Self esteem is a complex psychological issue that takes years to address. Individuals who present for therapy usually suffer from low self esteem. They think little of themselves, and at their core, feel unworthy of love, attention, affection, or success. Self esteem is at the root of most psychological disorders.
Causes of Low Self Esteem
Childhood Abuse
This is the most rampant and obvious cause of low self esteem. Individuals who suffer abuse as children and are raised in an atmosphere of rejection will begin to feel helpless and worthless, caught in a cycle of having their hopes raised then dashed. When this happens over and over again, it sends a message to the child that he/she will not be able to make a happy life for themselves. Much of the abuse is psychological. The child is confronted with verbal insults about their abilities, their worth, their usefulness, their intelligence or the way that they look. The child can only believe what is said after repeated exposure to abuse.
Guilt
The individual who suffers from guilt believes that they are a bad person. “Bad” in this case can mean weak, greedy, selfish, dumb, etc. This could be because of something they have actually done in their past, or it could be perceived badness often based on someone else’s evaluation. Many survivors of trauma suffer from guilt. They may come to believe that whatever happened to them happened for a good reason. Rape survivors often attribute the rape to something about them; the way they look, they way they dress, many report they feel they have a bad sexuality about them that others want to exploit. Others believe themselves to be gross or weak. They end up taking the responsibility for someones else’s wrongs.
Unrealistic Expectation of the Self
Some people regard themselves as individuals who are “supposed to” be able to do XYZ. Some of these expectations may be completely or partially out of line with what the person is actually able to achieve. Because they try and fail at fulfilling these expectations, they end up feeling very low and worthless. Often they appear to have an inflated ego, but then rarely are able to come through on promises that they make to themselves or others. These expectations are placed on them by their parents originally, and then internalized. They come to believe that in order to be worth anything they must live up to those particular expectations. They spend much of their time comparing themselves to other people and feeling jealous of their accomplishments. They often have such high performance anxiety that they inevitably fail at those very tasks they are supposed to be able to effortlessly perform. People who are perfectionistic tend to fall into this category.
Social Adjustment Difficulties
Much of self worth is gained through interactions with others in the world. If we are socially successful and a lot of people like us we tend to feel better about ourselves. There has to be something that we feel others value in us: talent, money, sense of humor, beauty, or ability to help just to name a few. When peers seem to be drawn to us for whatever reasons, this raises our self esteem. When peers avoid us, laugh at us, and ostracize us, we feel like there is something wrong with us or we have nothing to offer. Some of us are great at winning people over, quickly commanding the respect and attention of others, while some of us struggle with social awkwardness.
What to do About it?
Ok, brace yourself because this is going to take a lot of patience, time and effort. Self esteem is notoriously difficult and slow to raise. You need to make some changes in the way you operate if your self esteem is going to improve. In fact, raising your self esteem is going to be one of the most difficult things you have ever done.
Finding the root cause of your low self worth is your first task. For this you may need to start going to therapy and analyzing your childhood, your role in your family of origin, and your peer relationships. Once you have figured out where your feelings about yourself originate, you can start to target your self esteem with effective strategies. Here are a few general suggestions:
Raise Your Chances For Success
Set goals for yourself that are small and achievable and work on those. Make sure those goals are not too lofty or impossible, they should be things you are very confident you can achieve that would make an immediate difference in your life. A few examples could be to clean your room, cut down from 10 cigarettes a day to 8, sign up for the gym, learn to cook something, write in your journal for five minutes, finally buy and assemble a piece of furniture you’ve been needing… You see the gist of this.
Decrease Self-destructive Behaviors
Decrease behavior that makes you feel bad about yourself that are within your control. To name a few: smoking, eating badly, waking up late, not throwing out the trash, acting irritable at work, procrastinating.
Improve your overall health
This method is a relatively easy route to higher self esteem. Exercising more, eating better, going to needed doctor’s appointments all send the same underlying message: I’m worth taking care of. At the very least you are taking care of your health and that is actually quite something!
Stop Judging Others
If you have grown up in a very judgmental atmosphere where everything was subject to harsh criticism, and ridicule, you are likely going to have a poor self image. For some people this colors their interactive style and their sense of humor. Everything in the world is to be made fun of and criticized. This might be funny at times, but it will affect your self esteem. Pay attention to the judgments you make and know that you turn those judgments inward.
Contribute To Society
This could mean you volunteer your time helping others. Find your value and your worth by experiencing what it feels like to give rather than to acquire. Perhaps you throw a fundraiser for your favorite charity, or just donate food to a pantry. Whatever you feel will bring you the most fulfillment.
Accept Your Flaws
This one is a process so be patient. If you are going to be successful at this, then you have to start to make friends with the concept that you are who you are. Some people feel a real sense of grief when they go through this process because they have to let go of all those things they wish they could be. We strive to better ourselves, and this is fine. But before anything else you have to accept who you are just as you are. I can guarantee you that you are not perfect, and this has to start to become OK.
Resolving Posttraumatic Stress Disorder
This means therapy again. Many negative thoughts about the self are related to traumatic moments in our lives that can be identified and processed. EMDR is especially helpful for self esteem problems that are born this way.
On a very last note, some good new about low self worth. Your difficulties with self esteem may be very uncomfortable for you. People that go through life feeling badly about themselves are at a higher risk for depression but oddly enough, research proves that low self esteem is not indicative of lack of success. In other words, at the end of the day low self esteem doesn’t seem to actually affect what you achieve in life, just how you perceive what you achieve.