Today’s Inspiration: Positivityblog.com
“Self-Esteem is something everybody would like some more of. I like this article because after reading it you really feel like being a bit nicer to yourself. The quotes are lovely as well!”
~Sophie
3 Simple Ways to Start Raising Your Self-Esteem Today
“You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.”
Buddha
“Low self-esteem is like driving through life with your hand-break on.”
Unknown
Your self-esteem is one of the most important things in life. It is one of those things that will make a huge difference for you if you work on it.
As you raise your self-esteem you will for instance:
- Feel more deserving and trusting in yourself. This will allow you to more fully explore your own potential and start going for your dreams and happiness. Instead of holding yourself back in life because you do not think you deserve good things or because of fear of failure, rejection etc.
- Live as you want. Not just when it comes to your goals and dreams. But also in the way that you will be better at standing up for yourself, asking for what you really want, saying no and to not feel pressured by shoulds or perfectionism.
- Stop feeling lousy about yourself and start feeling that you are OK and good. Sure, life still has its ups and downs with better self-esteem but those ups and downs also become easier to handle. And if you become more understanding, accepting and loving of yourself then just about any day in life will become better and happier than it used to be.
But that is not the only thing about self-esteem that I wanted to share today. I also wanted to share three simple ways that you can start using today to start raising or to better maintain your own self-esteem.
1. The daily self-appreciation journal.
It is easy to get lost in basing your self-esteem on just what you accomplish, on what you get done in a day or week. But basing your self-esteem on just that makes it pretty unstable.
One way help yourself out with that and with appreciating what is good and awesome about you is to use a self-appreciation journal.
You can do that by taking out a pen and notepad (or use a word processor on your computer or cell phone) every evening for a week. There you write down 5 things you appreciate about yourself. But make sure that you do not only write down accomplishments. Also write down good stuff related to your core-self esteem. By that I mean things that always there no matter how you perform at work or in school. It could be things/traits like your sense of humor, your kindness, your honesty, wisdom, creativity and so on.
If you like, continue to make this kind of journaling a habit of yours after the first week is up.
2. The stop word or stop-phrase.
We all have an inner critic. The critic can spur you on to get things done and to behave in way that gains acceptance from the people around you. But it can also drag you and your self-esteem down.
The inner critic whispers or shouts thoughts in your mind. It could be thoughts like:
- You are lazy and sloppy too, now get to work.
- No one really likes you for who you are.
- You always fail in relationships.
- You aren’t good at your job at all and someone will figure that out and throw you out.
- You are worse or uglier than someone else.
Now, the inner critic can as I mentioned help you to be productive and so on. But there are alternatives that are better. If you want to become more effective then it will for example be healthier and more productive to remind yourself of your major reasons for doing what you do each day. You could write down the most important reasons why you are focusing on this project, on these classes in school and so on and put that note where you will see it every day.
But, as you start going on that other, healthier path, you also have to stop the critic so it does not start to drag you down. You have to talk back to it.
You can do so by simply creating a stop word or stop-phrase that you say or shout in your mind whenever your critic pipes up with a distorted and self-esteem hurting thought.
Simply say: Stop!
Or use something else. I like these two phrases:
- No, no, no, we are not going there!
- No, that is just stupid.
They have worked well for me to get the inner critic to shut up. Try these ones out or create one that feels good and works for you.
Then use it to not get dragged down by your own inner critic when it may get triggered by for example criticism or a mistake in everyday life. And as you use the word or phrase and it becomes a habit and as you find healthier paths towards what you want your critic will pop up up less and less.
3. Be kind and understanding towards others (and yourself).
By being kinder towards and more understanding of others if becomes easier to do the same to yourself. One simple way to focus on being more understanding and kind when you feel the need to judge someone is to use helpful questions. One I find to be really effective is:
What parts of this person can I see in myself? How is he or she like me?
This one helps me to shift my perspective from what is different and what I feel the need to judge to what we have in common instead. This tears down the mental barriers between us and I can feel closer to and more understanding of this person.
Try it out whenever you feel the need to judge someone, no matter if it is someone close to you or someone you don’t even know.
By doing so it becomes more natural to extend and use this more understanding and kind frame of mind when you view yourself too. And by behaving in this way towards others you will feel better about yourself and in that way raise your self-esteem too.
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Love your Posts!!
Thank you!
Your blogs are proving to be very useful to me. Thank you!
That is so great to hear !
Love the daily self-appreciation journal idea. I use something similar in my coaching. Very useful info! Great Blog!
Self esteem has always been an issue for me, but I am gradually getting better. I really like the idea of the daily self-appreciation journal and I am going to include it in my daily routine from now on. Thanks so much for this wonderful blog! – Simone 🙂
Great!! I’m happy the worksheets are being used 😀
Thanks for this, it’s really set me up for a great Sunday x
Hava a great sunday!
These are very useful tips. Being kind to myself is something I continually work at. I really like the ‘stop’ word one….something I’ll be using more now! Do you use any of these techniques yourself?
I love this post. Thank you so much and continue writing inspiring blog posts =)
Those are some very useful tips – thanks for sharing!
i needed this post today…thank you…
I enjoyed your post about self esteem. Believing in ourselves seems to be one of the most challenging things to accomplish. We forget that everyone is overly qualified at one thing, being ourselves. Living life the way we want is great advice, thanks!
Great article! Totally works with my Micro Goals that will change your life series. Enjoy reading…I rebloged your article. Thank you
Reblogged this on stevoscafe and commented:
Excellent article! Works well with my Micro Goal series…
I like and enjoyed your post! interesting..
Yay, Im happy you enjoyed it!
Reblogged this on haidarsaputra and commented:
great post! enjoy it!