Attention! Symptoms Of Low Self Esteem Could Be Holding You Back!
Are you experiencing symptoms of low self esteem and constantly quitting projects?
Do you put yourself down all the time? These are just some of the effects of low self esteem that might be preventing you from shutting off that negative voice in your head!
You see, the effects of low self esteem are so subtle that unless we're aware of them, we will always suffer because of lacking strong self esteem.
Some of the definite symptoms of low self esteem include:
- Listening to your negative voice
- Not succeeding
- Comparing yourself to others
Let's take a look at each one and see what you can do differently.
Your Self-talk
We all have conversations going on in our head with different voices.
One voice acts as our supporter with strong self esteem and another voice brings us down every time we feel good.
The effects of low self esteem make us choose to favor the negative voice over the positive one. When we prefer the negative one we are believing it and accepting it's negative view of us.
This is one of the symptoms of low self esteem. If you catch yourself doing this I recommend switching and choosing to listen to the other voice.
"How?" Read positive books. Hang out with positive people. Surround yourself with positive things and let it feed your positive voice.
Your Lack of Success
One of the effects of low self esteem is not believing in our self-worth or our ability to cope with life.
When we find ourselves succeeding at goals, we are contradicting that negative belief. In order for us to keep that negative belief we have to sabotage our success!
Maybe you're not finishing projects? Are you letting go of things that make you happy because you don't deserve it?
If you find yourself in this situation I recommend making time for yourself and going over times in your past where you sabotaged your success.
From there I recommend asking yourself "What can I do differently?" and completing sentence stems.
"Sentence stems?"
This comes from Dr. Nathaniel Branden. You complete sentences without thinking about them. I recommend completing the sentence stem:
"I don't believe I can succeed because_______"
Followed by:
"If I did believe I was worthy of success, I would_____"
He recommends 10 to 15 sentence completions each. Do this at least once to twice a day for one month. You'll start finding what's holding you back from experiencing strong self esteem.
Your Comparisons
Comparing yourself to others is natural and something people do.
Unfortunately taking those comparisons seriously and doing it regularly is one of the effects of low self esteem.
You will not experience the joys of strong self esteem if you're looking at how well or how poorly others are doing.
You see, 'the grass is greener on the other side' and looking for salvation by wishing we were someone else is the same as rejecting ourselves.
Nothing is worse than self-rejection. Hating ourselves is one of the worst ways to live in my opinion.
If you're going to compare, how about comparing yourself to yourself?
You can look back at your past and feel good about having improved certain areas of your life! Or you can feel self-pity for still being in your situation - which is one of the effects of low self esteem.
Focus Now on Curing The Source!
Granted my recommendations can only help with the symptoms. It's like putting a bandage on your wound.
If you want to do some healing I recommend reading about weak and strong self esteem and being retrospective about your own situation.
From now on I recommend educating yourself about self esteem and keep looking for what's causing you to suffer because of low self esteem.
I recommend starting with those sentence stems. Just open a new word document and give them a try!
I also recommend picking up one of Nathanial Brandens' books on Self Esteem. They're a great place to start finding out your source of low self esteem!
