate them.
- The best way to understand how to love yourself and increase self-esteem for a woman is to create a file with ideas for increasing self-esteem in her case and do what is written there. An idea came to mind and I wrote it down. After a while, so many ideas will accumulate that the question of how to increase a woman’s self-esteem and self-confidence will disappear by itself.
- The best sign of increased self-esteem is that a person begins to do what he was previously afraid of.
Thus, self-esteem can be developed; for this you need to learn to look at the world more optimistically, enjoy even the smallest achievements and work hard on yourself.
Important to remember! If, before the age of 40, a person had low self-esteem, also provoked by her husband’s betrayal, then it will take more time than if insecure behavior is a consequence of the normal process of formation of a teenager’s personality.
Beautiful and confident girl
After a year, a woman who regularly follows the recommendations described above will not recognize herself. Acquiring self-confident behavior is easy. The main thing is to maintain an adequate assessment of reality.
Dependence on public opinion is a factor that destroys personality: we overcome self-doubt
Public opinion can ruin our lives if we give it too much importance.
Constructive criticism pointing out specific mistakes is useful and helps in development, but completely depending on the opinions of others is a big mistake.
Learn to value your own opinion and your own view of things, then the words of others will cease to be so important to you. If, when performing any actions, you think first of all about what people will say, how they will look at you, then you are unlikely to succeed in your endeavors.
Let public opinion depend on you, not you on it. Embody your own will and think less about the consequences.
How to become more self-confident - practical exercises
To develop self-confidence, I recommend doing the following 2 exercises:
- "You're your own clown." Preparation: You dress ridiculously, for example, in curlers, a huge tie, funny clothes. Then go outside, go into stores, generally behave as if this is your everyday appearance. Naturally, you will feel discomfort in this form. But at the same time, your psychological threshold for critical perception of you by others will decrease;
- "Speaker for Life" Try to speak publicly as often as possible. If at work your boss asks someone to prepare a presentation, organize an event, or go on a business trip with an important report, take the initiative and take on these functions yourself. If you have a fear of public speaking, then ways to overcome it have already been described in this article.
Both of these exercises involve getting out of your comfort zone. Our brain begins to think that this behavior is normal for us and these things no longer cause as much stress as before. Remember, the best way to get rid of fear is to do what you are afraid of!
What will work on self-esteem give?
Well, my friends, I hope you have already begun to put into practice the knowledge you have acquired, or you will definitely try to do this in the near future. In order for you to definitely succeed in increasing your self-esteem, let’s consolidate your motivation and consider what qualities a person with positive self-esteem has:
- confident in one's own abilities;
- knows his strengths and uses them;
- knows his weaknesses and accepts them;
- does not look for excuses for his actions;
- does not need the approval of others;
- immune to criticism;
- does not judge people by appearance;
- does not experience unnecessary anxiety or stress because he is confident in himself.
This is only a partial list of what qualities a person has who has worked on improving self-esteem. In my opinion, it’s worth it to grow and develop in this direction, don’t you agree?
How to find yourself and learn to manage your self-esteem - 5 important tips
And now 5 short tips for managing self-esteem:
- Stop comparing yourself to others;
- Stop scolding and criticizing yourself;
- Communicate with positive people;
- Do what you enjoy;
- Take action, don't think about action!
Remember that you are a unique individual with enormous potential and unlimited possibilities. Increasing your self-esteem is one way to realize your full potential.
How to determine that self-esteem is low?
Typically, the following character traits indicate the need to work on improving self-esteem:
- excessive self-criticism when making harmless mistakes;
- fear of mistakes and constant worry over little things;
- increased sensitivity to other people's opinions about oneself;
- unreasonable jealousy due to lack of self-confidence;
- envy of successful people;
- constant search for excuses;
- pessimism and negative perception of events.
Even one of the listed character traits indicates a noticeable lack of self-confidence. If you find several items from this list, you urgently need to increase your self-esteem in all available ways.
Self-esteem test - determine the level of attitude towards yourself today
My self-esteem test consists of a few simple questions that you only have to answer “YES” or “NO.” When you do this, count the number of positive and negative responses.
- Do you often scold yourself for mistakes (yes/no);
- Do you like to gossip with girlfriends (friends) and discuss mutual acquaintances (yes/no);
- You do not have clear goals and you do not plan your life (yes/no);
- You do not engage in physical education and sports (yes/no);
- Do you like to worry about trifles (yes/no);
- When you find yourself in an unfamiliar company, do you prefer to remain “in the shadows” (yes/no);
- When meeting the opposite sex, you cannot carry on a conversation (yes/no);
- When you are criticized does it make you depressed (yes/no);
- You like to criticize people and are often jealous of other people's success (yes/no);
- You are easily offended by a careless word (yes/no).
Key to the self-esteem test:
Answers “Yes” from 1 to 3 : Congratulations, you have normal self-esteem.
There are more than 3 “Yes” answers : you have low self-esteem, work on it.
How to increase self-esteem and attract success
Most people suffer from low self-esteem, but high self-esteem can also become an obstacle to achieving your goals. A person with low self-esteem is sure deep down that there is something wrong with him, that he is not worthy and does not deserve happiness, money, success. And people with high self-esteem believe that they deserve the best, but are often not ready to work for it - they expect everything to come on its own. Both are problems when achieving life goals.
To achieve success, esotericists advise clearing your brain of debris, forgiving everyone and starting to meditate. Financiers advise simply saving and investing money wisely. But for some reason these tips don’t work for most people.
If you want to become successful and start earning good money, you want to become successful and start earning good money, you want to become successful and start earning good money, first of all you need to realize your worth and get rid of internal conflicts . To understand the mechanism, how it works, how incorrect internal attitudes prevent you from loving yourself and achieving your financial goals, becoming a happy and successful person, come to the free master class from Pavel Kolesov “Formula of Abundance”.
Simple practical exercises to increase self-esteem
Here are a few more exercises to help consolidate your success.
- Confront your inner critic.
This is a continuation of the exercise about negative attitudes. Now that you know how to work with it, immediately, without hesitation, give out the antithesis to your inner whiner. For example, you are offered a promotion, a nasty inner voice immediately tightens your voice: “No, you can’t handle it, you can’t, you won’t succeed.” Answer him: “Everything will work out for me, and even if it doesn’t, I will still try, and nothing will stop me. It’s better to do it and regret it than not to do it and regret it. This is just a job, and, fortunately, I am not a neurosurgeon or an astronaut, I can afford to make mistakes.”
- Stop comparing yourself to others.
We all do it, all the time. You must understand only one thing - no one knows what the person with whom you compare yourself really is, what he feels, thinks, what happens behind the closed doors of his home. You are not comparing yourself to this person, but to the small piece of his life that he shows you. This is true even in relation to fairly close people, let alone successful beautiful people from Instagram.
- Compare yourself to yourself.
This is a useful exercise, especially if you are doing something seriously: study, business, etc. Progress is often invisible, you need to look back and reconstruct events, and then you will see how much you have achieved. And also, sometimes the progress really isn’t that great, but there might not have been any.
- Take care of yourself.
People with low self-esteem believe that they do not deserve love and care. And, here’s a surprise, they really often don’t get enough of them. Love yourself - who else if not you. Every day, do something based on your own interests: delicious tea, an expensive dessert, a walk, a good book, a massage. What you love but are afraid to afford.
- Learn to accept compliments.
When someone says something good to you, even you to yourself, don’t brush it off, don’t say: “What are you talking about, it’s not worth it, I just slept today” or “Is this really an achievement, it’s nonsense, here’s Yesenin at my age “Just accept with gratitude (remember the point about gratitude, now is the time to show it) and respect.
- Seek support.
Contact your friends and family, if they are the critics who bring down your self-esteem, find interest groups. Or, sign up for a consultation with a psychologist.
It’s better to move toward your goal at a snail’s pace than to come up with excuses at the speed of light for why you’re standing still.
Bodo Schaefer
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