I’m often asked by my clients how to make their self-esteem better. Especially when facing unclarity and confusion in certain situations.
And I’d like to ask you:
How do you better your self-esteem?
What I’ve noticed with my clients, and myself, is that when you change the way you view self-esteem, it all becomes much clearer and easier.
Often times self-esteem is thought to be a feeling. And the perception of the level of self-esteem then leads one’s actions. Makes sense.
Until it doesn’t.
Feelings aren’t good masters.
They’re excellent serves, though. Providing you an ample of data of how you experience the current moment.
But they, your emotions and feelings, become poor leaders, if you don’t know how to interpret that data, and take them as facts of how things are.
Therefore, I’d like to invite you to try a new way of looking at self-esteem.
Would you be open to that?
To just try the thought and see if it makes any sense to you?
What if self-esteem, instead of being a feeling, is an action? A conscious action prioritising your wellbeing?
Would that change anything for you?
I know it did for me.
This way, every action provides the opportunity for you to see if you’re esteeming yourself or not. Whether you act from self-esteem or the lack of it.
If, for some reason, you weren’t able to prioritise your wellbeing the way you would have liked to at one moment, the next would offer a new opportunity to change it.
As long as you’re open, willing, and ready to stay conscious of your actions, and, when due, let go of your pride and admitto yourself that you didn’t do so good that time.
Then reflect back, identify the change needed, and express it. To the best of your ability.
But do not make the mistake of thinking that you need to do this for the sake of being a better person.
No.
You do this for the sake of deeper self-awareness, and thus wellbeing.
For when you know yourself deeply, you get to be completely at one with yourself, with your life, and with your leadership.
Then, when you’re completely at one with yourself, with your life, and with your leadership, you’re at one with others, with your purpose, with the planet, and the universe.
And this is the very foundation for a deep sense of meaning. For a deep sense of fulfilment, of wholeness, in both life and leadership.
A foundation for you to build more of you.
Harnessing the true health and wellbeing of your essence, the spirit within. For that serves the higher good of all.
Ok, but that’s an exploration for another time, as I got a little carried away here.
So, let’s return back to self-esteem as action and the question I often get about how to make your self-esteem better.
Let’s tweak that question a bit, now that self-esteem is an action, and ask:
How can you esteem yourself?
Or what kind of action can you take to esteem yourself?
In order for us to determine that, let’s take self-esteem and put it a continuum.
Where at one end you’re extremely good at putting your own wellbeing first.
And on the other, you’re extremely good at putting other people’s wellbeing first.
Your healthy expression of your self-esteem is somewhere in between those two extremes.
Looking at self-esteem like this, it’s easy to see how the same action can’t bring both extremes towards the middle. Towards the healthy expression of your self-esteem.
What I mean by this is that if you’re a person who’s primed to care for others’ needs first, your path to healthy expression of your self-esteem, your way of esteeming yourself, is to radically take care of your own needs first.
If you’re a person who’s primed to care for one’s own needs first, your path to healthy expression pf your self-esteem, your way of esteeming yourself, is to care for other’s needs first.
We all know that in the long term neither extreme alone serves the higher good of all. In reality, both are needed in varying quantities.
Prioritising actions for your own wellbeing first, and prioritising actions for the wellbeing of others first.
The key is to aim at some kind of balance between the two.
And remember, you do not live in only one extreme.
Every person I’ve coached during the past eleven years operates from both, depending on the situation and subject. Even on the people you’re associated with.
In my experience, we all have both of the tendencies within us, so for you to know how to esteem yourself requires reflection on from which side of the continuum you’re coming at that moment, or in that particular situation, or with those people in question.
- Are you prioritising others’ needs too much?
- Or are you prioritising your own needs too much?
Your answer determines how to esteem yourself.
- If it’s too much about others – stop, ask yourself and identify what it is that you actually need.
- If it’s too much about you – stop, ask others and identify what it is that they need.
Remember! It’s about aiming at a sufficent balance between these two.
Also another gentle reminder!
(Which comes to mind as I just had a conversation about this with one of my clients the other week)
If you’re accustomed to live much of the time closer to one of the extremes, finding the middle ground comes with overreactions.
It truly is the only way to locate the middle.
Just keep doing your best until you know better.
And be gracious, both with yourself and with your people, in the process.
With my all,
Paula
xx
Ps. If this topic resonates with you, and you have further questions about it, I invite you to send me a message – I look forward to hearing from you!