how to develop positive self esteem?

[theking00]

How can i improve my self confidence? Does affirmation work? 

Edited September 17, 2019 by theking00

[Knock]

Follow the 6 pillars of self esteem: essentially -

1. Take fully responsibility for your life
2. Accept that you are never perfect and love yourself
3. Stick to your word and be congruent with what you say and what you do
4. Have a long term vision that you want to work towards and take the necessary steps to get there everyday
5. Be intentional with your actions
6. Be highly assertive in what you want, never be afraid of asking.

As a bonus, get rid of negative beliefs and disempowering labels. 

This is actually a very big topic, and there is a lot of nuance in what was said above. 

What specifically brought about this question? Is there something you want confidence towards?

 

[theking00]

I become conscious of my negative thinking. 

[Ananta]

5 hours ago, theking00 said:

How can i improve my self confidence? Does affirmation work? 

Affirmation can work,  but in conjunction with other positive behaviors, such as trying to make others happy. This works best in-person so you get feedback right away. Like smiling at ppl, holding the door for someone, small things like that...or volunteer at a soup kitchen or homeless shelter. Ppl will show their gratitude and hence this may boost your self esteem. 

 

 

[Forestluv]

A positive orientation can help, yet I’ve also found it important to decondition stuff that was programmed into me. As well, actions are really important. Taking the actions of someone who is healthy. One thing I did was train for a marathon. For the first couple of years, I felt like an imposter - some guy pretending to be a marathon runner. Yet then a funny thing happened. After running marathons for years, I was training newbies for their first marathon. People regularly came to me for advice about training, injuries and nutrition. Then one day I suddenly realized “Holy shit, I’m a marathon runner. This is it”. All that action transformed my mind, body and spirit. . . . So what actions can you take to transform your mind, body and spirit? The next 10 years will pass whatever actions you take. Why not take actions that will transform you into an amazing person?

[Ananta]

@Serotoninluv

Nice post!

 

[Rigel]

Honesty, honesty, honesty

If you're honest with yourself and others you instantaneously remove the need to prove anything, to remember lies you told, to act a certain way, and you can look at what you are as just that: what you are.

Look at honesty as boosting your freedom to insane levels even though nothing external as to change(which doesn't mean it can't.)

Even the notion of being confident flies out the window. An honest being does not need to care about being confident he just lets life unfold before him in the most authentic way. It comes across as being confident to others but really it's not. 

Your honest self holds no fear. Now let me ask you why aren't you confident right now? What do you fear? 

Doesn't mean you go do or say whatever you want if it is going to hurt people. Be smarter than that. But most important: be honest. 

High five ✋there we go. You can do it?

[NoSelfSelf]

Love your guys respons!

[Leo Gura]

Nathaniel Branden's work.

[herghly]

@Leo Gura Any suggestions for more sentence stems? I've done the ones in the book

[Eph75]

For me building a fundamental understanding for how emotional impulses work was essential and helped me to get "unstuck" about a year ago, understanding what the impulses are for and how we misuse them.

Further understanding how emotional impulses in the rawest form are neither positive nor negative but instead they are pleasant or unpleasant. What we do is apply interpretation to these in themselves harmless emotional impulses and turn them into, for the most part, negative sensations as we're prone to being negative from a survival perspective.

Lack of action turns into procrastination, anxiety and angst. In the long term, depending on which of the primary affects we're talking about, and this is detrimental to self-esteem and self-worth.

It might be interesting to look into Sylvan Tomkins research on affect theory. A lot of our problems stem from a poor relationship with our emotions, that which is closest to us all and effect us tremendously. Negative thinking is a huge part of this, getting to terms with this is good and limits the effect, but it's important to understand the underlying cause and examine those as well.

A spin-off on unpleasant emotional impulses is that we do hold the power to change so that we redefine what previously was negative into something positive, e.g. anxiety is more than likely to be an invitation for growth and we can learn to want and like anxiety as we start seeing it as a possibility rather than a limitation that holds us back and down.

Edited September 19, 2019 by Eph75

[LeoIsMe69]

Learn to love, accept and forgive yourself completely. Then forgive others. 

[Strangeloop]

On Tuesday, September 17, 2019 at 11:17 PM, Knock said:

Follow the 6 pillars of self esteem: essentially -

1. Take fully responsibility for your life
2. Accept that you are never perfect and love yourself
3. Stick to your word and be congruent with what you say and what you do
4. Have a long term vision that you want to work towards and take the necessary steps to get there everyday
5. Be intentional with your actions
6. Be highly assertive in what you want, never be afraid of asking.

As a bonus, get rid of negative beliefs and disempowering labels. 

 

I'm going to contempmate these right on the spot, correct me if I'm wrong.

1. Taking full responsibility for your life. 

This means that every thought every action you take is yours, there isn't anyone else who has been at fault for your actions. You are responsible for your body self.

2. Accepting the imperfect you and loving yourself

This means that every mistake you make is there for a reason, it's a lesson it's there for you to see on what you can improve, if you see your self as perfect then you won't be able to grow because you will deny every mistake, justifying it and blaming others or the environment for your own mistake.(similar to first point) Loving yourself means having faith in yourself, even encouraging yourself in your mind or on paper. Telling yourseld positive things, giving advice to yourself (I do it now), and making sure that there is a lot of acceptance of the present moment.

3. Having integrity

Integrity means to say and to do exactly what you said. If you don't do what you said you would do then you are lying to yourself and others. 

4. Having a vision and taking the steps towards it.

This point is very important. From the vision you find meaning and purpose, first find this vision or several, you can do anything. The vision is there to motivate you, sometimes it can scare you and it might bring some worry and anxiety. Be like a river go with the flow, simply follow your intuition, if you don't know what it is, find out about it. Take small steps, the vision won't happen overnight, it takes time, there is a lot to do before you even get to your vision.

5. Be intentional with your action

I don't know about this one, I read this book though, I don't remember what it said about this point. Most of my action is unintentional. Without meaning, I guess because going too much with the flow hurts as well. 

6. Assertiveness and questioning.

On questioning you should watch Leo's video on "The power of questions". Assertiveness is when you say something and you are sure that it's true, though that's false assertiveness. What is real assertiveness? Being confident in your thoughts, accepting if you're wrong, apologising for it. Not too apologetic. Knowing when to stop and where to start.

[hyruga]

All these cannot be covered with just a few paragraphs of words.

For example, having integrity also means you do not commit crimes in general. Do not laugh at people, beat down people or push someone off the cliff. It also can mean owning up to your mistakes. So it is more than just about yourself, it is also for others.

 

[Farnaby]

For me, affirmations don't work too well. They feek kind of "fake". If I'm feeling insecure or in some way "not enough" I can't convince myself through positive affirmations. 

Sure, looking at the reasons the thought "I'm not enough" isn't true helps, but the feeling doesn't completely vanish. 

Personally, I find accepting every feeling, watching it mindfully and with compassion is more effective. 

Also, changing your body posture (although this also feels fake at first but it helps). 

Another thing that's important is taking action towards goals that make you feel like you're growing. Find some goals to pursue regarding your professional life, personal life and exercise and healthy diet is really important too. 

I've also found that doing what you're afraid of doing despite not feeling good enough for it or despite the fear and negative self talk helps a lot.

Lastly, I reccomend going to therapy so you can explore the roots of that low self esteem in depth. 

Oh and like others said, honesty and integrity is a very important part as well.

Hope this helps!