Self-Esteem- Why does it matter?
For every one of us, our self-esteem has a huge impact on how we live our lives. It affects our thoughts, the decisions we make and how we treat ourselves throughout our lives- all pretty important things! But what actually is self-esteem?
To have ‘esteem’ for something simply means to respect it or believe it has value. Self-esteem is therefore how you value and feel towards your own self and whether you accept and have confidence in who you are.
High self-esteem, or good self-esteem, means you appreciate and value yourself. You are able to think positive thoughts about yourself and when you make mistakes, as we all do sometimes, you accept and forgive yourself. You’re more likely to make decisions and try new things, backed by the belief that you are good enough and deserve to be happy.
Whilst it is healthy and good for us to have high self-esteem, it is only natural to experience times when you doubt yourself and your abilities. Stress, high expectations from others, difficult life events and many other factors can affect the opinion you have of yourself. A big one is comparison. You might look at your friends' appearances, abilities and strengths, comparing yourself against them. Perhaps you know that feeling of ‘’I’m not good enough” that often follows.
Low self-esteem describes that ‘not good enough’ state of mind. You criticise yourself, doubting your abilities and strengths. You might then struggle to move through difficult or new situations because you don’t believe you are capable. You are hard on yourself and expect little of yourself in the future. Even people who come across confident might be struggling with this feeling inside.
Low self-esteem in the long-term can make day-to-day life challenging and can lead to greater mental health struggles. Your self-esteem matters and it is great to find ways of making yourself feel good, valued and confident.
Some top tips include
making time for self-care activities
challenging critical, negative thoughts by replacing them with more positive alternatives
changing who you follow on Instagram, snapchat and Tiktok to reduce negative comparison
remembering the good things people have said about you - write them down
journaling about your thoughts and feelings
There are so many ways we can work towards better self-esteem, something we are really passionate about at Flourish - it forms a really important focus of our mentoring and group courses!
Check out some of the resources on the Flourish Hub about self-esteem.