The Greats Didn’t Start That Way

By Bob Proctor

Basketball fans and in fact most people know the story, that Michael Jordan, considered by many to be the greatest basketball player who ever lived, was cut from the squad when he was a sophomore in high school.  Fortunately, he didn't quit playing and the results speak for themselves.

Football fans who have followed the NFL for many years consider Joe Namath to be one of the finest athletes, and certainly one of the smartest, most confident quarterbacks with a great arm, who ever played the game.  As a sophomore in high school he weighed 135 pounds and was five feet seven.  He came from an athletic family, had athletic abilities and his older brothers were helpful, but he was the fourth-string quarterback on the JV squad.  After the second game he approached Bill Ross, the athletic director and head coach at Beaver Falls High School, saying he was thinking about quitting the game "because I'm too small to ever be a quarterback."

Bill Ross smiled and agreed that Joe was too small then and that he wouldn't play much as a sophomore, but "I knew he was a good athlete and that he would grow.  I told Joe that it was the wrong time to quit, that he hadn't proved himself one way or the other so I said 'Go home and think about it overnight before you make your final decision.'  The next afternoon he was back at practice.  Before the end of the season the JV squad played Elwood City in an away game, Namath was phenomenal and the football legand was on his way."  Message: Don't quit.  Stay with it and I'll SEE YOU AT THE TOP!


SOURCE

12:50:00 - By Vincent 0

4 Scientifically Proven Ways for Recovering Self-Esteem after Failure

BY Ilka Emig 

Have you ever failed miserably?

I certainly have. It’s awful isn’t it?

Failure leaves you disappointed, angry, desperate, and hopeless.

It crushes your self-esteem and convinces you that you’ll always be a failure.

You wish you could know how to get your self-esteem back.

Well, we’ve all failed at least once in our lives. Living without failing is simply impossible.

We fail if we don’t reach a goal. We fail if we don’t deliver as required or if we don’t perform as expected. And we fail if we make a mistake.

Some failures are better to hide than others, and that’s why some people seem to never fail. But deep inside, covering things up is hard, isn’t it?

Because one part of you always knows that you have failed and how you feel about it: Your brain!

You just may not realize how much your brain controls your responses to failure.

You also may not realize how much control you have over your brain —and how that can empower you.

You Control the Power to Change your Brain

As we go through life, our brains create new connections that affect our beliefs and emotions, often to the detriment of our self-esteem.

Fortunately, we have the power to change our brains to help rid our minds off the beliefs that don’t serve us.

The science behind this is called neuroplasticity, a fancy word for a simple but fascinating truth: the brain can always change throughout life.

It doesn’t just learn and create new connections; it can also break old connections.

This amazing ability of the brain and the nervous system to re-organize its structure, function and connections is researched more and more.

This knowledge is used to understand how we learn and de-learn as adults. It is also important in the medical field to help people recover after brain injuries or strokes and to understand addictions and mental diseases like depression.

This knowledge is also important if you want to change your brain.

So if you want to recover your self-esteem after failure, the following four ways will reprogram your brain to create beliefs that boost your confidence:

1. Break the connections that steal your self-esteem

It happens to all of us. We make a mistake that causes us to fail.

Now we are desperate, angry, and unbelievably sad. We then obsess over our stupid mistake —the one that kept us from reaching our goal.

This obsession causes our brains to constantly create new connections. With every new connection, our brains learn again and again that we are a failure.

With every new connection, this belief becomes stronger and stronger.

So you must not let it be engraved in your brain that you are a failure. You failed. That is part of life, and it’s perfectly ok. But you are not a failure.

There’s a big difference. Obsessing about it gives too much power to the failure, and you’re just wasting your precious time doing so.

Fortunately, you can make and also break connections in your brain.

If we take the focus from what causes the connection, we can stop new connections. If we don’t think about it for a while, the connection can be broken.

So, be disappointed and angry, stamp your foot, or shed a tear, but then shake it off. You can do that by following some practical tips:

• You can actually shake it off by physically shaking your hands. That might sound a little silly, but it works. The brain reacts to movement.

• If you lean more toward symbols, you could write your mistake on a piece of paper and then burn the paper – or tear it into many small pieces. I have done this before, and it has a wonderfully liberating effect.

• You could also make a list of all of your accomplishments and consciously focus on them. See that you are capable of so much and make your mistake look small and irrelevant.

Stop thinking about failure and your brain stops treating you as a failure.

So forgive yourself, treat yourself compassionately, and you’ll break those bad connections that wound your self-esteem.

2. Create goals that guarantee success

People often fail because they set unrealistic goals, and, also they often plan and execute wrong while trying to reach their goals.

By wanting too much too fast, we set ourselves up for failure.

By impatiently pushing towards a goal, we lose our focus on what needs to be done and fail.

In the end, all we do is program our brains to believe we are incapable of succeeding.

If this is why you’ve failed, you can recover your self-esteem by learning to set small achievable goals, give yourself more time, and plan better.

You can also track your goals and reward yourself every time you have reached one of your smaller goals.

Don’t be foolish and think only reaching a final major goal can be called success.

What we see as a big success is always the sum of many small steps and successes. So, don’t forget that every time you reach a goal you do experience success.

How to measure success – should be part of your initial planning.

And experiencing success is even more crucial and important than you might think; because your brain is again involved in this experience.

The smaller the goals, the more likely you are to succeed. And while you experience success, your brain shows high measurable brain activity.

It results in increased motivation, self-esteem, and happiness, which only increase your likelihood of succeeding again in the future. Success is what you need to go on.

Don’t expect to be a billionaire in half a year, to perform as a musician at the Sydney Opera after a few years of practice, or to lose half your body weight in a month, though.

Set yourself up for success with achievable goals.

3. Ensure you’re prepared, and try again

On your way to success after failure, don’t forget an embarrassingly simple strategy that appears to be a little bit out of fashion these days.

That strategy is to practice, practice, and practice. By practicing, we gain knowledge of how something works and the confidence with everything we do.

While you may have failed you can build your self-esteem by trying again and this time making sure you are prepared.

For important information to travel from short-term memory to long-term memory, we must repeat things at least three to five times.

Doing something only once is not enough to have it stick; unless it is mind-blowing.For the best results, repeat it as much as possible as often as possible.

Repetition tells the brain first of all that this must be important and that it is better to keep it in the long-term memory.

Repetition is also increasing the connections in the brain up to the point where a behavior or activity happens almost automatically.

Have you ever been to a conference and listened to a presentation?

Some of the presenters look totally surprised at every new slide on the screen. They lack easiness, and they have to read every slide. They are usually the people that have not practiced.

The information presented is not engraved in their long-term memory, and they look insecure.

The self-confident and entertaining presenters have practiced many times; probably with a timer next to them.

The information they present is engraved in their long-term memories and is available to them anytime. They are confident, and they represent self-esteem.

The same goes for playing an instrument, presenting results to the boss, studying for an exam, doing sports, or learning a language.

So, what you do with practicing after a failure is getting prepared to try again.

It is important to get up and not to give up after a failure. But this time try it differently by being better and more prepared.

So, get busy practicing so that you can enjoy some true self-esteem.

4. Teach your brain the truth about fear

When we fail, we often develop a lot of fear. This fear stops us from taking action and messes with our goals. It prevents us from wanting to try again. It sabotages our self-esteem.

Since fear is also important for our survival, we can’t just get rid of it.

Imagine you are standing in front of a poisonous snake. You need your instincts and all the adrenaline that fear powers into you, to run and survive.

What we don’t want is the fear that stops us, and the fear that feeds more fear and blocks our self-esteem.

Fear is complicated. Fear does not happen in one area of the brain. There exists acomplex system of different brain areas all working together.

So if you’ve failed at something and then developed a lot of fears that are shattering your self-esteem, you must teach your brain that the threats it’s feeling are not real.

Here are some tips on how to manage and control your fears:

Analyze your options

It is essential to evaluate and analyze different options. Don’t think you are stuck with only one option. Look into all the options you can think of, even if they seem odd or scary.

Then rank them according to the risks they present.Finally, chose the option you want to try with confidence and consideration.

Familiarize yourself with what you fear

Regain your self-esteem by slowly getting familiar with the situation or the thing you fear. Expose yourself to a situation, observe it, and get familiar with it.

Doing so gives you control over fear, and your brain learns that no threat, but rather something familiar is present.

Talk about it

We often hide, and are embarrassed about our fear and our lost self-esteem. Sharing and speaking it out loud makes a huge difference.

This little boost of our self-esteem can reduce our fear. While we talk about it, we usually experience that a person we talk to is empathetic with us.

Surprisingly, the other one does not see us as low as we think of ourselves. This reality helps us to change our perspective and boosts our self-esteem too.

Ask for help

Maybe you are scared your work, and your abilities are not good enough. Consider getting help from an expert.

For example, a blog post that went through an editor will allow you to hit that submit button with more confidence. Or taking a few lessons before an audition will allow you to show up with earned self-esteem and reassurance.

Final Thoughts

Now we know that our brains control our responses to failure.

We also know that we have control over our brains and how we can use that to be empowered. Isn’t that amazing?

Failure is not the end of the world. What is important is to get up and go on.

For this, we need to recover our self-esteem first, so that insecurities, fears, and wrong beliefs won’t stop us again.

It is also important that we learn from our failures so that we don’t repeat previous mistakes. It is important to sit and see what went wrong.

We might do that alone or even with some help from outside.

Then we have to re-set our goals and re-evaluate our strategies. As we have learned in this post, we can do that using our precious tool of understanding our brains.

We can stop thinking about mistakes, and we can shake them off. We can set ourselves up for success and find motivation, self-esteem, and happiness.

We can practice to keep information in our long-term memories and gain confidence. Being prepared with knowledge we can get ourselves together and try again.

And finally, we can understand and control our fear to overcome it.

Over To You –

What are your experiences with regaining your self-esteem after a failure? Do you see failure and success differently after understanding your brain better? Let me know in the comments below.

SOURCE

13:30:00 - By Vincent 0

DIVERSIFY YOUR IDENTITY

By Mark Manson

I don’t watch much TV, but if there were a channel that played Tony Robbins seminars non-stop, I’d watch it like a teenage girl glued to an America’s Next Top Modelmarathon. Say what you want about Robbins (opinions range from him being a complete hack and fraud to him being the second coming of Jesus Christ; my opinion is somewhere in the middle), but his seminars are never dull. The guy knows how to market helping people.

For the uninitiated, Robbins’ seminars have some informal portions where people in the (massive) audience are able to stand up and address their personal issues with Tony one-on-one, in a kind of private counseling session… in front of 2,000 other people. Tony manhandles their emotional worlds, reshaping their realities in front of your eyes, all to thunderous applause. Whether it’s genuine or not, it’s never boring, and it’s usually educational.

(A good friend of mine who is a psychologist and therapist refers to Robbins as the Batman of Psychology — sometimes he has to break the rules and do some unethical things, but it’s always for the greater good.)

In one seminar, a middle-aged man in the audience stood up and confessed that he was suicidal. He then shared his story: he was a finance guy, a very good finance guy. He made a fortune and not only that, but his friends and family members gave him their savings to manage and he made them fortunes as well. His entire life he had been successful and made a lot of people a lot of money.

And then one day he lost it all.

When prodded by Robbins, his reasoning for wanting to kill himself was that his life insurance policy would pay enough to support his wife and children after he was gone, whereas if he stayed alive, his family would be saddled by debt and left broke. When Robbins threw out the obvious point that while his kids would grow up with financial stability, they wouldn’t have a father, the man calmly asserted, “Yes, exactly. That’s the idea.”

What immediately strikes you is this man’s dumbfounding belief that his kids need financial stability more than a living father. And it’d be easy to discount him as a loony for that and be on our merry way.

But if we take a moment and empathize with him and dig a bit deeper into his motivation, we discover something important about his self-perception: This man perceives the value of his own life to be nothing more than financial.

He has no sense of value in himself as a father, husband, friend, companion, not to mention any other skills or hobbies. It’s not just that he thinks his kids would be better off with money than with him, it’s that he believes his only value as a person is his ability to make money.

Superhero Robbins quickly pounced on the nub of the issue: this man had never emotionally invested himself or identified with his roles as a father, a husband, a friend, a colleague — he had invested all of his identity (and time and effort) in making money and becoming rich. Then once his wealth vanished, so did his entire sense of self.

A while back, I saw a short video of Tim Ferriss and in passing he mentioned a concept called “identity diversification.” He more or less said the following:

When you have money, it’s always smart to diversify your investments. That way if one of them goes south, you don’t lose everything. It’s also smart to diversify your identity, to invest your self-esteem and what you care about into a variety of different areas — business, social life, relationships, philanthropy, athletics — so that when one goes south, you’re not completely screwed over and emotionally wrecked.

I loved this idea. It’s one of those ideas that’s so obvious yet elusive. When you hear it, it makes you feel like you just woke up. Identity diversification.

WHAT IS IDENTITY?

Whether consciously or unconsciously, we all choose what’s important to us; we choose what we value. We choose the measuring sticks with which we measure success and our self-worth. Common measuring sticks people often choose include: being professionally successful, being highly educated, making a lot of money, being an excellent father/husband, being pious and faithful in a chosen religion, being socially and/or sexually popular and desired, being physically attractive or beautiful, and on and on.

Whatever we choose to judge our self-worth by, be it how big of a fan we are for our favorite sports team or making more money than any of our friends or getting more attention from the opposite sex, we are choosing in which way we want to receive validation to feel good about ourselves. Like a mural, whatever you choose to value and receive validation from conglomerates into your overall identity.

Most of us naturally gravitate toward certain aspects of our identity merely through growing up and having attention or praise lavished on us for particular reasons. Maybe you were the smart kid, or the good-looking quarterback, or the popular musician, or whatever. The validation we receive growing up largely determines how we choose to value ourselves in our adult life.

Some of us also experienced emotional traumas early on and therefore many of us get fixated on certain aspects of our identity more than others. Social pressures can also force us into over-identifying with a certain aspect of our identity, which then drowns out other areas of our lives.

For instance, the movie Blow is a true story about drug smuggler George Jung. Jung grew up in a poor family with a father who had trouble paying the bills. As a result, Jung grew up identifying disproportionately with earning money and being rich and doing it in whatever way he could. Once he began smuggling drugs, the social pressures of those around him, the drug cartels and the lifestyle he lived continued to reinforce his choice to receive validation from money and wealth. Even if you haven’t seen the movie, it’s fairly obvious that eventually his life unraveled along with all of the relationships which mattered to him.

In my own life, I over-identified with my sex life and the validation I received from women. This led to me becoming depressed and living on a couch with no job. Later on, when I was building my business and often working 14-16 hour days simply to make a rent payment, a simple refund request or 2-3 days with no new sales could send me spiraling into a depression. Both of these examples from my life were times when I was investing myself completely into one area — women and business — and forsaking other important areas of my life and my identity.

In the case of the man in Robbins’ seminar, he lived an entire life that reinforced his identity as a man who could make money. He worked 100 hour weeks for decades. He made millions. Everyone who knew him, knew him as the man who could make money and did. Many of them knew him and liked him because he could make money.

This constant reinforcement and lack of diversity in his life eventually warped his perception in himself away from being a father, a husband, a friend, a role model, and instead a walking bank account. That’s all that came to matter to him and his identity. He had nothing else going for him because he never invested in any other aspects of his relationships. And when the money went, so did his self-worth along with it.

WHAT DO YOU CARE ABOUT?

One could take this advice as merely being a well-balanced individual. The problem is, people can be well-balanced but still not have a diverse identity. They can participate in a lot of different activities, but still derive the majority of their validation and self-worth from one source.

For instance, let’s say you’re a well-balanced individual with a successful law career, a spouse, some cool hobbies, and you enjoy reading in your spare time. But in reality your career dominates your identity. You work so much that you have little with which to relate to your spouse other than work. Your hobbies all involve your coworkers. Your reading relates to your career. You have no diversity.

A lot of people I know in finance are like this. Their friends are their co-workers. The books they read and movies they watch relate to their job. Their social excursions are work and networking functions. The dates they go on with people they meet doing work-related things. There’s no diversification of where they’re receiving their validation. And therefore their emotional stability and self-esteem is at risk.

If you invest all of your identity in one basket, then you put your self-esteem and emotional well-being at risk.

American Football player Junior Seau recently committed suicide a few years after retiring. A lot of discussion has taken place about athletes and how they can regain their lost identity once they retire. One can’t imagine what they must feel, having gone their entire lives since childhood being recognized for being great at a single activity, and then once they hit their 40’s, it’s all taken away.

Seau is not the only casualty. There’s this heartbreaking article about Hall of Fame football player William “Refrigerator” Perry and his descent into depression and alcoholism after retirement. Or this excellent article on soccer legends Pele and Maradona and their inability to let go of their pasts. Or how about this one on Michael Jordan and his continued bitterness and insecurity after retirement?

Three years ago, the thought of my business going under terrified me. I stayed up entire nights worrying about if a new web page would make me money or not. When they didn’t I would lose sleep again trying to figure out why.

Ironically, now that I’m successful in business, my identity isn’t as invested in it, and if it failed tomorrow I don’t think I’d be as devastated now as I would have been three years ago. Why? Because I’ve diversified my identity. I’ve been around the world, speak multiple languages, have a wide array of friends of varying lifestyles, am a good musician, a successful writer — if my business crashed, it would surely suck and be stressful, but I imagine emotionally I would hold up much better.

What do you care about? I mean, what do you really care about? Invest yourself in a wide range of areas. If you like music, start attending concerts or learn an instrument. Don’t just travel as a vacation, but invest in learning about the cultures. Learn a new language. Make time for old friends. Pick up new hobbies. Get competitive in something. Expand yourself beyond your work and your relationships. Go out for no other reason than to be with your friends. Learn how to dance. Take some time off work. Attend a meditationretreat.

And don’t just do something else, but care about it, invest yourself in it.

Lest you become like our finance guru at a Tony Robbins seminar. Because chances are, the Batman of Psychology is not going to be around to save you.

12:43:00 - By Vincent 0

THE “DO SOMETHING” PRINCIPLE

By Mark Manson

I‘ve been working with self development advice for a large percentage of my life. I’ve come across a lot of concepts and ideas as well as invented quite a few of my own. But the following is one of the most important ideas I’ve stumbled across in my life:

Action isn’t just the effect of motivation, but also the cause of it.

Most people only commit to action if they feel a certain level of motivation. And they only feel motivation when they feel an emotional inspiration.

People only become motivated to study for the exam when they’re afraid of the consequences. People only pick up and learn that instrument when they feel inspired by the people they can play for.

And we’ve all slacked off for lack of motivation before. Especially in times where we shouldn’t.  We feel lethargic and apathetic towards a certain goal that we’ve set for ourselves because we lack the motivation and we lack the motivation because we don’t feel any overarching emotional desire to accomplish something.

Emotional Inspiration → Motivation → Desirable Action

But there’s a problem with operating under this framework: often the changes and actions we most need in our lives are inspired by negative emotions which simultaneously hinder us from taking action.

If someone wants to fix their relationship with their mother, the emotions of the situation (hurt, resentment, avoidance) completely go against the necessary action to fix it (confrontation, honesty, communication). If someone wants to lose weight, but experiences massive amounts of shame about their body, then the act of going to the gym is apt to inspire in them the exact emotions that kept them at home on the couch in the first place. Past traumas, negative expectations, and feelings of guilt, shame and fear often motivate us away from the actions necessary to overcome those very traumas, negative expectations, and negative emotions.

It’s a Catch-22 of sorts. But the thing about the motivation chain is that it’s not only a three-part chain, but an endless loop:

Inspiration → Motivation → Action → Inspiration → Motivation → Action → Etc.

Your actions create further emotional reactions and inspirations and move on to motivate your future actions. Taking advantage of this knowledge, we can actually re-orient our mindset in the following way:

Action → Inspiration → Motivation

The conclusion is that if you lack the motivation to make an important change in your life, then do something, anything really, and then harness the reaction to that action as a way to begin motivating yourself.

I call this The “Do Something” Principle. And I developed it on accident back in my years as a consultant, helping people who were otherwise immobilized by fears, rationalizations, and apathy to take action.

It began out of simple pragmatism: you paid me to be here so you might as well do something. I don’t care, do anything!

What I found is that often once they did something, even the smallest of actions, it would soon give them the inspiration and motivation to do something else. They had sent a signal to themselves, “OK, I did that, I guess I can do more.” And slowly we could take it from there.

Over the years, I’ve applied the “Do Something” Principle in my own life as well.

The most obvious example is running this website and my business ventures online. I work for myself. I don’t have a boss telling me what to do and not to do. I also often have to take major calculated risks in which I’m personally invested, both financially and emotionally (spending months writing a book, re-branding my entire website, ceasing promotions of my past products, etc.). It’s been nerve-wracking at times, and major feelings of doubt and uncertainty arise. And when no one is around to push you, sitting around and watching TV reruns all day can quickly become a more appealing option.

The first couple years I worked for myself, entire weeks would go by without accomplishing much for no other reason than I was anxious and stressed about what I had to do, and it was too easy to put it off. I quickly learned that forcing myself to do something, even the most menial of tasks, quickly made the larger tasks seem much easier. If I had to redesign an entire website, then I’d force myself to sit down and would say, “OK, I’ll just design the header right now.” But after the header was done, I’d find myself moving on to other parts of it. And before I knew it, I’d be energized and engaged in the project.

I also use this regularly in my own life. If I’m about to tackle a large project that I’m anxious about, or if I’m in a new country and I need to give myself a little push to get out and meet people, I apply the Do Something Principle. Instead of expecting the moon, I just decide, “OK, I’ll start on the outline,” or “OK, I’ll just go out and have a beer and see what’s going on.” The mere action of doing this almost always spurs me on.

Inevitably, the appropriate action occurs at some point or another. The motivation is natural. The inspiration is genuine. It’s an overall far more pleasant way of accomplishing my goals.

My math teacher used to tell us in high school, “If you don’t know how to do a problem, start writing something down, your brain will begin to figure it out as you go.” And sure enough, to this day, this seems to be true. The mere action itself inspires new thoughts and ideas which lead us to solving the problems in our lives. But that new insight never comes if we simply sit around contemplating it.

I recently heard a story about a novelist who had written over 70 novels. Someone asked him how he was able to write so consistently and remain inspired and motivated every day, as writers are notorious for procrastination and for fighting through bouts of “writer’s block”. The novelist said, “200 crappy words per day, that’s it.” The idea is that if he forced himself to write 200 crappy words, more often than not, the act of writing would inspire him and before he knew it he’d have thousands down on the page.

You may recognize this concept among other writings in different guises. I’ve seen it mentioned in terms such as “failing forward” or “ready, fire, aim.” But no matter how you frame it to yourself, it’s an extremely useful mindset and habit to adopt. The more time goes on, the more I realize that success in anything is tied less to knowledge or talent, and tied more to action supplemented by knowledge and talent. You can become successful at something without knowing what you’re doing. You can become successful at something without having much particular talent at it. But you can never become successful at anything without taking action. Ever.

SOURCE

13:20:00 - By Vincent 0

How to Boost Self Esteem in 8 Simple Ways

By Harleena Singh 

Have you ever felt the need to boost self esteem in order to feel good and complete about yourself?

There are moments in life when people feel down and rejected. At such times, they experience a lack of confidence and self-worth.

Do you also feel that you are insufficient and lack in many areas of life? If your answer is yes, you need to check out the ways to boost self esteem as mentioned later in the post.

Boosting self esteem isn’t tough, especially if you are ready to work for it.

However, before that, let me tell you a little about what is self esteem as many people tend to confuse it with self confidence.

“You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love and affection.” ~ Buddha

What is Self Esteem

Simply stated, self esteem is how you judge yourself as a person. It is your opinion about yourself, how you accept, respect, and value yourself. So, it is all about YOU.

Self esteem simply means to appreciate yourself for who you are – along with the faults and everything else.

Some people think themselves to be unattractive, ugly, unlovable, useless, losers, worthless, or they remain depressed and miserable about the way they are.

While others might have had a bad childhood, been hurt in their relationships, or lost a job, and all of this affects them negatively. Such people are said to be suffering from low self esteem.

Thinking low about yourself often leads to the development of mental health problems, and if the problem gets severe – low self esteem can even indirectly lead to death.

But you don’t have to worry if you are undergoing such conditions, as there are many ways to boost self esteem.

“To be beautiful means to be yourself. You don’t need to be accepted by others. You need to accept yourself. “ ~Thich Nhat Hanh

Difference Between Self Esteem and Self Confidence

Self esteem is more about your sense of personal worth, whereas self confidence is the confidence you have in yourself. It’s how you evaluate your ability to do certain things and be successful.

You could’ve all the confidence in yourself, but still feel incomplete and worthless. However, contrarily, a person with high self esteem may have more self confidence, or will find it easy to develop self confidence.

Self esteem is a general assessment of yourself, while self confidence is related to specific tasks, problems and challenges you face. Thus, self confidence is one part of self esteem.

Self esteem is a much broader concept than self confidence because it literally affects everything you undergo. If there is anything you want to change in your life – you have to start by boosting self esteem.

Not to mention that high self esteem doesn’t mean an inflated ego or pride. Instead, it’s an honest opinion of yourself.

Hope this helped explain the difference between both these terms. 

“Whatever you are doing, love yourself for doing it. Whatever you are feeling, love yourself for feeling it.” ~ Thaddeus Golas

Now, let’s see how and what you can do to boost self esteem in yourself.

Ways to Boost Self Esteem

There are many ways to build self esteem, and am sure you can add a lot to this list. So, be sure to let me know in the comment below.

1. Focus on your positive points

How many of you walk up to the mirror in the morning and start finding flaws? Don’t do that! You need to start concentrating on things you are good at, instead of what you aren’t.

Boost your self esteem by telling yourself that you have pretty eyes, or that you are beautiful and have lovely features. Or that you have achieved what you wanted to within a short period.

Simply list out what you are good at, and feel happy about it because you have achieved it. When you see yourself in the positive light, it helps to boost your self esteem.

When I feel insecure at times, I look at the root cause and try to remove or sort out the main problem. I appreciate these opportunities too as they always make me look within and find solutions.

When you believe in yourself, gather the courage and remain optimistic – you can achieve a lot. Self esteem creates a feel-good factor, which makes you like yourself and this way others like you too.

2. Keep aside all negative talks

You cannot build self esteem if you keep telling yourself that you are stupid, not good enough, worthless, or if you keep putting yourself down.

If you keep having such a low self esteem about yourself, or torture yourself mentally and verbally, you certainly wouldn’t feel good about yourself. More so, sometimes you start taking these false images to be true.

You need to tell yourself that these negative feelings aren’t the real truth, and don’t internalize such thoughts too much.

Instead, when you use positive and hopeful statements, and encourage yourself by avoiding negativities, you are more likely to build up self esteem.

Also, avoid negative self-talk that will stop you from enjoying the success you have achieved. Instead, honor and celebrate your achievements and watch how it will boost self esteem in you.

Similarly, you can improve your self esteem by being in the company of friends who cheer and uplift you.

You need to nurture relationships with those who appreciate and value you, instead to be with those who criticize you.

3. Enjoy yourself and find something special in each day

Another way to boost self esteem is to enjoy what you do, whether it’s cooking, painting, blogging, or picking up any other hobby. Simply try something you’ve never done before, or just get creative.

You could do the following –

• Listen to your favorite song, or download the music you like.
• Take a friend along and go for hiking, fishing, boating, or just walk on the beach.
• Venture out and go swimming in the ocean or lake for a change.
• Develop one good habit every week.
• Go on a shopping spree.
• Start penning your thoughts in a grateful journal.
• Go back and think of all the good moments you’ve had.
• Call an old friend and talk long or meet up for lunch – just reach out and connect.
• Join a gym or have fun at the exercise class.
• Make new like-minded friends, and go out having fun with them.
• Practice to be quiet and listen to your inner-self.
• RELAX and let go! Don’t let anxiety and stress get to you. (This one’s for me too!)

For boosting self esteem, just try and do one thing daily, and do it well. When you finish that task, don’t forget to give yourself a pat on the back for doing a good job!

Honestly speaking, it’s been quite a while since I practiced this one myself. I need to find the time to enjoy myself too once in a while. Don’t you too?

4. Give back in some way

Contributing in your own way is another great way to boost self esteem. When you give something to others, you strengthen the fact that you have something to offer to the world.

You could try helping people in your way, visit nursing care facilities if they give permission, or even try volunteering at times.

Or do things like buying coffee for a co-worker, donating, holding the door for someone, offering your seat to a senior. When you do good deeds like these, you’ll feel good about yourself.

I love to reach out and help as many people as I can through this blog, and it surely gives a huge boost to my self esteem 

Remember, when you shift your focus on something or someone else, your self esteem boosts up and you gain self confidence.

5. Take risks

Another way to boost self esteem is to get out of your comfort zone and take positive risks. If you do that you feel better about yourself. You might ask – why?

That’s because when you overcome hurdles, you are also able to overcome your personal fears and able to see your inner strengths. This builds self esteem – doesn’t it?

I’m sure like me, most of you have taken risks to do things you wouldn’t have done otherwise. Didn’t it make you feel good when you achieved your goals? Wasn’t it a morale booster? It sure was for me!

All risks have an element and chance of failure, but you will gain self confidence if you go ahead and show that you don’t fear failure.

You need to just go ahead, take the risk and just do it. Go with your instincts, as most of the time they are right. This is one way to boost self esteem and gives a sense of achievement.

6. Never compare yourself to others

You are you – and no one else. So, don’t compare yourself to others or how much they have done or achieved. Or that why you can’t be as good as them – such comparisons never end.

You will only feel unsatisfied, never find peace, and face low self esteem if you compare yourself to your friends, family, or other acquaintances. All of this will certainly not raise your self esteem, instead sadden you further.

I know this is tough to achieve, but you need to understand that you should compare yourself to no one other than yourself.

Instead, set achievable goals for yourself. When you do that, you are more likely to get what you want. Your self esteem and belief in your abilities will grow when you reach these goals.

7. Regularly exercise, eat right, and take care of yourself

This might not sound like a tip to boost one’s self esteem, but it is! Effective exercise makes you feel positive and good about yourself.

It gives you a sense of achievement, and most importantly, it stimulates the release of happy hormones.

Try this out – lift your chin, hold your chest high, push back your shoulders, and walk across the room. How did it feel?

Didn’t a simple thing like changing your posture improve your self esteem and make you feel good about yourself?

That’s because your emotions are connected to your physical body, and it affects how you feel. Always listen to your inner voice and follow your heart.

You need to also be careful of your food choices and nourish your body well. Avoid too much of fat in your diet, and eat more of well-balanced and nourished meals.

These will boost your self esteem and give you energy, which will make you feel good about yourself, and not overstuffed or sluggish.

The simplest way to boost self esteem is to take care of yourself. You can do that by listening to your body, especially when it tells you to sleep, relax, exercise, and eat.

I’m again guilty in this one as I need more sleep than I’m getting presently – a good reminder for me!

8. Look and feel your best, and keep smiling

There’s much more to than what meets the eye – isn’t it? In the same way, there’s much more to who you actually are, than what you think.

With that said, one way to boost self esteem is to make efforts to look your best. When you do that, it will lift your mood and you will like yourself more.

Try out things like improving the way you present yourself, buying a nice outfit, getting a stylish haircut, or just anything that makes you look good.

Most importantly, dress yourself up with a smile and be happy for being YOU. A smile costs nothing but gives much – isn’t it.

No one is born with good self esteem – everyone has to work at it. You can develop your self esteem from the way you think and everything you do daily to make yourself feel good.

“The strongest single factor in acquiring abundance is self-esteem: believing you can do it, believing you deserve it, believing you will get it.” ~ Jerry Gillies

Did you know that February is the National Boost Your Self Esteem month? I didn’t know that, but it’s nice to know that there is a month dedicated to boost self esteem 

Sometimes you should just do things that have no goals or objectives other than just to make you feel good and see how it will boost your self esteem.

Once you work on boosting your self esteem, you will feel and look happier, healthier, and much more vibrant.

Here’s a lovely video about how to boost self esteem in simple ways, which I’m sure you will enjoy.

How to Boost Your self Esteem ~ Dominic Davies ~ YouTube Video

I know I made it sound all easy, but it’s not. Changing your self-esteem takes time, patience, and even some trials and errors.

But if you make efforts to be more fair and realistic with yourself and accomplish your goals, the inner strength that comes from within will help you reach new heights.

Setbacks and mistakes are a part of life, and they always teach us something in return. So, don’t fear failures, but learn from them.

Be compassionate and gentle with yourself as you build on your self esteem, though start now! Remember, the greatest journey begins with the first step, which YOU have to take. 

“You are wonderful. Valuable. Worthwhile. Lovable. Not because others think so. Self worth comes from only one place: self.” ~ Karen Salmansohn

Over to you –

How do you boost self esteem and maintain it? Are there some more ways of boosting your self esteem? Share in the comment below.

SOURCE

12:30:00 - By Vincent 0