Self-start your Improvement.

No-one else is ever going to know about your personal struggle with your Self. It's a very private battle, and often completely invisible to the external world. Perhaps the first and most important insight in starting this quest is that it is conducted, for the most part, alone. 

While there will be others who may at times offer support, this is a road travelled on our own, and fought in the battlefield of thought. It is predominantly a mental event. Many of the assaults on a better self-esteem, however, will come from the external world, when disappointments, criticisms, failures and hardships assail us constantly. One does not have to let these in. A strong self-esteem is not affected by external circumstances. 

The second insight is that no-one else has the right to decide who you are and what you value. If you allow someone else to decide your worth, then you only have yourself to blame if you cannot fulfil other's illusions about you. In fact, you can even have your own illusions about yourself, but be prepared to take responsibility for them - at least they are yours. You cannot take responsibility for other people's a illusions about who you 'ought to be'.

The third insight is linked to the second, in that it is critical to have a realistic perspective on your own behaviour, capabilities and values. Don't kid yourself - it is better to be ruthless in your self-evaluation than it is to be compassionate. Replay events afterwards, and ask yourself questions about your behaviour, your intent, your feelings and where they stem from, and you start to get an idea of who you really are... Of course, you could just avoid intro- and retro-spection completely, it's your illusion, but illusions have consequences...

The fourth insight shows us that comparisons, as Will Shakespeare put it, are odious. If you compare yourself with others, you will either become vain or bitter, because there always be people better than or worse than yourself. The interesting thing about self-confident people is that they have no need to look up to or down to anyone else - they are merely themselves.

Think of your self-esteem as an island with an impregnable fortress around it, and only you have the keys to the gate. And you just do not allow anyone else in. Leave criticism, emotions and hardships at the gate, and examine them from the safety within - this way, you may make changes to your behaviour, but the core, your perception of the value of self, remains untouched.

Self-esteem is the degree to which you value yourself, and nobody else should be given the right to mess with it. 

It's YOUR value of YOUR self, isn't it?

D (just call me D)

justd@justd.ws

© Uncommon Sense Communication - Enabling Independent Thought