Self-Esteem, does it work?

[SadGirl]

Telling yourself that you are good, smart and that ppl like you, is it fool - proof? What if you are a mean idiot. Isn't it too easy for someone to come along and point that out, leaving you back at square one again?

 

[comfortzone]

Unfortunately there is nothing fool-proof. What a person tells oneself can be just as damaging as what others say depending where a person derives their self-esteem. In other words, If someone was to point out our faults and we lower our opinion of ourself based on another person's opinion...our self worth seems to be based upon what others think of us instead of what we think.

 

[Eunoia]

I think our words have a lot of power, even over ourselves. Have you ever heard of people telling you not to "self-talk" in a negative way? ie. saying things like "I'm so dumb" or "I wont' do well on this test" b/c studies have shown that this results in more negative outcomes and lower self- esteem, where as if you were to say "I will try my best and I'll be ok" that the outcome will reflect that mind set. It also kinda comes down to whether you attribute things to your own failure at something or as a result of external circumstances... It's obviously not as easy as that but my point is the way you say things and to what you attribute causes does matter. Self-esteem is defined as "a global evaluation of one's own worth". Research w/ kids has shown that there's two parts to it, first you evaluate how well your ideal self fits with your actual experiences (experience-based self esteem). So if you value popularity but are not considered "popular" your self- esteem will suffer. However, seeing yourself competent in other areas can somewhat buffer this... so the point is how big of a discrepancy there is btwn what you want and what you have achieved. The second part is the overall support you feel you are getting from those people who mean a lot to you. ie. you want to feel liked and accepted.

In our society, most people do care on some level about what others think, so even if you were to tell yourself all those things it'd be pretty difficult not to even listen or consider the negative things somewhat would say (in your example). Then again though, if you really do believe you're all those good things and have a good self-esteem and don't put too much value on what others think, their words may not affect you as much. It's the whole balance thing...

 

[SadGirl]

well I put a lot of weight on sexuality and I was promiscuous so it is hard not to think of myself as a slut.

 

[David Baxter PhD]

Take that word and change it to "a woman suffering from low-self esteem and needing verification from the attention of others" - does that sound like a different person to you? Does it help if you think of another woman you know and apply those two terms to her? Does SHE sound like a different person?

 

[Eunoia]

yeah but those things don't define you. obviously our behaviour is part of who we are and valuing certain things makes that behaviour ok or not ok to us, but that's not all that there is to you. there are ways to get around feelings you have about certain issues by working on them and understanding them. that's one part of your life. the difficult part is that valuing one thing and then not achieving what you want to in that area is a blow to one's self- esteem, and especially if other people remind you of that behaviour, but in the end, it's up to you where to go from here.... it's never too late to change or to even evaluate where that feedback is coming from, ie. is the person telling you these things concerned or just trying to hurt you? I don't know if this makes sense...