In my practice as a therapist, I am often asked what it takes to achieve, or to improve our self-esteem. The question is incoherent at one level: achieving self-esteem implies that it exists to begin with! We must feel ourselves capable of doing at least that much right.
Just like with global warming, when I ask, “Okay, so you want to cool the earth, Mr. Gore, but pray tell – what’s the RIGHT temperature?” I will ask my clients, “Okay, so you want to improve your self-esteem, but pray tell – to what level?” I cannot help people who are intent on complete and abiding self-love. To me that smacks of a certain kind of narcissism. Self-acceptance seems to be the better goal.
My first step, therefore, is to establish a proper inventory of what they like and dislike about themselves and then proceed to work on the latter. But … even that is fleeting. We all, ALL OF US, do things from time to time that we wish we hadn’t. Shame is at work in these moments and shame is a good “check” on our behavior. The key is to have a healthy sense of shame. And from there, to accept oneself as an imperfect member of the human race.
Now, plenty of people engage in self-loathing, to be sure, but if we are to pause at look at this somewhat metaphysically, self-loathing implies the existence of an inner self that precisely knows the parts to be esteemed and those parts we wish to work on. Complete self-loathing seems to me to be the antecedent to suicide, but even that that, there is a piece of self-esteem which can assert that by committing self-murder we are doing the “right” thing. Does that make sense?
I am reminded of the various instances in history when greatness was not appreciated in the moment. Think here of Winston Churchill who was more or less tossed out of office … twice! Or, of Amelia Earhart who had to get a job as a social worker because no one would allow her onto the pilot’s chair.
We could list hundreds if not thousands of people, arguably of true and abiding greatness, who were not fully appreciated in their own time. Most of them did not let it get them down. They persevered. They picked themselves up, dusted themselves off, and got back into the game. They knew, at some visceral level, what they had to offer the human race and went on to deliver.
What I have found is that the root of self-loathing is, more often than not, an exaggeration of the rejection by others that all of us feel from time to time. Earhart was rejected. Churchill was rejected. Ronald Reagan ran for the presidency three times before winning. He too was rejected.
So, the question becomes, “Why do you think it’s going to be any different for you?”
The truth is, you will be rejected from time to time. At various points in your life you will not be appreciated as you believe you should be. Not by your parents. Not by your lovers. Not by your bosses, or by your country, or by your own children.
But then again, why should you be? Appreciating you is not their job.
It’s your job.
That’s why it’s called self-esteem.
Expecting, or worse, demanding, approval or recognition from other people is a dead end. It’s outside your circle of control. Are you going to anchor your happiness and self-worth on something as precarious as that? Why, I wonder, would you want to be their prisoner?
No, you must base your own appreciation on the actions you take in service of what you know is right, and of being the person you know it’s right to be.
That appreciation is borne of a proper inventory of your strengths and weaknesses. Pure and simple. Be honest with yourself and stop leaving the plus category empty. That’s complete and utter bullshit. We ALL have pluses and most of the time they outweigh the minuses by oodles.
Stop and take inventory.
