What is self esteem and why does it matter?
Self esteem is defined as an “individual’s subjective evaluation of her or his worth as a person” (Trzesniewski et al., p. 60).
Therefore, if you believe that you are a person of worth and value, you have high self esteem, regardless of whether other people validate your self-assessment.
Self esteem is important because it significantly influences your well-being and happiness.
In fact, high levels of self esteem are associated with psychological & physical health. On the other hand, low levels of it are linked to health complications and depression. (Myers et al., p. 89)
Self esteem also influences the way you perceive the world: if you have low self esteem, you may sense negativity and rejection from others even when they do not actually hold such perspectives (Shrauger & Schoeneman, 1979, in Trzesniewski, et al., p. 69).
Therefore, building high self esteem is essential to promote psychological & physiological well-being and live an overall happier and joyful life.
5 practical ways to improve self esteem
The way other people perceive you, your success/pretensions ratio, your effort, your focus, and your level of physical activity are all factors that influence your level of self esteem.
Thus, to increase your sense of self-worth, it is essential that you work on these 5 aspects.
Let’s explore how.
1. Build a social circle of supportive people
The first step to improve your self esteem is to surround yourself with people who support you, appreciate you, and love you, and to get rid of toxic relationships that make you feel unworthy and underserving.
This is because science has proven that other people’s perception of you has a significant effect on your sense of self-worth.
For instance, according to the dependency model by Murray et al. (2000), your partner’s feeling about you strongly influences your sense of self-worth. If you perceive that your partner is loving and supportive, through time, your self esteem improves. On the flip side, if you feel that your partner does not perceive you positively, long-term, your self esteem decreases.
The same applies to your friends and other members of your social and familial circle: if your peers like you and consider you as a competent person, they will positively impact your sense of self esteem; if they dislike you and generally perceive you negatively, they will diminish it (Fenzel, 2000; Wade et al., 1989).
2. Set better goals and take massive action
According to the classic Jamesian formulation, self esteem is derived from the ratio of successes to one’s pretensions (i.e., expectation of success)(Harter & Whitesell, 2001 p. 3, in Riding & Rayner, 2001).
Thus, based on this formula, if you want to improve your self esteem you either have to:
- increase your successes and/or;
- lower your expectations of success
How can you achieve this?
By setting better and more realistic goals and taking massive action towards them.
Writing down your objectives and setting SMART* goals are both powerful techniques you increase your chances to attain your goals.
In fact, people who write down their objectives are 42% more likely to achieve them compared to persons who don’t write them. (CNBC)
Taking massive action towards your objectives is also critical to reach them. Therefore, cultivating self-discipline is fundamental.
*SMART =specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, time-bound
3) Do your best
Another powerful way to improve your self esteem is to always do your best.
As Jim Rohn says, “self-confidence comes from feeling good about yourself, and one of the best ways to feel good about yourself is, at the end of the day, to know that you poured it on you did your best“.
So, whether you are preparing for an exam or helping a co-worker, always give it all you’ve got!
4) Focus on the things you can control
“Self-esteem can be measured by how much we feel we can control the events in our life versus that life’s events are controlling us”. (Robbins, 2016, p.582)
Thus, focusing on things you can control and letting go of those which you cannot control can significantly improve your self esteem.
Here are a few things you can always control:
- Your words
- Your actions
- Your attitude
- Your focus
- Your effort
- Your energy
-> Focus on them
Here are things you can never control:
- The past
- Other people’s feelings, thoughts, and happiness
- Luck
- Death
–> Let them go
5) Exercise
Finally, research has demonstrated that physical exercise has a positive impact on self esteem on the short term.
Therefore, making physical movement a habit will help you keep your level of self esteem high at all times.
Find a form of exercise that you enjoy and integrate it into your daily routine. Is it yoga? playing team sports? dancing? working out?
Whatever it is, make sure that you do it consistently, so that you can get daily / weekly doses of self esteem boosters.