Chapter 1

The Nature of Self-Esteem

In This Chapter

Understanding the difference between healthy self-esteem and low self-esteem

Developing your self-awareness

Improving your relationships at home and at work

Believe in yourself! It’s such a short sentence, but its impact is crucial to having happiness and success in your life.

Self-esteem is how you feel about yourself as a person. Many people base their sense of self-worth on external factors, such as how much money they make, how many material possessions they have, how good-looking they are, and how many friends they have. But any of these can change, and if they do, self-esteem can take a nose-dive.

Real self-esteem comes from an inner knowing that you are competent, confident, and worthy of a good life. It’s recognizing that you can accomplish what you desire to do and be, that you have the ability to be successful in relationships, and that you are happy with who you are.

Defining Self-Esteem

Like everyone, you have a self-concept, a sense of who you are. It’s the perception you hold in your mind about yourself, how you feel about yourself, and the opinions you hold regarding what you can attain in life and how well you can manage everyday demands.

The dictionary says that “self” means “one’s own person” and that “esteem” means “having high regard, respect, admiration.” So people with healthy self-esteem have great respect and admiration for themselves. They hold themselves in high regard.

Conversely, people with low self-esteem have little regard for themselves, don’t respect themselves, and certainly don’t admire themselves. They have little or no confidence and belittle themselves with their own thoughts.

What are the consequences of having low self-esteem? We describe many negative outcomes in Chapter 2. You feel insignificant and lonely. You feel that you don’t matter and that no one cares about you. You have little purpose in life and no reason to dream about doing anything worthwhile. Because you’re not worthy of other people’s love or friendship, you find it difficult to have an open, honest relationship. Most likely, you feel stuck at work, do a mediocre job, and are less likely to get promotions or raises.

Understanding the Foundations of Self-Esteem

As we explain in Chapter 3, the foundations of your feelings of self-esteem have come from your past. The sources are many — your parents and siblings, the neighborhood children you played with, the children you attended school with, your teachers, and religious authorities. All of these people have helped establish how you’ve felt about yourself.

Many of your notions of self-esteem have come directly from how you were treated in your family. If you were given loving attention and praise and if you were spoken to in a polite manner and listened to, these experiences have helped you form a strong sense of self-worth. On the other hand, if you were put down, neglected, or disregarded, or screamed at and disciplined harshly, your sense of self-worth has been diminished or extinguished altogether.

If that weren’t enough, you have also received messages from society about who you should be. These messages can come from movies, television shows, and magazines. They tell you to act a certain way and look a certain way. They tell you how successful you should be and what a great relationship you should have. They tell you that you should have a perfect life, so if you don’t, you feel something must be wrong with you.

All of these factors work together to create core beliefs about yourself in your mind — how you see yourself and how you interpret what takes place in your life. Even as an adult now, you still have the core beliefs you formed as a child.

Throughout this book, we show you how to change those beliefs and become the person with healthy self-esteem that you desire to be. First, you begin to understand yourself more fully by measuring your self-esteem in Chapter 4. Then in Chapter 5, you discover the power of using affirmations and visualizations to create new beliefs.

Healthy Self-Esteem versus Low Self-Esteem

The core beliefs that formed your sense of self-worth as a child are just that — beliefs. They’re not necessarily true or accurate. They’re only your opinions. As opinions, they can be changed.

Healthy self-esteem and low self-esteem are two sides of the same coin. They both activate certain rules for living that either help you or hurt you.

If you have healthy self-esteem, you

Learn from past successes and look forward to future successes
Care for yourself physically, emotionally, and mentally
Create goals in your life and work toward them
Appreciate your positive qualities
Accept responsibility for your actions
Have confidence that you can accomplish things, even if it takes more than one try
Feel capable of meeting life’s everyday challenges
Are happy and sure of yourself

On the other hand, if you have low self-esteem, you

Compare yourself negatively with others
Are anxious, stressed, and worry a lot
Need others’ approval
Fear speaking up at meetings
Fear confrontation with others
Are shy to talk with others you don’t know
Focus on your shortcomings in the past
Have doubts about your worth

In this section, we explain how negative self-talk is damaging to your self-esteem and how positive self-talk can uplift you. We also describe what happens if you have too much self-esteem. Too much? Yes, you can actually have too much self-esteem, so much so that it becomes intolerable to other people.

Taking care of yourself

Because caring for yourself is one of the characteristics of having a healthy level of self-esteem, in Chapter 6, we give you numerous ways to nurture yourself to create more happiness in your life and raise your self-esteem. We describe how to take care of your body by eating healthy foods, doing enough exercise, and getting regular, deep sleep.

We also teach you how to focus on positive emotions by shifting negative feelings that drain you to feelings that uplift and encourage you, and we give you many tips to turn around a bad mood. Finally, we share how to change your thoughts by talking to yourself in a loving manner.

As a bonus, you discover how to speak up in an assertive manner, including how to confront another person using this four-step process:

Expressing what the other person is doing that you want to see changed
Explaining how that person’s behavior negatively affects you
Identifying your emotions
Describing exactly what you want the other person to do instead

Confronting another person may be one of the most difficult things for you to do, and we show you how to do this assertively and calmly, but firmly.

One of the most common ways people experience low self-esteem is in the way they consider their body image. In Chapter 7, we help you reconnect with the positive aspects of your body, while emphasizing the importance of appreciating the real beauty that is on the inside.

Looking at positive and negative self-talk

Your sense of self-esteem is expressed through your inner thoughts. The statements you make to yourself determine how you value yourself and how successful you are in your life. This internal voice inside your head influences everything you experience.

Take a look at the difference in Table 1-1.

Table 1-1 Negative versus Positive Self-Talk

Negative Self-Talk	Positive Self-Talk
I am stupid.	I have strong abilities.
I can’t do it, so why try?	I know I can do it.
I can’t speak up.	I’m speaking up more all the time.
I’m too nervous to focus.	I’m remaining calm and relaxed.
I’m never going to get a good job.	I have confidence that I’ll get just the right job for me.

Your mind deceives you in several ways to make you believe you have little value. In Chapter 8, we discuss these ways and how to refute each one:

Mind-reading
Predicting a negative outcome
Overgeneralizing
Labeling yourself
Blaming yourself
Focusing on the negative and discounting the positive
Using “shoulds”

Do you use any or all of these in your everyday thinking? If so, it’s time to transform your thoughts into optimistic and positive ones. We show you how to do this step by step.

Discarding unsuccessful strategies for improvement

You may feel you can improve your self-esteem by seeking approval from others. You seek reassurance that people like you, and you try to please others by doing everything they ask, even if you don’t want to. You feel insecure and may try to counter these feelings by becoming the center of attention.

You may use your education and workplace achievements to try to improve your sense of self-worth. You may earn more academic degrees or strive to get a better job at a more prestigious company. Both of these may lead to greater competence in the workplace, but if you haven’t dealt with the underlying causes of your lack of self-esteem, you’ll find that once in the workplace, you may not believe you deserve the job you have, or you may procrastinate and belittle yourself if you make any mistakes, no matter how small.

In fact, if you’re like many people who have low self-esteem, you may feel you must be perfect at everything. If you aren’t, you criticize yourself mercilessly, and your productivity actually decreases over time. You suffer from perfectionism, frequently using negative self-talk that says you must do things perfectly all the time and that you’re not worth anything if you don’t do everything flawlessly. In Chapters 9 and 10, we analyze how perfectionism begins, what the characteristics of a perfectionist are, and how to be a healthy high-achiever instead.

Considering whether you can have too much self-esteem

Is it possible to have such a strong self-esteem that your confidence and pride are detrimental? Yes, this can happen. Pride can result in a large ego, one that demands that you’re always right and must be obeyed.

When you have a sense of self-worth that is too strong, you interrupt others when they’re speaking, try to impose your position on others, make decisions for others, and find fault with others without regard to their feelings. You’d rather cause harm or inconvenience to others than bring harm or inconvenience to yourself.

You may even use threats, such as “You’d better” and “If you don’t watch out,” as well as sarcasm and put-downs like “Oh, come on, you must be joking” and “You should have.” Your body language includes leaning forward with glaring eyes, pointing a finger, and using a raised or haughty tone of voice. You may even go so far as to humiliate others. Your aggressive manner encourages others to treat you in a fearful and defensive way.

Obviously, you don’t want to go this far. Having healthy self-esteem means being respectful of others and expressing what you want in a kind manner.

Enhancing Your Self-Awareness

An important step in moving into greater self-esteem is to become more aware of who you are, why you are here, what’s important to you, and what you want. Appreciating every phase of your life and what it’s teaching you, listening to yourself, and knowing, loving, and accepting yourself are crucial. In Chapter 11, we take you on a deeper journey into your inner self to get ready to embrace the new changes you’re about to make.

We help you understand your feelings, why you feel the way you do, what’s keeping you from living life to the fullest, and what you’re missing by hanging on to unconstructive notions about what life can be and what you can become.

We know that being stronger and living your dreams can be scary and create anxiety. Questions can lay heavy on your mind: Will I fall short? Will people like me? Am I prepared? Most people have these apprehensions, so don’t feel alone.

Fear comes from many places, such as uncertainty as to what will happen, past bad experiences, lack of information, and possible mistreatment by others. But beneath all of these is mistrusting yourself. Fear is a mindset that takes control of your life when you can’t reassure yourself that you’re going to be fine no matter what happens.

Interestingly, statistics show that 90 percent of what you worry about will never happen. To live a life with strong self-esteem, dealing successfully with your fears is necessary. We’ve found that there’s only one way to prevail over fear and develop inner strength, and that’s to face the fear. In Chapter 12, we take you through a number of exercises to uncover your core fears and deal with them by flowing with your fears or navigating around them.

After you have a deep understanding of your fears and how to be triumphant in dealing with them, we give you the steps to replace these apprehensive thoughts with words of faith in yourself. This resilient faith supports you in moving forward.

Designing and Attaining Your Goals

People who experience success have an unshakable faith in themselves, can visualize their accomplishments, and are determined and persistent in reaching their goals. In Chapter 13, we help you focus on some of the most important questions you can ever ask yourself:

Who do I want to be?
What do I want to do?
What do I want to have?
Who do I want to help?
How will I help them?
Who do I want to spend time with?
What do I want to spend my time doing?

After you respond to these questions honestly, we direct you on how to set both long-term and short-term goals in your life that will lead to the results you desire as indicated by your answers. Creating these goals has many constructive effects — it generates confidence, encourages interest, inspires hope, and initiates enthusiasm. These qualities are all necessary to achieve your goals, and we give you some additional “secret weapons” you can use to give you the edge to reach your objectives.

Creating Healthy Relationships

Did you know that you’re physically, emotionally, and mentally healthier when you have meaningful and fulfilling relationships? When you’re ill, you’ll get better more quickly if you have a loving support system. If you’re broken-hearted from a romantic breakup, you’ll get back to normal more quickly if you have someone to talk to and pour your heart out to. Relationships are crucial to having a balanced, happy, and healthy life.

What makes a relationship meaningful? It’s all about sharing. It’s opening up to share your true self and having the other person share his true self with you. The more self-esteem you have, the more likely you are to be sincere in relationships. You don’t try to be an image of what the other person wants you to be; instead, you think, speak, and behave in a manner that is genuine and easy for you.

When you have a sense of strong self-worth, you have a healthy balance between happiness that comes from yourself and happiness that comes from your relationships. Although you’re not totally self-sufficient and happy only to be with yourself, you’re also not dependent on people you’re in relationships with to fulfill you. When the relationship is going well, much of your contentment comes from that. When the relationship is not going well or when you have no relationship at all with a particular person, you experience joy from within.

As you’re developing a stronger sense of self-esteem, you’ll be able to have satisfying and fulfilling relationships without the need to be completely dependent on others to define who you are. You can share with others, and you can be contented by yourself too. Both are important.

Before you can develop a healthy relationship with another person, it’s best to understand yourself. First, you need to consider what internal barriers you have to being in relationships. In Chapter 14, you find the seven steps to tracking your behavior in order to change those internal barriers. Then, in Chapter 15, you assess what you like about yourself and discover tips for making friends with yourself.

An important exercise in Chapter 15 helps you understand the lessons of ten pivotal moments in your life. If you only hold onto the feelings of these moments without learning the lessons they have to teach you, the feelings stick with you, causing you to unconsciously create more situations to validate the beliefs you have. By bringing the thoughts and feelings you had in these important moments to the surface and seeing when similar situations returned, you’re able to identify the lessons you need to learn. This exercise helps release you to have deep and enduring relationships.

Falling in love with the right person is difficult if you don’t know what you’re looking for. What you need is different from that of anyone else. Here are some questions to consider:

What do you want in a romantic love relationship?
What are your core requirements?
What worked well in past relationships?
What were your unmet needs in those relationships?
What is your ideal profile of a partner?

In Chapter 16, you go in depth to break through the fantasy of romantic love and identify truthfully and honestly what your core yearnings are. After you’ve met someone, we help you explore the essential questions for you and your potential mate to answer about yourself and your relationship before moving forward.

From romantic relationships, we dive into personal relationships with family and friends in Chapter 17. At the core, everyone wants to be loved, accepted, and appreciated for who she is and what she does. But every person needs to receive these expressions in a different way. Understanding your unique needs is the foundation for understanding the dynamics behind your relationships with people you’re close to.

There are some family members whose behaviors seem intolerable. Is dealing with difficult family members something you’re faced with? If so, the key is to maintain respect and address the behavior instead of criticizing the person. We provide a three-step strategy to preserve your composure while you interact with them:

Live according to how you want people to respect you.
Immediately address any transgression.
Show repeat offenders the door.

If you live in a blended family or have extended family members, you’ll benefit from the “ten B’s” in Chapter 17, suggestions to help you and your loved ones work together to create the best environment for yourselves and your families.

And where would you be without friendships? We assist you in continuing your journey into relationships by giving you pointers on creating deeper connections and overcoming disagreements and hurt feelings.

Being Successful at Work

You most likely spend more time working than most things in your life. You get ready for work, travel to work, do your job during the day, have lunch with associates, come home from work, change from your work clothes into more comfortable clothes, and rest to get ready for your next day at work. You may even bring work home with you. So having a solid sense of self-esteem in the workplace is crucial to having a happy and fulfilled life. Chapters 18 to 20 give you astute ways to improve your performance and likability.

You have a brand. Your brand is your reputation. What is your reputation? Building an effective personal brand and presenting yourself in the best image possible creates a presence that draws people to you. They want to talk to you and hear what you’re up to.

Most successful people plan their journeys to attain their achievements. To prepare for success, you must

Have a vision
Have a plan to attain that vision
Know what you need in the industry you work for
Develop resistance to rejection and affirm yourself
Develop a positive outlook on life that is uplifting and inspiring
Develop a support network
Be strategic with your time and priorities
Be confident, but humble

Becoming the go-to person means you know your stuff in a specific area. How can you establish yourself as the go-to person at work? We show you the steps to provide the solutions that your organization, customers, coworkers, and community need. And as the go-to person, you need to grow the awareness of who you are and your expertise by increasing your exposure at work. You do this by engaging three people in leadership and two up-and-coming influencers who would be interested in what you have to offer. Don’t be concerned about how to do this, though. We provide a list of 21 different strategies to engage them.

Your relationships with the leaders and your coworkers at your job can make or break your work experience, especially if they’re difficult. By understanding others’ core needs, you can uncover what they want and how to respond to them. Asking questions, watching their reactions, and listening for the emotion that drives what they say can lead you in the right direction.

The scariest thing for most people is presenting before a group of people. Whether you’re an amateur or an experienced speaker, we show you how to present with presence, passion, and power both before an audience and at meetings.

Cultivating Self-Esteem in Others

Everyone deserves to have healthy self-esteem, including your family members, spouse, friends, and children. Everyone is unique and has his own special gifts to give to the world. Only if you have a strong sense of self-worth can you bring these gifts to fruition so others can benefit.

Chapters 21 and 22 give you the lowdown on nurturing self-esteem in others. To help both adults and children develop their own self-esteem, you first need to believe in them, even when they don’t believe in themselves — in fact, especially when they don’t believe in themselves. Speaking uplifting and encouraging words and supporting others are essential in assisting them.

This is particularly true with children and teens. They need a safe place to share their feelings and to know they’re accepted. They need to know you’re listening and that you believe in their capabilities. Teach them how to be responsible, prepare them for success, and assist them in making good decisions. You are their model, their example on how to live with healthy self-esteem. Through you, they learn to advance.

Buy a special notebook and put in it only things that celebrate you and the terrific person you are. Find pictures at different ages, mementos of things you’ve enjoyed doing and places you’ve enjoyed being, awards and cards you’ve received, writings you’ve written, and so on. Open your special notebook often, especially in times when you need to strengthen your self-esteem.