Self-esteem is a person's opinion of himself.

It is often wrong.

With high self-esteem the person considers himself the King, the King and the Navel of the Earth. A person tries to jump above himself and jumps into stress, earning himself neurosis.

With low self-esteem the individual is generally surprised how he, so completely absurd, dared to appear in the light of God, and cannot understand why those around him tolerate the very fact of his existence. The question of how to increase self-esteem worries tens of thousands of insecure people.

A common sign of low self-esteem is when a person - constantly apologizes in front of other people for a reason, but more often without a reason. In fact he would like to apologize profusely to those around him for existing and breathes the same air with them.

The problem with women and men with low self-esteem is that they usually believe that you can only raise it by loving yourself. But they ask the psychologist a counter question: " Yes, I would love to love myself. But I dont know how?"

What is self-esteem?

Self-esteem is how a person evaluates himself. It is an indicator of whether a person loves, and therefore trusts and accepts, himself.

If yes, then everything is in order with self-confidence.

If not, it means he makes mistakes in self-perception.

The formation of self-esteem occurs in childhood and very much depends on maternal and paternal love, attention, and care. Children who are disliked are more likely to suffer from self-doubt. They think: “If no one needed me as a small child, in childhood, will anyone need me as an adult? Hardly..."

It is very important to increase self-esteem - after all, by remaining an insecure person, a person, unnoticed by himself, unconsciously, subconsciously, destroys his even successfully developing personal and professional life.

The individual considers himself unworthy of the blessings that have befallen him and, consciously fighting for them, subconsciously does everything to get rid of them and again find yourself with nothing in order to once again reinforce your negative opinion about yourself and get some pleasure from it (psychological benefit, which will be expressed in the trivial “I still turned out to be right!”).

When you have a low bar for evaluating yourself, then you must understand that you are actually better than you think you are. Therefore, increasing self-esteem is necessary to align thoughts with reality.

How to increase self-esteem? By deepening self-knowledge.

The better you get to know yourself, the higher your self-perception rises - like the ugly duckling with low self-esteem from the fairy tale by Hans Christian Anderson, who, having gotten to know himself better, immediately turned into a beautiful swan.

Healthy self-esteem consists of:

• Knowing your strengths and confidence in your strengths
• Trust and self-love
• Honest respect for your abilities, characteristics, potential
• Awareness and adequate assessment of one's own shortcomings- limiters
• Accepting these shortcomings as a harmonious component of the personal “I” (each coin has 2 sides - black and white, good and bad, without one there would be no other)
• Understanding that some limitations can be overcome, and some shortcomings can be eliminated
• Freedom from worrying about what other people think or will think about you. The opinions of other people, of course, play a certain role in your life, but they do not determine your essence, they do not decide who you really are. This is only a reflection of part of the truth.

Low self-esteem - How to recognize a lack of self-confidence?

The main symptom of low self-esteem is that a person thinks poorly only of himself, but not of others. A person considers himself bad and others - good. Although this is not always true.

A mentally healthy person has self-esteem - he respects and loves himself, trusts himself unconditionally - no matter what actions - good or bad - he commits. He still accepts himself for who he is.

Moreover, in the case of committing bad deeds or incorrect behavior, a psychologically full-fledged person experiences feelings of guilt, shame, and remorse. People with low self-esteem experience these feelings without even committing these actions. That's the difference.

Scientists have long debunked the myth that only people with low self-esteem do bad things - this means alcoholism, drug addiction, cruelty to children and people. Such “bad things” are often done by people with high self-esteem. That is, you can have low self-esteem, but not behave badly.

It is necessary to increase self-esteem as early as possible - the faster a person increases his self-esteem, the sooner he will begin to live a full life, without a heavy feeling of uselessness and guilt for every even normal action.

To be a happy person and at the same time constantly suffer from self-doubt is almost impossible; these are two antagonisms.

After all, in order to achieve happiness in relationships, love, personal life and find success in a career or business, you need to behave openly and feel free (including from fears), and inferiority complexes squeeze a person, low self-esteem drives a person into extremely narrow limits, makes you doubt yourself all the time, and prevents you from focusing on a specific issue.

People with low self-esteem tend to treat themselves worse than other people. They put those around them on a pedestal, while they themselves grovel slavishly before everyone in order to justify their bad opinion of themselves.

If you suspect you have low self-esteem, answer the following questions honestly:

• Do you think that you are worse than others?
• Do you consider yourself a bad person?
• Do you think that you look worse than others? Do you agree that you are not as handsome and attractive as most other girls/guys, women/men?
• Don't you love yourself?
• Are you dumber than others?
• Do you often feel guilty?
• When you are praised, do you feel the praise is undeserved?
• Is your opinion not as important as other people's?
• Does it happen that you did not dare to do something that you really wanted, only because of self-doubt?
• Do you regret spending money and time on yourself because you consider yourself unworthy of paying attention to yourself?

If you answered at least 3 questions from this list in the affirmative, then you definitely have low self-esteem, which urgently needs to be improved.

5 Ways to Boost Your Self-Esteem

So, you have decided to increase your self-esteem and get rid of self-doubt once and for all. Well, that's commendable. Let's get started.

Don't think, don't talk bad about yourself - Tell only good things about yourself!

Low self-esteem has the unpleasant feature of generalizing specific situations and drawing global conclusions based on 1-2 cases.

So, for example, if a woman failed to prepare a delicious dinner, she immediately begins to blame herself not even for the fact that she failed to prepare the food, but acts globally - she immediately generalizes the situation and exclaims: “Ah! I'm such a bad housewife and just a terrible wife! How can my husband tolerate such a lack of skill next to me?!”

Or, if a boy fails to solve an algebra problem, he says: “How stupid I am! I'm the stupidest person in the class." At the same time, a specific inability to solve 1 problem in a subject for which he simply does not have special abilities is transferred to intellectual capabilities in general.

And it also happens that a guy from 11th grade loves his classmate, but she is afraid of a serious relationship at that age and simply avoids him, because... feels serious intentions on his part. The guy thinks to himself: “What a loser I am... No one loves me and will never love me.”

Such an unfounded, illogical generalization greatly affects self-confidence - the psyche feels unfairly treated and is suppressed, oppressed more and more.

Now knowing about this feature of low self-esteem, take the first step to increase it - praise yourself for every solved problem, for every deliciously cooked dinner, for every smile of a girl you meet on the street, and in case of failures, just remain silent (both out loud and to yourself ).

If at first it doesn’t work out very well and you still scold yourself, then, having caught yourself doing this, immediately refute yourself and give specific examples of when you coped with similar tasks.

To increase your self-esteem, realize what voices of critics you hear in your voice?

Self-esteem drops when we are criticized.

In general, our assessment of ourselves is formed from how other (usually the closest) people evaluate us.

If a child in childhood was constantly pulled back by parents (teachers, peers), criticized, beaten, scolded, then the child unwittingly absorbed their message “You are bad” and believed in them. And having believed that he was bad, he took on the role of the main critic in relation to himself, and began to constantly scold himself, criticize himself, look for non-existent shortcomings in himself - do everything just to express displeasure with himself.

Thus, if the formation of high self-esteem occurs due to the fact that the individual is constantly praised (and often unreasonably) by other people, and the formation of low self-esteem occurs due to the fact that the person is constantly scolded and criticized by people significant to him.

To increase your self-esteem, you must understand that that critical voice in your head is not your voice, not the voice of your brain, consciousness or subconscious - it is the voice of those very critics who had their own reasons (they derived their psychological benefits from this ) to humiliate you and undeservedly doubt your abilities and merits.

Therefore, an effective way to get rid of self-doubt is, having started to mentally or out loudly scold yourself, immediately stop yourself and ask a simple question: “Stop. Who is really criticizing me now?”

By learning to separate your thoughts from the critical thoughts of other people, you will take an important step towards your own psychological INDEPENDENCE. Increase your self-confidence by noticing your strengths and successes, and cutting off criticism of other people who don’t really know what a kind, good and smart person you are.

Honesty is a medicine for increasing self-esteem

Low self-esteem evaluates a person only in black - and stubbornly, deliberately, a priori does not notice, ignores white tones. This is dishonest to oneself and an incorrect, erroneous self-perception. This is kind of a lie.

That is, in others we notice only advantages and achievements, but in ourselves we see only shortcomings and collect our own mistakes and defeats. This is self-deception, which leads to a nervous breakdown.

Stop stepping on these rake - it's time to raise your self-esteem and let truth and an honest assessment of both yourself and other people into your life. We must try to notice not only our shortcomings, but also our strengths, to focus not only on what does not work out, but to notice and rejoice at what does work out.

If someone praised you or gave you a compliment, agree with it.

So I’m telling you now:

You are smart, beautiful and kind, a good person. You are worthy of love and respect. I see in you great potential to become a happy person.

What should I say? Right:

Thank you.

And no reservations, additions, apologies, excuses. You are a good man. And period. Repeat to yourself:

I AM A GOOD PERSON.

And remind yourself and others about this more often. Praise yourself - after all, you have something to praise for. Every person is talented at something and better than others. Even if it's just chewing gum.

Stop believing criticism and rejecting compliments - do the opposite to increase your own self-esteem - believe compliments and reject criticism. You know yourself better than anyone.

Do not treat yourself with prejudice, like a bribed judge. Keep a record of both your strengths and weaknesses, and remember that they are usually in some kind of balance, like assets and liabilities in accounting.

Without one there would be no other. If you have many shortcomings, it means you have just as many advantages. Find them in yourself - here is your homework that needs to be completed right now. Write down your pros and cons on a piece of paper, and you will understand that you have no reason to kill your own self-esteem with your own lies to yourself.

Be honest with yourself - balance your strengths and weaknesses with an open mind! And without “accounting” errors. And take into account all the components of your personality, and do not act selectively. Then your self-esteem will rise automatically.

Boost your self-esteem by letting go of imperfect idealism

“If my man is not perfect, he is not my man!”

“If I’m not perfect, then it’s not me!”

“If things don’t go exactly the way I want, then I won’t take part in it!”

Perfectionism, idealism, maximalism - this phenomenon and one of the most important reasons for low self-esteem has a lot of beautiful, pompous names. But demanding 100% perfection is a psychological trap. Low self-esteem demands everything from life, or agrees to nothing.

Either everything or nothing!

And usually it works on the principle: “Others are absolutely perfect! “I’m absolutely imperfect!”

This ignores the simple and understandable fact that nothing and no one is perfect under the sun.

This is a myth, a blatant lie to yourself, which prevents you from raising your self-esteem from your knees, as if other people have no shortcomings, and you have no advantages. Stop living in your imaginary world - ALL PEOPLE ARE IMPERFECT- this is the real truth.

There is no ideal - it’s not for nothing that they say that the ideal is unattainable. Then why strive for it if it is an illusion, a myth, self-deception? Isn't it more logical to strive for what is real and achievable? For example, to better self-knowledge and greater self-understanding?

It is impossible to increase personal self-esteem without ceasing to divide the whole world into white and black. Stop thinking in categories: “Either 100% perfection - or complete 0”, “Either I’m super - or I’m a nonentity.”

Add more honesty and realism to your life.

An increase in self-confidence occurs when a person begins to give himself the right to live not only on the edge (either 100% or 0%), but also within this interval from 0 to 100%.

Allow yourself to look not 100%, but 25%. It's okay to look 25%. But you can gradually strive to increase your attractiveness to 30%.

Give yourself the right not to be perfect and do not demand that others meet your high requirements as much as possible - let them be who they are, real. And you, too, finally become yourself, stop pretending to be an “ideal”.

Boost your self-esteem by giving yourself time and attention.

Low self-esteem is often a vicious circle that you can only break out of by starting to love yourself.

Self-love is expressed in caring for your own inner well-being and appearance. For the first, the best care is REST, relaxation, when a person gives himself time to catch his breath, take a break, gain strength, and recharge his batteries.

But self-esteem depends not only on our internal well-being, but also on how good we look and how well we are perceived by society. Therefore, in addition to relaxing, take care of your body, go for a massage, go to a beauty salon, buy beautiful clothes, get a fashionable haircut, take care of yourself like a flowerbed in order to bloom.

When you lie down to rest, or sleep, dream, visualize yourself as you would like to see yourself - beautiful, smart, healthy, athletic, well dressed, successful, rich. Imagine in detail how you would feel if you had already managed to increase your self-esteem and raise your self-confidence to a fundamentally new, wise level.

You need to increase your self-esteem in order to simply learn to enjoy life and enjoy your existence. You have the right not just to a place in the sun, but to a happy place under the gentle sun.

Remember once and for the rest of your life: A diamond can think whatever it wants about itself, but that will not stop it from being a diamond. But if he thinks positively about himself, he can turn into a diamond.

My light, mirror, tell me,

Tell me the whole truth

Who is the cutest in the world...

Who, looking at themselves in the mirror, has not asked themselves a similar question? But everyone has different answers to it. They usually show our level of self-esteem.

Self-esteem - This is a complex of a person’s attitudes regarding his internal qualities, appearance, advantages and disadvantages. Simply put, self-esteem is how a person feels about himself. It's no secret that the level of self-esteem greatly influences a person's life. His social status, level of material wealth, personal life, and relationships with friends largely depend on this.

Self-esteem can be:

• understated;
• normal;
• overpriced.

Today we will talk about the first option - decreased self-esteem - as a factor that occurs in society much more often than the next two. And it negatively affects a person’s life.

A person with low self-esteem shows excessive self-criticism and is sensitive to criticism from others, is indecisive, wants to please everyone, and is prone to feelings of guilt.

How self-esteem is formed

From early childhood we learn to perceive the world and ourselves in it. Personal experience helps us with this - tactile sensations, taste, what we see or hear. But our loved ones - parents, grandparents - give an assessment of everything that happens. It is from them that the child learns what “good” and “bad” are. And in what situations is he “good” or “bad”. It is from here, from childhood, that many adult complexes originate.

At the reception there is a young beautiful girl of 25 years old. She says that her relationships with men do not work out. She doesn’t manage to meet anyone, and even if she does, it doesn’t turn into a serious relationship. From the girl's behavior it is clear that she is very shy, does not believe in herself and considers herself unattractive.

During the work, it turned out that as a child, her father criticized her very much and lectured her at every step - for bad grades, for her skirt, which, in his opinion, was ugly, etc. Thus, he taught his daughter to the idea that she cannot look beautiful in the eyes of a man.

Instead of telling the child: “your action is not good,” parents, without thinking, say: “you are not good,” or “bad,” “ill-mannered,” “ugly.” Believing his parents, the child accepts these attitudes and projects them onto other life situations. As a result, he becomes withdrawn, uncommunicative, constrained, and unsure of himself.

But, in addition to children's complexes, there are other factors that can reduce a person’s self-esteem.

Man's self-esteem

It can be lowered by factors such as lack of a prestigious job or own business, or low salary. That is, material instability. It seems to the man that because of this he cannot be a full-fledged support for the family.

Intimate matters. The number of partners, the ability to satisfy them in bed, the duration of sexual intercourse is another very significant point that can affect a man’s self-esteem.

Criticism from the wife. Men want to feel support, complicity from their partner, hear praise, be understood and accepted. But often they have to hear reproaches and criticism, face aggression, groundless resentment and, as a result, scandals in the family. This all hits a man’s self-esteem very hard and reduces it.

A man's low self-esteem can result in depression and anxiety. Which in turn leads to fear and anger. Because of this, a man may become addicted to alcohol or drugs.

Woman's self-esteem

As you know, for the vast majority of women, the first place is appearance. It is critical assessments of one’s appearance that are one of the sure signs of decreased self-esteem. A woman who is satisfied with herself and confident in herself knows that she is always beautiful. And if there is something unnecessary, she will remove it in the gym or beauty salon. But completely calm.

This complex can provoke or intensify social media. Thus, English scientists have found that social networks have a negative impact on women’s self-esteem. Some representatives of the fair sex spend a lot of time in them. Scrolling through their friend's feed, they compare themselves and their lives with other women and draw positive conclusions that are not in their favor. This phenomenon was called self-reification.

Inability to accept signs of attention and compliments. Every woman is pleased to hear beautiful words addressed to herself, but insecure representatives of the fair sex are shy and pretentious. With all my appearance, as if saying: “I’m not worthy of this.”

Failures in relationships with men. Divorce is another circumstance that “hits” a woman’s self-esteem very hard. It begins to seem to her that she has failed as a woman and wife. That she was supposed to save the family and failed.

At the reception - a 35-year-old woman. She says that after divorcing her husband, she cannot get her personal life back on track. The divorce process itself was very stormy, with mutual reproaches and accusations. Although the couple married for love. The woman has a daughter from her marriage. And on the one hand, she understands that she needs a family, and the child needs a father. But she cannot meet men.

“You see, doctor, I think I’m no longer attractive to men. After all, they have already rejected me once. Besides, I now know that I can be betrayed.”

After painstaking work with a specialist, the woman managed to cope with her fears and feel confident and attractive again.

In addition, there are other reasons for decreased self-esteem, characteristic of both men and women. They could be:

Living in a negative environment. Some people have a habit of complaining about others, instead of taking responsibility for their lives. Communication with such people gives rise to self-doubt.

Comparing yourself with other people. No two people are completely similar, and accordingly, the results of their activities cannot be compared. But such actions lead to sadness, dissatisfaction with oneself, and self-criticism, which directly affects a person’s level of self-esteem.

Setting goals and priorities that are too high, when they are incommensurable either in terms of time or resources. Very often, when planning their lives, people set such unrealistic goals that later, without achieving them, they become disappointed in themselves. As a result, for some, self-esteem decreases so much that they generally stop setting any goals for themselves.

Criticism of others regarding a person's appearance, his intelligence, any of his achievements or ridicule of failures leads to a lower assessment of himself. The person becomes withdrawn and stops expressing himself in any way.

What to do?

Low self-esteem is a rather deep problem. As you can see, it can be triggered by a number of psychological reactions. Of course, there is a lot of information on this topic on the Internet and very often good recommendations. Just like in the books.

But it’s very difficult to figure this out on your own. In addition, it is unlikely that a book can replace live communication and a specialist who works with you. Therefore, the best way out of the situation would be to consult a psychologist or psychotherapist. He will help:

• understand when and where a “failure” occurred in the system of personal values ​​and self-evaluation;
• work through negative life experiences that caused a decrease in self-esteem;
• learn other options for behavior with people who are trying to criticize and condemn you;
• align the emotional background in relation to yourself and stabilize self-esteem.

As you can see, if you understand the problem, you can deal with it. Start a new life and look at yourself in a new way.

Women with low self-esteem suffer from insecurity, are afraid of criticism and do not know how to accept compliments. The habitual role of the victim does not allow us to perceive life in all its colors and boldly look into the future. We learn not to give in to manipulation.

As you know, self-esteem is how a person evaluates himself, his personal qualities and capabilities in comparison with other people, what place he assigns to himself in society. Self-esteem is not inherited - it is formed in preschool age under the influence of the people closest to the child - parents. It primarily depends on them whether the baby will have adequate self-esteem, high or low. And how his future life will turn out, how successful it will be, whether he will be able to set goals and achieve them or whether he will constantly doubt his abilities and come to terms with the stigma of a loser - all this depends on the level of his self-esteem.

It is not easy to live next to people who have high self-esteem, because they are convinced that they are always right, do not see their own shortcomings and do not admit their mistakes. They believe that they have the right to control others, strive to be the center of attention and show aggression if someone disagrees with them. “You are the best,” they were told in childhood. “You are a queen!” Dad repeated to a girl he knew. He believed that by feeling like a queen, she would make everyone around her believe it. But for some reason those around her did not want to play the role of her subjects, and there were fewer and fewer people who wanted to be friends with her.

Life is not easy for those whose... For some reason that is understandable to them, parents humiliate the child, showing their power over him, break him, making him obedient, and ultimately turn him into an infantile, weak-willed creature on which everyone wipes their feet.

“It’s terrible what you’ve done, you can’t be entrusted with anything!”, “You’re just ruining everything - better leave”, “Look at Anya, she’s a girl like a girl, and you’re disheveled and a slob”, “Now you’ll get it from me, it’s such an infection ! - criticism, threats, comparison with other children, unwillingness to take into account the child’s opinion and see him as an individual, talking to him in a commanding tone reduces his self-respect and self-esteem. His own life attitudes have not yet been formed, and he considers his parents’ beliefs to be an immutable truth. Psychologists call this direct suggestion, and children at an early age are very suggestible.

If mom and dad call a child a fool and a nonentity, then that is exactly how he will perceive himself. As the proverb says: “Tell a man a hundred times that he is a pig, and on the hundred and first he will grunt.” Others will perceive him the same way.

Another test for a child's self-esteem is adolescence. At this time, he is very vulnerable and takes criticism painfully. If you repeat to him that nothing good will come of him and that his only choice is to go to prison or to jail, then you shouldn’t be surprised that this will happen.

Ultimately, people with low self-esteem justify all the nicknames and epithets that were awarded to them in childhood. They really become losers, losers, outsiders. They lose, sometimes without even entering the game, because they are indecisive and do not believe in themselves. “I’m not worthy,” they explain their loss.

Women with low self-esteem - which men choose them?

Women with low self-esteem, just like men with the same character, do not achieve significant success in life because they “know their place.” However, psychologists have noticed that they, in addition, attract men of a certain type - domineering, authoritarian and selfish. It is beneficial for them to have such a woman at their side, because she is not demanding and is easy to manage. It is easy to convince her that her main task is to create comfortable conditions for her husband, raise children, and she has no right to demand more than he can give her.

A woman with low self-esteem is also convenient because she does not need to be jealous - she is grateful to her husband for marrying her and does not look at anyone else. And even if she does look, she believes that she herself does not deserve the attention of men. The husband can relax, because if he were married to a woman with adequate or high self-esteem, he would have to strain to measure up. And so he is forgiven a lot - pettiness, rudeness, and sloppiness, because a woman believes that she does not deserve better.

A woman with low self-esteem is treated negatively not only by her husband, but also by those around her. Knowing that she cannot refuse, they sometimes sit on her head, hanging their problems on her and shifting their responsibilities onto her. Moreover, women with low self-esteem are often perfectionists who strive to do everything in the best possible way.

It is especially easy for them to instill in them a feeling of guilt. In an effort to make amends for this really non-existent guilt, they try even harder to please in order to earn praise.

What are they like - women with low self-esteem?

Many women have no idea that all their depression and failures are associated with low self-esteem. They think: this is how life turned out, the unfavorable circumstances are to blame for what prevented them from becoming happy, successful and loved. “You can’t escape fate!” they resign themselves, instead of working on personal attitudes with the help of which they can change their attitude towards themselves - to love themselves. Are we not worthy of this love? “I’m alone at home,” says psychologist Ekaterina Mikhailova, who wrote a book with the same title. If we want to be understood, valued and loved by others, we must learn to understand, value and love ourselves.

Do these women remind us of anyone? They:

1. Trouble-free

But not because they are compassionate and feel satisfaction from fulfilling other people’s requests. On the contrary, they scold themselves for not being able to refuse, they get angry and irritated. But they are unable to say “no”: suddenly the person asking will be offended or think badly of them, but someone else’s opinion is very important to them, and it must certainly be positive;

2. They take criticism painfully.

Women with adequate self-esteem also adequately perceive criticism: they accept it or not, without falling into hysterics. If you tell a woman with low self-esteem that she is wrong, it will almost become a tragedy for her. Resentment, tears and indignation will follow, because she perceives criticism as an insult and humiliation, hints at her inferiority. After all, as you know, people with low self-esteem want to please everyone and be good to everyone;

3. Overly critical of your appearance

They do not tolerate criticism from others, but they themselves are never satisfied with themselves and their appearance, so they strive not to stand out, to be in the shadows. They don't like their figure, their face, their body, their hair - nothing. At the same time, they often engage in public self-criticism, obviously subconsciously expecting that those around them will begin to dissuade them, assure them otherwise and give compliments;

4. They don’t know how to accept compliments.

They love them, but they don’t know how to accept them. It is possible that in response to praise that she looks great today, a woman with low self-esteem will fuss and say something like: “Yes, I washed my hair today” or “Oh, this is an old dress, so it doesn’t show who I am.” became a cow";

5. Feel like a victim

Their vulnerable psyche reacts painfully to every sidelong glance and crooked word. They exaggerate their importance in the lives of other people; it seems to them that others are only thinking about how to offend them. They often feel sorry for themselves, repeating when they fail: “Well, not with my happiness”;

6. Giving up their own desires

They have their own dreams and desires, but they are driven somewhere so deep that they no longer remind of themselves. And all because women with low self-esteem live by other people's desires. Have you been waiting for the day off to take a walk in the park with your husband? But he said: “We’re going to the dacha to clean the garden, weed the vegetable garden.” Tired and want to take a break? “What a vacation! Look, my old mother is working, and you’re lying down?!” “Tomorrow my friends will come to visit. Do not want? Can't be. Let’s run to the kitchen, to the stove!”

They do not know how to refuse, because this means disappointing others, not meeting their hopes, which women with low self-esteem cannot allow;

7. Inability to make choices and take responsibility

They too often utter the words: “I can’t,” “I won’t succeed,” “I don’t have the right to decide this.” It is not surprising that making a decision is incredibly difficult for them, because you can make a mistake and earn disapproval and receive a negative assessment. Therefore, they hesitate for a long time and, if possible, shift this task to others: “What do you recommend? I will do as you say";

8. Unsatisfied with your surroundings

They often complain to colleagues and friends that their husband suppresses them, their mother-in-law finds fault with them, and their relatives do not appreciate them. At home they cry that the boss does not take their point of view into account, and that the employees offend them. Psychologists say that subconsciously women with low self-esteem themselves attract people who do not value them, and thus further strengthen the opinion that they are worthless losers.

We increase our self-esteem

Women who are tired of being a puppet and an object of manipulation, who want to live their own lives and not depend on other people's opinions, can correct their character. It's not difficult - you just need to want to change.

1. Minimize or stop communicating with people around whom self-esteem decreases

We doubt, constantly seek advice, show uncertainty, show how someone's remark hurts us, constantly make excuses and easily take the blame upon ourselves - and in the end we become such a whipping boy, an eternal scapegoat that no one takes seriously. and which is not usually taken into account. People easily figure out someone they can treat condescendingly, condescendingly, and begin to manipulate him.

To a large extent, we are to blame for the current situation: they say that we are treated the way we allow ourselves to be treated.

But if we are no longer satisfied with this state of affairs, we must “show our teeth” - of course, not with the help of hysterics. We control our reactions, not giving any reason to consider us a spineless mumble.

Changing the attitude of those who are already accustomed to our “toothlessness” towards ourselves is more difficult than starting to build relationships from scratch, but it is possible. However, if those around us stubbornly continue to assert themselves at our expense, then we have no need for such communication. We will spend time with those with whom we become better and gain confidence in our abilities.

2. Love yourself

Nowadays a lot is said and written about the need to love yourself. Loving yourself does not mean not giving a damn about others and carrying yourself, your beloved, like a sack. This means understanding yourself, learning to live in harmony with yourself and the world, respecting yourself and not engaging in self-flagellation and self-criticism.

Louise Hay, a famous American psychologist and author of several books on psychological self-help, suggests going to the mirror in the morning and looking at your reflection and saying: “I love you. What can I do for you today to make you joyful and happy?” At first, this phrase will be hindered by some internal protest, but soon it will sound natural and free.

As Louise Hay writes, “I’m not trying to fix the problem. I am correcting my thoughts. And then the problem corrects itself.”

3. Set ourselves positive attitudes

We do this with the help of visualizations. The above phrase by Louise Hay about self-love is one of the possible affirmations. Some people complain that affirmations don't work for them. “I repeat the same thing ten times a day, but nothing changes,” they say.

Louise Hay compares affirmations to a grain or seed - it is not enough to plant it, it needs to be watered, it needs to be looked after. Having planted, for example, a tomato, we don’t expect to get fruit tomorrow, do we? The same can be said about affirmations and visualizations - they stimulate us and do not let us forget about the goal, but for them to work, we must take real steps.

4. Meditate

For example: we relax, close our eyes and mentally transport ourselves to some wonderful place where we once were and where we felt good. We will feel it very clearly - sounds, smells. Then let’s imagine a wandering wizard who tells us: “My dear, you are beautiful and unique. You have the right to your opinion, you may not know something or be wrong. You can judge for yourself what is good and what is bad, and take responsibility whenever you wish. You have the right to decide for yourself what and when to do. You have the right to be who you are! You came into this world, on this planet for your own sake!”

The wizard smiles at us and says goodbye to us, and we take a breath, open our eyes and return to reality.

5. We don’t save on ourselves

Remarque wrote that “A woman who saves on herself evokes in a man the only desire - to save on her.”

Nothing raises a woman's self-esteem more than the confidence that she is good and desirable. (Obviously, this is why some men are satisfied with an unpretentious and undemanding wife, around whom they can relax without fear that she will leave or be taken away.)

A gym, swimming pool, beauty salon, SPA salon, etc. are not only about external beauty, but also about health, and above all mental health.

If you want to get to know a person, take a trip with him

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Hello, dear parents, I have already written about. Today I will teach you how to correct a child’s low or high self-esteem - that is, to form an adequate self-esteem in the child.

To begin with, I’ll tell you about a very interesting experiment that clearly reveals the importance of children having adequate self-esteem.

In one of the Moscow schools After a series of tests, 2 groups of junior schoolchildren were selected. The first group included children who had an adequate assessment of themselves, the second group included children with low self-esteem of their abilities.

From these two groups, 2 classes were formed.

In the first grade, children (whose self-esteem coincided with actual capabilities and successes) were distinguished by cognitive activity, good spirits. They boldly chose difficult tasks to solve and believed that they could cope with them. During the lessons, they were not only listeners, but also actively participated in discussions and expressed their opinions. Criticism and objections from classmates and the teacher not only did not infringe on them, but, on the contrary, encouraged them to understand the issue more deeply. A bad grade did not put them out of action, but motivated them to take action aimed at correcting it.

In the second grade (with children with low self-esteem), students were characterized by passivity, timidity, and lack of confidence in their knowledge, even when this knowledge was completely satisfactory to the teacher. Increased anxiety and suspiciousness forced them to remain in the shadows. They tried to avoid the possibility of being evaluated, they themselves did not raise their hand to answer the teacher’s question, even when they undoubtedly knew the answer to this question.. Perceiving themselves as unsuccessful and incapable of defending themselves, they were afraid of those who, in their opinion, were “stronger”, teachers, parents.

This is the picture. I think she answers the question? Why do you need to correct inadequate self-esteem? So let's get started.

How to improve a child's low self-esteem:

1. The “I see you” method.

When parents are interested in their child's life, the child feels loved. I have already written about how an indifferent attitude towards a child leads to a low assessment of himself.

Agree with the fact that You always pay the most attention to what you value most.. If you pay more attention to your child, he will feel more valuable.

Listen to your child, ask him how his day was, ask for details, respond emotionally to his story, laugh, groan. When we listen carefully to a child (and even an adult), his self-esteem grows, that is, his self-esteem grows.

Moreover, such listening creates a special level of trust between you and your child. He will begin to confide in you about his secret experiences and tell you about his innermost being. You will know what is in his soul, you will be able to get to know and understand your child better.

2. The method of “positive expectations”.

When you tell your child, “I believe you can do it,” “you will get better at it with time,” you encourage him to believe in himself. You create in him a desire to make more efforts than would be the case if the child did not hear these words of your support.

There is an important point here. In no case The method of “positive expectations” should not be confused with the method of “inflated demands”. If a child feels your pressure, your categorical expectation of outstanding success from him, as a condition of whether you will be satisfied with him or not, this will have the opposite effect on his achievements.

Try to convey to your child the fact that you love him and are proud of him in any case, regardless of his successes or failures.

3. Family democracy.

What is important here is not such an aspect of democracy as freedom of speech and freedom of choice, but a respectful attitude towards the child’s opinion, the ability to listen to him, and take him into account.

If you want to raise your child's self-esteem, if you want him to be confident, involve him in discussing family matters. Let him contribute to decisions that are important to the family. Where to go on vacation? Which car is better to buy? Let him not just make an assumption, but also try to justify his proposal. Treat his reasoning with respect - let him feel that his opinion is important, that he is a person who is taken into account.

This will help him in school life and will directly affect his academic success.

If you treat children as meaningful and intelligent, they will surprise you with the extent to which they can be insightful and wise.

Ask your child what he thinks about this or that matter, ask for his advice - this will increase his self-esteem and self-esteem. And you will receive an impartial view from the outside and often really wise advice. Do not forget that “through the mouth of a child the truth speaks.”

4. Create “success situations.”

The more often the child will feel successful, the more he will try, and the higher his achievements in life will be.

The task of parents is to create this very “success situation” for their child.

You probably know what your baby does best. Give him tasks that he can do - but not too easy, but such that he will get a good result if he puts in a little effort. And when he succeeds, mark it with praise, pay attention to what worked best.

Board and outdoor games help with this; you can slightly give in to your child so that he wins, but not always. In some cases, he still has to lose, but only after he was in the lead almost the entire game and only lost ground at the end.

How to reduce inappropriately high self-esteem.

If it so happens that your child, like the “star boy” from the fairy tale of the same name, considers himself the center of the universe, and that the world revolves around him. If he greatly overestimates his abilities, if he is sensitive to criticism as an unacceptable manifestation of disrespect for his person, it will be oh, how difficult it will be for him at school.

Perhaps you overpraised your child, or simply avoided criticism of him. What happened happened. Now it is important to carry out corrective work aimed at lowering self-esteem to a more adequate level.

1. A gentle method of “gradual sobering up”.

Next time, after a portion of the usual praises has already poured into your child’s ears, draw his attention to those aspects of the situation that leave much to be desired. “Oh, how smart you are, you washed the dishes and dried them, thank you for that. But the fact that the whole floor is splattered is not a problem, you need to wipe it off so that the work is 5 (10).”

That is careful introduction of criticism, after praise, a child who is accustomed exclusively to positive assessments will not perceive it as a disaster. This is important to remember - since star-struck children in some cases react aggressively to criticism and can seriously harbor a grudge - we don’t need this.

2. Raising the Bar Method

A child with high self-esteem very often overestimates his capabilities due to the constant “situation of success.”

This happens when parents constantly play giveaway (just to please the child) and set too easy tasks for him. The child wins, the child quickly and easily solves the problem and, based on this experience, comes to the conclusion about his outstanding abilities. If a child at least sometimes fails to win, or if you give him a task that requires some effort from him, he will understand that not everything is so simple. It turns out that there are situations in life when, in order to achieve something, you have to work hard.

3. The "unconditional love" method

It happens that a child clings to his stellar position, that is, he deliberately does not want to adequately evaluate himself, to admit the fact that he did not succeed in something, failed. You use the “method of gradual sobering up”, the method of “raising the bar”, and the child insists that he won (and if he lost, it was only because others played dishonestly), that the task he failed at was stupid, uninteresting, and that he didn’t really want to do it.

Here the fear of “losing his crown” is evident; he is afraid to admit his imperfection. Why? Yes, because he thinks that along with his “demotion” there will also be a loss of his parents’ love.

Parents' task– convince your child that you love him in any case, with all his guts, successes, failures. That he is the best in the world for you.

And that other people are also imperfect, but they are loved. Mom can say she loves dad, even though he leaves his dirty socks everywhere. Dad will reveal the secret that Mom cooks borscht disgustingly, but out of love for her other qualities, he is ready to put up with this cute flaw.

You will see how quickly these methods will give results, how your child will change. How balanced and harmonious he will become. How to improve your relationship with him.

I really hope that this article will help you and your baby be happier and more successful. I will be glad to see questions and suggestions in the comments to the article.

Olga Klishevskaya specially for the site