Self-esteem essay

The View of Self-esteem

The view that a person has of themselves is referred to as self-esteem. Self-esteem mainly appeals to a person's feelings, which are where they choose to judge their own merit. Most people's self-esteem is dictated by their encounters of wins, defeats, embarrassment, confidence, or simply knowing what their peers, colleagues, or family say of them. Self-esteem determines any part of a person's life, from their career and studies to their relationships with friends and families, as well as the individual's willingness to trust others. A person’s self-esteem can affect the lives significantly, either positively or negatively, depending on whether their self-esteem is high, too high, little, or too small. As Baumeister writes, “Self-esteem has shown to have a pervasive and powerful impact on human cognition, motivation, emotion, and behavior” (2013). It is important that one finds a balance for their self-esteem. High self-esteem is important, but at the same time, it should not be too high to a point, where the individual becomes too full of oneself. At the same time, it should not be too low to the extent, where a person sees no worth in oneself. Self-esteem is an important aspect of everyone’s life and should be nurtured with care. Having a low self-esteem is not a hopeless situation – there are various steps one can take to increase their self-esteem; hence, these will be discovered in this paper.

Steps to Increase Self-Esteem

As a man thinketh in his heart so is he. The first phase of increasing one’s self-esteem is by first striving to change how they view themselves. The thoughts that an individual has about oneself greatly influences the state of one’s self-esteem. This is because, when a particular thought or perception prevails in one’s thinking for too long, this view translates into a belief (Baumeister, 2013). When this idea becomes something that the individual believes, it gradually turns into the actual reality. This, therefore, means that for an individual to increase their self-esteem, the first step is to change what one thinks about oneself into positive thoughts. With time, these thoughts will develop into positive beliefs about oneself, and then actualize into their reality. Once an individual has felt the effects of positive thinking, the self-esteem is going to be boosted higher.

Avoid Comparing Yourself to Others

Secondly, to increase self-esteem, one should stop or rather avoid as much as possible comparing oneself to other people. Many people tend to compare the state of their academics, professions, relations, or even finances to those of others and use that as a way of gauging how well they are doing. This is a wrong way of evaluating oneself because everybody is unique in their way and has different capabilities, which, when used, have different outcomes (Baumeister, 2013). When an individual compares oneself to others, more often than not, they are tempted to mainly see the ways in which the other person is better than them, rather than the ways in which they are better than the other person. This, therefore, leads one to think lowly of oneself based on comparison with others, hence lowering one’s self-esteem. One should, therefore, strive to evaluate progress independently and not as compared to other people.

Counting Blessings Instead of Losses

Finally, self-esteem can be increased by changing or rather improving how an individual chooses to evaluate the progress in various aspects of life, whether it is school, work, or friendship among others. To increase self-esteem, one should learn how to count their blessings rather than their losses. No human is perfect; therefore, people should avoid seeing how much better their accomplishments would have been and focus more on how good those accomplishments are. This is because striving too hard for perfection may cause one to feel as though they are not good at anything, hence lowering their self-esteem (Baumeister, 2013). It is important for an individual to regularly think about one’s accomplishments and positive outcomes, which, in turn, causes one to think highly of oneself, hence increased self-esteem.

Conclusion

Self-esteem is an aspect of an individual’s personality that should be nurtured and developed carefully. The effect that it has on one’s life should be taken into consideration. Self-esteem, if not well developed, can easily escalate or deteriorate to both extremes, where it is either too high or too low, both of which have adverse effects. Self-esteem should be balanced from its sources or rather from the points of origin should be positive values and perceptions.

Reference

Baumeister, R. F. (Ed.). (2013). Self-Esteem: The Puzzle of Low Self-Regard. Springer Science & Business Media.