Where do we get our sense of self-esteem? Self-esteem is the reflection of an individual’s overall evaluation of her or his own worth. Everybody at one time or another has struggled with low self esteem. Self esteem is influenced by our relationships, support systems, parenting styles, childhood, personal assets, perceived successes or failures, and our self talk.
What do I mean by self talk? Self talk is the internal dialogue that goes on inside our head all the time. Often times we give ourselves messages also called cognitive distortions that are self defeating. For example, Sam has a work project that is due today. Sam went out to his car to get the project and all of a sudden realized he had forgotten the project at his house. Sam’s boss seemed disappointed, but told him just to bring it in tomorrow. For the rest of the day Sam gave himself messages like, “You are such a failure,” “You do nothing right,” and “Your boss hates you and thinks your worthless.” These statements are overgeneralizations and are simply not true. You can probably imagine that if Sam gave himself messages like this every day, his sense of self worth would take a plunge down south.
Low self esteem is expressed differently in each persons life. For example, sufferers of low self esteem may appear shy, intelligent, outgoing, lazy, incompetent, confident, or perhaps like they have it all together. Contrary to popular belief, you can’t always tell when someone struggles with low self esteem. Sometimes women will cover up low self esteem by paying extra attention to their outside appearance such as regular hair dyes, fake nails, tanning sessions, makeup, new clothes, etc. Likewise, men may focus on fitness and health to overcompensate for a low self esteem. As a disclaimer statement, looking attractive and staying fit by no means indicates low self esteem rather it’s the extremes on both sides we’re talking about. Sometimes people may exhibit chronic low self esteem where they don’t remember thinking about themselves in a positive way. For others they may have just experienced a break up, job loss, or abusive relationship where their self esteem has been shaken. The thoughts we carry about ourselves have a great impact on the quality of our relationships, career success, and personal growth.
Counseling can make a tremendous difference in improving ones’ self esteem. By working together with the individual we explore relationships, habits, thought patterns, choices, and experiences that may have been sources of low self esteem. With this knowledge, we can begin the process of reframing thoughts, identifying strengths, and developing a real sense of self awareness and self acceptance. If you or a loved one in the Aurora area struggles with low self esteem, Aurora low self esteem counseling can help, call us today for an initial consultation at 303-481-4229.