Who am I today?
where your self-esteem is right now, will tell you.
Hello everyone.
Before you read on, you might want to grab a pen and paper or the notes on your phone, this is an interactive article for you to participate in.
Interesting question, isn’t it. Who am I? Have you noticed how your opinion about this changes? even on a day to day basis, sometimes.
Are you wondering why I am linking self-esteem to this question? Or perhaps you know.
Trying to make sense of who we are, why we do what we do and self-esteem is such an enormous subject. I have tried, and please let me know what you think, to take one small piece of it here as a starting point for our self-esteem library, here on Floreo.
First of all, what is self-esteem?
(not to be confused with self-confidence and values, by values, I mean what is important to you eg being kind to others, honesty and so on)? to help you answer this question, imagine if you met an alien who had just landed on this planet and the alien did not understand humans and said, hey human, so nice to meet you, can you help me please? I have heard lots of humans talking about self-esteem, what is this thing they name, self-esteem?
I would invite you to use either a piece of paper or your phone to write it down before you read on, to explain it to our little green friend in really simple terms so he can understand.
How much did you struggle to come up with a definition? It is quite normal to struggle!
It is quite complex, but in very basic terms, for me, self-esteem is about how we see ourselves. It is about, what we call in CBT, our core beliefs. An example of a core belief is “I am good enough”. We usually have a kind of Ying and Yang of these, I am good enough versus I am not good enough. Which one we use when we think about ourselves is dependant on many things, which I won’t get into today, but I will another day. Which core belief we draw on, in any given moment, shapes how we make sense of ourselves, how we think other see us and how we fit into the world.
An example of feeling good enough (good self-esteem):
I know that I feel good about my abilities at work because I received a compliment about my recently completed project that I busted a gut over. I felt good to receive the compliment, was able to say thank you and feel proud. I know that my skills as a project manager are sound and helped me complete that project. I know that I am good enough at work and am good with people. I made a few mistakes but was able to work through them and that is ok as I don’t have to be perfect and we had a really good outcome.
If this example was someone who had low self-esteem, what would that look like instead?
Maybe you notice that you experience both versions of this yourself, at different times in your life?
So lets go on to what your self-esteem is looking like at this moment in time.
As you can see, self-esteem ebbs and flows, dependant on what is going on in our lives at any given moment. It is also dependant on many other factors.
It is also quite normal to feel really great and then have a low, like a rollercoaster. Most of my clients use the word rollercoaster, when they come to see me about improving their self-esteem.
To try to help you take one element of how you see yourself, I would invite you to read through the question in bold below. To take just one, right now, that resonates with you. Answer it in relation to how you are feeling at this moment. Of course, you can do more than one! but to not get to overwhelmed, maybe start, with one.
What is your awareness of who you are (not what you think or perceive what others say, what YOU think) today? Like explaining to our little green guy.
How do you think about your characteristics and traits, what are they? How do you know that is what they are? Is this coming from you or what others have said or you fear they think. There is a big difference.
How you think about your abilities and skills. What are they?
How you think about your strengths and difficulties. What are they?
How you think about the mistakes you make or even fear you have made! What are those nasty mean thoughts you listen to?
What do you expect of yourself. What demands do you make of yourself, is it realistic? is it fair? is it possible? Where do those demands come from? Whose voice do you think of when you make those demands of yourself or who does it remind you of?
Your awareness of what you want from life. Not what others want from you, if you were to put everyone else to one side, what do you really want? Are they two different things?
Whether you accept yourself for the way you are or not. Are you happy with who you are? If not, why not? What is it exactly you don’t like? Can you hear the word ‘should’ a lot?
Whether you approve or disapprove of yourself for who you are. This might be a mix of both so make a list, what do you approve of? and then another list of what you disapprove of.
Whether you wish you were different or not. And again, exactly what is it you would like to be different and would that actually be helpful? If so, how?
Whether you believe you have to change who you are for other people. This is a very interesting one. Exactly what do you think you have to change for others and why?
How you view yourself in comparison to others. Another big one. When you look at others, what thoughts come to your mind. Is there a pattern? Who makes you feel bad, and who makes you feel good, and why?
How confident you are in your abilities, which abilities and why?
How worthy you think you are as a person. Another big one! What does worth mean to you, what are the words that come to mind that describe these?
You could use these questions as journaling prompts as well. I will be making some prompted journaling worksheets shortly you can download. If you keep adding to it over time, you can see how your self-esteem ebbs and flows and look at patterns that may unfold. This can really help with our insight into ourselves.
These are just some questions that can help us make sense of where we are with our self-esteem, how we look at ourselves and how this shapes how we feel we fit into the world.
It is a first step to understanding ourselves better. How we think about ourselves shapes our behaviour and can create helpful or unhelpful unintentional consequences from that behaviour.
The good news is, that wherever your self-esteem is right now there are all kinds of things we can do to change it for the better. But first, we need to know where we are and why!
If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to get in touch with me, I would love to hear from you.
With all kind wishes
Jane
Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist
Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT), Mindfulness & Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
Floreo (Latin for flourish) Self-esteem is not just about confidence, it is the foundation of your human experience. It is your right to feel comfortable with yourself and flourish.
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Hi Jane, these questions are great.. has really got me thinking (and journaling).. so interesting to see what comes up 👍 Thank you 😊
It's slowly starting to sink in that the insanely high bar I set for myself was my father's draconian treatment at work. He was never satisfied. I got a B; he wants an A even though he was a C student at best.